Page 201 - 101 Ways to Market Your Business

101 WAYS TO MARKET YOUR BUSINESS

94 The power of free samples

Always have free samples of your work or product on
display. Think back to the last time you visited the local
supermarket and someone pushed a plate of exotic sausages
or cheese under your nose for a free trial. Or at the bottle
shop for the Friday night free wine-tasting. Once again, if
the large companies do this, you can be guaranteed that it
works.

In America it is common to see people handing out
samples of a new product like a chocolate bar or soap
powder on Park Avenue in New York. To the manufacturers
this is a cost-effective and high profile way to reach a lot
of potential consumers within a certain area.

Of course, government regulations may stop you from
doing this in some places, but try it inside your business.
Do you remember going to the local butcher and receiving
a few free sausages or perhaps half a kilogram of the latest
stir-fry mix to take home and try? This type of marketing
is very effective for a number of reasons:

• the customer receives something for free;
• the butcher has introduced a new range that the cus-

tomer may not normally have tried but now they may
include it in the weekly purchase; and
• the customer will come back to the butcher because
they feel important and, to the butcher, they are.

I recently visited the local seafood shop to buy some
prawns. When I walked in the door the very friendly man
behind the counter put a big, juicy prawn on a napkin and
handed it to me. The prawn was fantastic and of course I
purchased a kilo. Everyone that walked into the shop was
given a prawn in this manner and everyone that I saw
purchased at least one kilogram of prawns.

I recently met a young man who had started up a
courier business. He was charging the same price as the

186