Sandy is a highly motivated business owner. She comes up with fabulous ways to market her business. While others may be standoffish to merging their marketing efforts with other businesses, Sandy aggressively pursues them.
As an independent beauty consultant, she recently contacted a successful restaurant owner in her neighborhood in and effort to woo the female patrons for her upcoming Mothers’ Day promotion.
What Sandy saw was the perfect place to find her target market and the best opportunity to win the restaurant owner over to her way of thinking. This out-of-the-box thinking is just the sort of thing that ensures Sandy’s successful business growth.
Sandy’s proposal is to offer a flower and a card for a complimentary facial to each female patron along with a chance to enter a drawing for a combination of a special basket of products from her and a gift certificate for dinner for two from the participating restaurant owner.
Then on Mother’s Day, Sandy will approach each lucky lady, introduce herself on behalf of the restaurant and let her know that she wants to honor her on her special day with a beautiful flower and an invitation for a complimentary facial. Then she mentions the beautiful gift basket that the woman may have noticed as she entered the restaurant and hands her an entry to fill out so she can enter the special Mother’s Day drawing.
To close she would mention that the winner will be notified by phone and state, “Happy Mother’s Day and thank you for celebrating at the name of the restaurant.”
Then the following week all Sandy has to do is call to schedule the complimentary facial and let the lady know she can have a few friends join her if she would like.
Once scheduled, a quick reminder and note of thanks is sent out to her with a free sample. This further solidifies the appointment and makes the confirmation call, a couple of days before the facial, that much more pleasantly received. This is certainly a win/win/win all the way around. It’s just that simple to come up with a unique marketing approach.
Here is another idea that you don’t even have to leave home to take advantage of. Often there are online events that are looking for speakers and/or donations that you can participate in. An added benefit comes from the increased activity and promotion campaign launched and totally done by the organization and their members.
A good example here is a well-established group like the popular WINning Sisters organization. Each year they host a bi-annual Fling. This event is open-to-all and both fun and informative. The Winning Sisters is a not-for-profit group. Their membership consists of women entrepreneurs from just about every nation and country in the world.
Their Fling events are the perfect opportunity to meet a group of small and medium sized business owners. You can share in the wealth of knowledge provided by their special guest speaker and win valuable prizes. Each event brings together a worldwide following, as well as a flurry of activity. This is a unique opportunity for you to market your business for a small donation.
When these types of events become available in your niche market be sure to take advantage of their increased traffic and boost your bottom.
Another event idea is to offer yourself as a speaker, pro-bono. Many clubs and organizations both online and offline are in need of speakers for their meetings. If you don’t know where to begin or need some instruction on public speaking you might consider picking up a copy of Felicia Slattery’s latest eBook, “Cash In On Speaking”.
Do you already have the skill and knowledge and need a place to share? Figure out your niche and Google for organizations or networks. Begin by joining social networking sites like FaceBook, MySpace, and Ryze. Then search out your target market and offer your services.
Are you looking for offline ideas? Check first with your local chamber or senior citizen center. Then venture forth through club listings in your local yellow pages. Another terrific resource of club listings can be found in your small, local newspapers and publications.
These are superb sources as they list not only the organization name but the type of speaker and topics they look for is listed in their event notice.
I hope I have given you at least one idea that you can and will utilize. Think about teaming up with other business owners and create y our own WIN/WIN marketing campaign.
© Copyright 2008 Ginger Marks
Author's Bio
Ginger Marks is the founder of DocUmeant, We Make YOU Look GOOD! For more information, visit www.documeant.net/. Her book Presentational Skills for the Next Generation, now in its second edition, is available through both Amazon & Lulu. Currently Ginger is the magazine layout professional for Girls Who Network Lifestyle. She also offers a wealth of knowledge through her ezine Words of Wisdom available on her blog gmarks.wordpress.com/
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