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Every successful company uses some sort of pro-
motion to influence certain audiences – usually
customers or prospects – by informing or per-
suading them. Reasons for promoting a business
include: increasing visibility; adding credibil-
ity to you or your company; enhancing or improv-
ing your image; and bringing in new business.
The following cost-effective, easy-to-execute
ideas have the power to increase sales in a way
conventional advertising cannot. The key is to
find the methods that are appropriate for your
business, marketplace and professional style.

1. CONTESTS. As one example, a cookware store
decided to sponsor cooking contests. After send-
ing out a press release announcing a competition
for the best cookie or chocolate cake, a mailing
went out to the store+s customers soliciting en-
tries. Food editors, professional chefs and cook-
ing teachers were invited to be judges. Both the
winners and the winning recipes were publicized.
Essay and design contests are also possibilities,
such as a furniture store establishing a prize
for student furniture design. Pie eating, pan-
cake flipping, oyster shucking and grape stomp-
ing contests make sense for restaurants. Den-
tists can hold smile contests, while video ren-
tal stores can stage movie trivia quizzes.

2. NEWSLETTERS. Another good way to promote, par-
ticularly for brokers, banks and business consul-
tants, is through newsletters. They demonstrate
how much you know about your field, and do it in
a low-key, informative way. They help keep your
company high in the consciousness of your pro-
spects.

3. DEMONSTRATIONS. Demonstrations are an option
to attract people to your place of business, show
them how to best use your product, and establish
your credibility. A retail-wholesale fish outlet
holds cooking demonstrations twice a week, fea-
turing a different restaurant chef each time and
attracting substantial crowds. Recipe cards are
even given out. Wallpaper demonstrations, fa-
shion shows, gift wrapping, refinishing and com-
puter demonstrations have all worked well for re-
tailers selling products associated with them.

4. SEMINARS. Often more appropriate for business-
to-business marketing, seminars are the commercial
side of demonstrations. If you hold a seminar,
follow these rules for success:

* Schedule the event at a time convenient to most
attendees.
* Be specific in the invitation about when the
event begins and ends, who will be there, and
what the agenda is.
* Follow up the invitations with personal phone
calls.
* Charge for the seminar to give it a higher
perceived value.
* Follow up after the event to get people’s re-
actions.

5. PREMIUMS. Also called an advertising special-
ty, a premium is a gift of some kind that reminds
your customer of you and your service. There are
thousands from which to choose: key chains, cof-
fee mugs, refrigerator magnets, baseball caps,
paperweights – just about anything that can be
engraved, imprinted, silk-screened or embroidered
with your company name and phone number.

6. SPEECHES. Depending on your topic and your mar-
ket, you might want to speak before chambers of
commerce, trade associations, parent groups, sen-
ior citizens or other local organizations.

7. ARTICLES. Another possibility is to write an
article for a trade journal, reprint it, and mail
it off to your friends, customers and prospects.
This positions you as an expert, and is a partic-
ularly good way to promote a consulting business.

8. BONUSES. If you have a restaurant, give away a
glass of wine with dinner to introduce a new menu.
If you sell to retailers, give them a display fix-
ture with the order of a gross. If you sell of-
fice supplies, give away a new pen with a size-
able purchase. If you+re in the cosmetics busi-
ness, offer customers a free sample blusher when
they buy mascara and lipstick.

9. COUPONS. For best results, the price break
should be significant – at least 15 percent.
This is one of the least expensive ways to de-
velop new trade, and an excellent tool for eval-
uating advertising. However, one theory holds
that coupons draw people who only buy discount
and never become regular customers. So be sure
to monitor the results.

10. DONATIONS. Donating your product or service
to a charitable cause often results in positive
exposure to community leaders, charity board mem-
bers, PTAs and civic groups. While consumer pro-
ducts are desired most, many organizations also
look for donations of professional service time.
If you have a restaurant or a large meeting facil-
ity, consider hosting an event for a charitable
organization. This works best if volunteers for
that charity are potential customers.

11. SAMPLES. No matter what you do to promote
your business, giving potential customers a sam-
ple is an excellent way to attract attention and
make a positive impression. In many cases, it
makes just as much sense to spend your marketing
and advertising dollars on giving out your own
products instead of buying advertisements -
especially if cash is tight. The key is to give
samples to the audience you want to reach, i.e.,
software packages to computer user groups, or
nutritious snacks to health-oriented consumers.
In the food arena, where one taste is worth a
thousand words, firms now exist that test market
new products for large and small companies alike
through in-store demonstrations. A good demon-
stration company not only keeps track of how much
of your product was given away, but also submits
detailed reports on what people said about the
product and how much of it was purchased.

12. FREE TRIALS. If your product is too big or
expensive to give away outright, why not offer
a free trial to qualified customers? Try ship-
ping it out to prospects with no strings at-
tached. Most people will appreciate the oppor-
tunity to try the product, and hopefully many
will like it enough to buy it.

13. FREE SERVICES. If you can+t afford to give
away products, offering your services as a way
of generating new business can also pay off.
For example, if you own a retail clothing busi-
ness, send out a flyer offering customers a
free fashion consultation to draw them into the
store.

14. SPECIAL BENEFITS, RATES OR NOTICES. Smart
organizations go out of their way to make cus-
tomers feel important and appreciated. Frequent
flyer clubs are the most pervasive example of
loyalty-building benefits for customers only,
now adapted by many kinds of businesses. Most
software companies sell program updates to cus-
tomers at discounted prices. And advance notices
about sales or other changes or opportunities can
help cement customer ties.

© 2002 By Linda Elizabeth Alexander

On the Back

1. Print a team’s sports schedule on the back. Fans will keep them handy and keep your name in front of them.

2. Print a special discount offer or coupon on the back. People will keep it because they intend to use the coupon.

3. If you do seminars, print key principals on the back. Your attendees will refer to them later and think of you.

4. Hand write on the back your “unlisted” 800 number. This adds value to your card, making people keep it longer because they don’t want to lose the special number.

Ad Specialties

5. Make the business card the ad specialty: Print your company information on letter openers, CD openers, magnets, pens, highlighters, keychains, mousepads, mugs, luggage tags, and other items that people will keep because they are useful.

6. Attach a business card to an ad specialty: For example, give business card holders as a thank you gift and place your business card in as the first one. Or, have your card designed as a Rolodex card.

7. If you routinely give out seasonal gifts or specialties, attach your business card. Examples: candy canes at Christmas, heart shaped containers filled with candy for Valentine’s Day, or even a sandwich bag of candy with a card stapled to it.

Unique Places to Put Them

8. Tuck them into the product before delivery: If you are a florist, cut a hole in it and tie a ribbon around the flowers and through the business card. If you sell gift baskets, Tuck one inside the basket before delivering it to your customer. The same goes for Mary Kay or Avon Cosmetics – place your card in the bag. You’ve seen how some restaurants staple a menu to their bags for takeout; if you use bags, staple your card to the outside of the bag.

9. Send a business card in every piece of correspondence – letters, invoices, even your electric bill. Sooner or later, those cards will be used.

10. If you are crafty, incorporate them into your designs: embellish them with rubber stamps, or blend them with other art projects. You can also mount them to greeting cards you create and send to customers and prospects.

11.When mailing out information: Take a number 10 envelope, facing you and upside down. Fold the envelope in thirds. When you turn it around, there is a little pocket to tuck your card in. Include it in the mailing. Using a colored envelope makes the presentation even more dramatic.

12. Scan your card in and use it as a graphic for when you exchange links with other websites. The other site can use your graphic as the link.

13. Place them in library books as if you used them as bookmarks. Visit bookstores place them in books related to your business.

Keeping Them Handy:

14. Use them as bookmarks so you’ll always have some readily available if you meet someone at school, in the library, on the bus, or at the park where you like to read.

15. Have your spouse, family, and friends carry some of your cards with them in case they meet someone who might be interested in your product or service.

16. Wear them! Use them as nametags at meetings and conferences instead of the “Hello, my name is …” type of tags.

17. Keep a stack of cards everywhere you might need them – in your car, your jacket pocket, your briefcase, your purse or wallet, in your planner, at home, anywhere you can think of. Then you’ll always have some on hand when you meet a prospect.

When to Use Them:

18. Give them out during your personal meetings when you meet someone new: at your church, your children’s soccer games, at lunch with your friends when someone brings a guest. To be more polite, you could have a personal “calling card” printed up with your information to use in these situations.

19. If you do seminars, have your participants exchange cards with each other. Have them write a compliment about the person on the back before they hand them out. Everyone will have a wealth of contacts; they will remember each other and it will also give participants a boost of confidence.

20. Ask neighborhood businesses if you may display your cards near their registers.

21. Tack them to bulletin boards at supermarkets, restaurants, retail stores and the library – anyplace that has a bulletin board.

22. Give out two cards at a time – one for your prospect or client, and one for her/him to give away.

23. Place some on the table when you leave a restaurant.

24. Agree to mail the cards of other businesspeople in the mailings you do, if they will do the same for you. Your networking circle will grow as your cards are passed around.

How Not to Use Business Cards:

25. Don’t give them to a member of the opposite sex in the hopes that s/he will call you. I have a friend who was told this wouldn’t work. He did an experiment for six months to prove it, and his friend was right! Sadly, not one woman called him. Although he does have a girlfriend now!

26. Some people don’t give out business cards when they meet a prospective client. Instead, they send a follow- up note later with their card enclosed.

Other Types of Business Cards to Have

27. Business card CD-ROM. If you haven’t seen these yet, they are a mini-sized CD that plays in any CD player and has your contact information on it, as well as an introduction to your business.

28. Email Signature. Put your contact information into a signature file for email, along with a link to your website (be sure to include the “http” in order to make it “clickable.”)

29. Vcard. These are electronic business cards that recipients can click on and automatically add to their address books. Do a web search for “vcard” to find software that supports this technology. Then use it in all your emails!

30. One consulting company, which works with designers of products for people with disabilities, prints their cards in Braille. It reminds their clients how they can help them comply with disability laws. It also gets people asking for information.

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Linda Elizabeth Alexander is a business writer and marketing consultant specializing in web content and sales copy. Be heard and understood! Subscribe to Write to the Point, a FREE ezine for business people who want to learn how to write better.

http://www.write2thepointcom.com

One extremely effective method is brand marketing through merchandise. Think about it—before the web existed, how did businesses like real estate companies market their brands? One way they did it was to give stuff away—a marketing trick that is still being applied effectively today. How many pens, pencils, and magnets do you have lying around the house, stuck to the refrigerator, placed behind your ear—wherever—that bear some company’s logo or name? If you have ever worked in an office environment doubtless you would have noticed several different slogans on a hodgepodge collection of pens (some that might even still work) and pencils collected over time from seminars, informational fairs, trade events, etc. Brick and mortar businesses are doing it, so why aren’t you?

If you don’t want to market your website on writing utensils or magnets you have several alternatives. Other products that work well for marketing include coffee mugs, travel-and-go cups, mouse pads, bumper stickers, key tags, and stress balls. Let’s not forget another great place to show off your website—on your body! No, I’m not talking about taking drastic measures like tattooing your company URL on your forehead. Clothing advertisements are the name of the game. Clothing is a wonderful way to advertise your website, especially if you have a funny slogan or eye-catching logo. You can have your website address printed on hats, shirts, umbrellas, tote bags, and all sorts of wearable accessories. The best thing about advertising on clothing is that the advertisement is mobile—it goes wherever you go. The next time you get dressed to go out why not wear something that promotes your business? Don’t forget that you can give away things as well—imagine a hundred walking billboards for your website!

There are plenty of companies that will apply your brands to products. The cost is cheap and the rewards can be high, so what are you waiting for? Look through your local phonebook or do an internet search for companies that print to merchandise and then go get branding!

Copyright 2005 Jon Castle

This article can be reprinted freely as long as the author bylines are included.

About the Author
We are each a single drop of rain strafed by the wind to merge with other droplets and thereby form an ocean. For more unconventional home business wisdom, home business opportunities, and more please visit Jon Castle’s website www.AmericanHouseDad.com.