Businesses spend a lot of money, time, and effort into trying to produce promotions that will attract more visitors to their website or store and bring in potential customers. Some of these promotions work, and some don’t. I spent a couple of years working in the marketing department of Verizon Wireless as an assistant. Part of my job, when I wasn’t creating flyers and posters and other graphic design materials, was to research potential premiums to give away and to come up with potential promotional ideas. Most of the time, we just took guesses based on what worked in the past.
As a small business owner, however, there’s very little room for gambling on such things. When your budget is often whatever’s left over after you’ve paid the utilities and rent for the month, it’s hard to justify spending $100 on something that may or may not attract attention. I began searching for better ways to market our business, to get the attention and attract the clients that I knew were out there. Over the last three months, I have spent a lot of my time and a lot of my efforts learning better techniques for every aspect of our business, and now I’m going to share what I’ve learned.
1. Solve a problem
Your giveaway should solve your customer’s problem in a way that creates a lasting impression on them and encourages them to come back to you for more solutions.
2. Research your giveaway
In this information age, it’s easy to find out what problems your customers have that you can easily (and inexpensively) solve for them. It may surprise you. For example, the idea for How to Write an eBook in 40 days or less came while I was researching other topics. I noticed that people were doing a lot of searching for how to write a book and how to write an eBook. There were almost a million searches a month for variations of that topic, which told me there were a lot of people out there who needed help I could provide. Capitalizing on this, I wrote that eBook and published it, then used it as a tool to drive people to our Facebook page. It’s been our most successful advertising campaign yet.
3. Remember: People love their kids
I probably shouldn’t need to tell you this, but people love their kids. This is especially true for most women. If you want to win the heart of a female customer, you appeal to her through her children. When you seek to create a giveaway that will have lasting value and keep your brand front and center, give them something that will become a keepsake. Offering free pictures with Santa for the Holidays works very well when you’re trying to get customers in the door.
4. Give them something fun to do
There are over 1 million searches a month for things to do for fun. Create a fun activity or a game and use it to bring people to your website.
Brandy M. Miller
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