Offers that Turn Lookers into Buyers

by Marcia Yudkin

If you're getting only a sluggish response for a product or 
service that people genuinely need, wake buyers up by 
spicing up your offer. I've seen losing propositions become 
winners with these kinds of changes, which in most cases 
cost you nothing:

1. Guarantees. With a strong, simple guarantee, you can 
overcome the doubts of people who have not done business 
with you before, and calm down worriers who don't act when 
they can think of too many "what ifs." The guarantee does 
not have to promise a refund. Someone hiring an 
exterminator service wants those darned critters out, not 
their money back. "We guarantee you'll be pest-free for a 
year, or we'll come back and spray again for no extra 
charge" is the thing to promise them. Direct-mail 
professionals tell us that a one-year guarantee sells 
better, with fewer refund requests, than a thirty-day 
guarantee, and a lifetime guarantee does even better.

2. Package deals. If you sell office supplies, you might 
think that folks going back to school know how to select 
what they need. Perhaps, but why not make things easy for 
them -- and more profitable for you -- by shrink-wrapping 
three spiral notebooks, two packets of pens, a pocket 
calendar and several semi-necessary items together in a Back 
to School packet? This often persuades people to spend more 
than they would on separate items.

The same principle applies to services, where you can 
mobilize people who shy away from hourly fees with fixed-
price bundles: only $350 for a will and a consultation on 
estate planning. A name makes your bundle more appealing: 
$150 for the "Get Organized Special." 

3. Premiums. Try rousing sleepy customers with bonuses -- 
spend more than $100 and receive a free whooziwhatsit, which 
isn't available any other way. One mail-order company 
offered a free booklet with any order from that catalog, and 
received 13 percent more orders from that catalog than 
previously. Similarly, frequent-buyer programs have now 
spread far beyond airlines, because they work. If 
convenience-store patrons have a card to buy nine cups of 
coffee and get the tenth free, they're more likely to 
consolidate their coffee buying rather than buying sometimes 
here and sometimes there. 

4. Payment terms. When you let clients know they can 
spread payments out over two or four months, you'll snag 
some wavering over the money issue. But changing payment 
terms doesn't necessarily mean you get your money later. I 
know speakers and consultants who offered a 2 or 5 percent 
discount for payment in advance, and received their money a 
whole year before they would have otherwise!

With any new offer, test, test, test. You can't know any 
other way whether "Buy one, get the second one free" works 
better or worse than "Buy two and each is half price." 
Human beings are illogical creatures, and unexpected offers 
can turn this fact to your advantage.

The above is adapted from "Secrets of Mouthwatering 
Marketing Copy" by Marcia Yudkin, available from 
http://www.yudkin.com/mouthwatering.htm . Marcia Yudkin 
<marcia@yudkin.com> is the author of 11 books, including 
Persuading on Paper and Internet Marketing for Less than 
$500/Year.