You can create more traffic for you and your business without spending
any additional money on marketing. With guerilla marketing, it is more
about out-smarting the competition than it is about out-spending the
competition. Boundless opportunities and countless positive effects on
your business await you when you take advantage of the guerilla-
marketing concept.

Guerilla Marketing is defined as unconventional marketing designed for
low budgets and maximum impact. Guerilla marketing gets you and your
company in front of future customers in the places that they frequent.
Customers today are bombarded with traditional advertising and have
become resistant and unaffected by it. Meaning: it is time to change the
way you market.

Guerilla marketing works when complimentary businesses agree to
come together and take a cooperative approach to marketing their
businesses. There are synergies between companies who serve a
similar customer base. Identifying these synergies and getting to know
one another’s business are the first steps towards creating a lasting
guerilla marketing relationship.

The possibilities are as vast as your imagination. Here are four guerilla-
marketing techniques that you can use to generate more traffic next
week:

1. Thank-You Take-A-Way Packets

A thank-you take-a-way packet enhances your sale, helps validate the
customer’s purchase, and provides a valuable service to your customers
while simultaneously thanks them for being your customer.

The key to the take-a-way packet is to have something that is high
quality and feels like a thank-you gift. It should, by no means, represent
a selling piece.

The thank-you take-a-way packet will vary depending on your type of
business. For a high-end retail location we suggest using a small folder
about the size of a half sheet of paper. On the outside of the folder
should be an effective and professional design with the words “Thank
You.” Inside the folder should contain all the relevant paperwork
associated with their purchase as well as all necessary information to
make sure that their after purchase experience is pleasant and well
informed. This information should go on one side of the folder only.

The other side of the folder is where you will put your pieces of value.
Pieces of value can include anything that your customer will enjoy
receiving. Successful examples include, a free appetizer at a local
restaurant, free dry cleaning, a small book on a topic relevant to their
purchase, or a small ad-specialty item from a complimentary business.
The pieces of value will differ depending on the type of business that
you are in. Use your imagination and have fun with it.

These thank-you packets work because every company that is
represented in your packet will reciprocate by including your piece of
value in their packet. Therefore, you are quadrupling your exposure to
customers from complimentary businesses in exchange for giving your
customers something that they perceive as a gift.

2. Website Co-Branding

When you have a strong guerilla partner network, you can use a similar
approach with your website. The group of businesses can link their
websites together in a way that ‘provides value first’. Providing value
first means that the link needs to be positioned in a way that is more
than an advertisement.

A good cooperative link on a website is more than just an
advertisement. It must be something that would interest a customer.
Examples include interesting tips, suggestions, or examples of how the
customer can enhance their experience. For example, having an
interior designer and a realtor provide design tips could add value and
augment the experience of buying a new home.

3. Lunch and Learns

Whether you are a financial planner, a realtor, or a fitness expert, you
have valuable information that people would love to hear about. When
you provide value first and you provide value without expectation of
something in return, a return is exactly what you will get.

Office buildings love food — especially free food. The lunch-and-learn
program is a guerilla marketing strategy that has been proven
successful. The lunch and learn program is an educational lunch
program for an office that would be sponsored by you or your company.
The office personnel would gather and eat lunch while listening to your
talk on something both valuable and interesting. Do not try to sell them
anything; this should be treated as an opportunity to share valuable
information that they can use.

The best contact to set up these lunches is the office manager. Most
times the office will provide the lunch and you will provide the talk. If
they do not provide lunch, you will be able to negotiate for a local
restaurant to provide the lunch for free in exchange for some signage on
the lunch table and their information in your packet that will accompany
your presentation.

Topics will naturally vary depending on your profession. If you are a
financial planner you can give a talk on “10 things you can do now to
guarantee financial security,” “investing tips for the non-investor,” or
anything else that is both creative and interesting. After the mini
seminar, ask “If anyone would like to hear more about (topic), just drop
your business card in the basket at the front.” You can also have a mini-
book prepared on the subject and offer to send it free to anyone who is
interested. You will leave with an established reputation in the field as
well as a small stack of qualified leads with whom you have already
established rapport and credibility.

4. Be A Guest Columnist In A Newsletter

There are networking organization newsletters, non-profit newsletters,
and internal company newsletters. These newsletters are always
looking for guest columnists that will provide a relevant and an
interesting article.

This technique is similar to the concept of the lunch and learns. Seek
out these newsletters and offer to write a column. When they run your
column, you will provide valuable and interesting information. By doing
so you will be getting your name out into the community as an expert in
your field. By having a brief bio at the end of the column, the readers
who have an interest will have the information necessary to contact you
for further information. You may even direct them to your website to
download a small mini-book on the topic where you will capture their
information for proper follow up.

The different types of guerilla marketing are endless and are only limited
by your imagination and willingness to get out in front of people. Guerilla
Marketing is incredibly effective because the rapport that the partner
business has already established with their customer is transferred to
you and your company. When you successfully implement guerilla
marketing into your marketing plan, then your cost per lead will be
significantly reduced while the quality of your traffic will dramatically
increase.

Tom Richard conducts seminars on sales and customer service topics nationwide. Tom is also the author of Smart Salespeople Don’t Advertise: 10 Ways to Outsmart Your Competition With Guerilla Marketing, and publishes a free weekly ezine on selling skills titled Sales Muscle. To subscribe to this free weekly ezine go to http://www.tomrichard.com/subscribe

Tags: equipment, fitness, guerilla, gym, increase, marketing, richard, sales, tom, trafficequipment, fitness, guerilla, gym, increase, marketing, richard, sales, tom, traffic

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You can grow your business through effective community based cross promotions. Leverage your core strengths with that of others and keep your marketing costs in check.

Patricia Fripp and Susan RoAne are buddies, and professional speakers. They both live in Northern California. When they attend an event together, they network, and cross-promote at the same time by giving each other a glowing endorsement.

First, Fripp will introduce RoAne to someone neither has met saying, “She’s (RoAne) too modest to tell you, but” Then Fripp raves about RoAne’s accomplishments. Then RoAne says, “She (Fripp) is also too modest to tell you” And, then RoAne brags about Fripp.

The beauty of this idea is that in a networking situation, someone else tells people how wonderful you are and what you’ve done. Bragging is not necessary. This cross-promotion networking is quite simpleas are most other cross-promotion strategies.

Cross-promotion strategies can range from highly sophisticated with formalized contracts like with the major airlines and certain telephone long distance carriers, to promotions as casual as stuffing your bags with flyers or coupons from another merchant in your community and having them do the same for you. Or, perhaps putting promotional messages on one another’s register receipts?

An insurance agent in my community cross-promoted with a local restaurateur. The owner of the restaurant paid for the printing of the insurance agent’s business cards. The cards doubled as a 20% discount coupon for the restaurant and also had a map to the restaurant on the reverse. The insurance agent gave out several of his cards at every business upon which he cold called. The cards ended up sitting around in many of the businesses for a long time. This was because the cards were seen as a valuable discount coupon rather than another salesman’s business card.

They call themselves the Sonoma County Fine Furniture Association (SCFFA). Eight Northern California fine furniture retailers, all competitors, banded together to survive the recession of the early 1990s through cross-promotion and buying strength. They developed combined events where customers would visit several of the stores to be eligible to win prizes. They promoted each other to their customers within the store, especially if the specific retailer did not have exactly what the customer was seeking. They even printed a combined brochure, including the address and map locations of each member. The front of the brochure said, “People you can trust.” They bought advertising together on the local radio and in the local newspaper. They even dictated to the local newspaper on which pages their advertising would be located. They received impact and results.

Taking the cross promotion idea one-step at a time, consider using the below listed basic publicity tactics by collaborating with another merchant in your community to cross-promote through publicity. Do the events together, and when ever possible use the Fripp/RoAne glowing endorsement idea.

1. Distribute free booklets or reports.

2. Author a book.

3. Publish a newsletter.

4. Submit news releases.

5. Write a regular newspaper or magazine column.

6. Do your own radio show.

7. Get on popular radio & TV talk shows.

8. Become an expert resource for reporters.

9. Welcome new people to your town.

10. Congratulate people in writing when you read about their accomplishments.

11. Give public speeches.

12. Sponsor public seminars.

13. Host power breakfasts.

14. Sponsor local charity or service club events.

Ideas are great, implementation is better. You will want to implement your cross promotion well. To achieve successful cross promotions, you’ll need to develop your process or road map. I suggest these steps:

1. Be clear on what you want to create for yourself.

2. Discover the “What’s In It For Me” for your promotion partner(s).

3. Develop a plan for who does what, especially in the areas of costs and contributions.

4. Explain to your promotion partner(s) the value they will receive. Help them to also have emotional ownership (commitment) in the promotion.

5. Develop a method to measure results.

6. Execute the cross-promotion.

7. Debrief on the value all the participants received.

8. Plan your next promotion.

Use this simple cross-promotion checklist:

1. Who does what?

2. Develop a theme.

3. Explore print advertising.

4. Explore radio advertising.

5. Explore cable TV advertising.

6. Explore direct mail advertising.

7. Explore E-mail advertising.

8. Divide the work equitably.

9. Is everybody going to receive similar value?

The owner of several local Dominos pizzerias suggested this to me. “When you cross-promote with non-profit groups, keep the following in mind:

1. They always tell you what they want.

2. They generally have their hand out without offering much in return.

3. Be sure you tell them what you need.

4. Ask them to do more for you than simply take your money.

5. Always use coupons to assist in measuring results.”

Customer list based cross-promotions are usually quite successful and inexpensive. Generally each merchant expands the reach of their targeted customers two-fold, at a cost of approximately 40% to 60% less than is usually spent on a similar promotion conducted solo. Additionally, each enjoys the credibility of the other. Common direct mail strategies include flyers, postcards, coupons and calendars. Flyers can be printed on both sides for a two-party promotion or several flyers can be mailed in the same envelope.

Cross-promotion is simply common denominator marketing. You find another merchant or business that has similar or overlapping markets and customers. Then you discover a way to work together to do what you already do more efficiently and effectively or cooperatively do something promotionally that neither of you could not pull off solo.

To access helpful additional information from Ed Rigsbee at no charge, please visit www.rigsbee.com/downloadaccess.htm.

Ed Rigsbee, CSP is the author of PartnerShift, Developing Strategic Alliances and The Art of Partnering. Rigsbee has over 1,000 published articles to his credit and is a regular keynote presenter at corporate and trade association conferences across North America. He can be reached through http://www.Rigsbee.com or http://www.EdRigsbee.com.

Tags: business growth, collaboration, cross promotion, marketing, partnering, sales, strategic alliance, valuebusiness growth, collaboration, cross promotion, marketing, partnering, sales, strategic alliance, value

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