Febuary 2004

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- by: Stuart

Back in my college days, I attended a one day business seminar. The seminar was titled, "How to Get More Customers Who Will Give You More Money More Often." Catchy title, don't you think?

The keynote speaker was a local marketing "expert" who had several decades of business experience. The speaker began the seminar with the following question: "What are you in the business of?"

Somebody in the audience raised their hand and said, "Selling tires."

"Wrong!" the speaker responded. "Tires is what you sell, but not what you're in the business of. Who thinks they know?"

Somebody else said, "Making money."

"Wrong!" the speaker yelled again. "That's getting closer, but you still haven't figured it out yet."

Apparently, none of the small-business owners that were attending that seminar that day had any idea what they were doing, because nobody knew the answer this speaker was looking for.

Finally, he decided to tell us what it was that we were in the business of: "Marketing!"

I thought about that for a long time. I began to realize how true that statement is. It doesn't matter what product or service I was selling. What truly mattered was how I marketed the product.

In order to get a person to buy your product, you need to tell them why they should buy your specific product or service, and why they should buy it from you.

So, exactly how do we flip the magic "buy now" switch in a consumer's head to the "on" position?

One of the largest mistakes people make is to think that what flips the switch in a consumer's head is having the lowest price. That is one of the biggest mistakes made by business owners today! By lowering your price, you are simply eating into your own profits!

"To Save Money" is actually one of the lowest in the list of reasons why people buy something.

There's a local computer-store chain where I live here in Utah. I know the owner personally. He doesn't have a business plan. He doesn't know what he's going to do one month from now. But he does well over $2 million dollars in sales each month!

Here's the kicker: I can build comparable computer systems by buying parts from a computer store, not a half mile up the street from his store, for nearly half the price!

Despite the fact that this computer store owner has the highest prices in the state, he sells more computers than nearly all his competitors combined! What does he know that his competition doesn't?

The answer can be found in the psychology of the human mind. As master marketers have discovered, everybody is different, but almost everybody has the same basic needs and/or desires.

Next month, well start talking about those needs and desires that will help get you well on your way to making the sale!