Retail fashion is a notoriously fickle business, with yesterday's hot trends marked down today like so many Pokemon toys. But for years, Gap had been impervious to fashion ups and downs by being favorite supplier of favorite clothes of Baby Boomers: Denim jeans, khaki trousers and basic shirts.

But as Boomers hit middle age, Gap made decision to go after youth market. Gone were comfortable fit jeans its customers loved, replaced by hip huggers and belly shirts that could not be worn by someone carrying 20 years of cellulite. And that was beginning of their troubles.

As owner of a home business, I found this puzzling. After all, Gap had always identified youth market as its own and was just carrying out course it set for itself back in 1969, when it was a single store in San Francisco. But as their young customers grew, so did chain, resulting in a clientele that stayed loyal for 30 years. By shifting gears to appeal to *today's* teenagers, they alienated millions of loyal customers who moved on to discounters like Target (which manages to evoke an image of "cheap chic") and newer outlets like J.Jill and Chicco, which proudly display relax-fit clothes that are stylish, comfortable and hide a multitude of middle-aged sins.

In meantime, young people Gap so desperately courted could not get over their image of chain as a place frequented by their parents. These kids flock to their own trendy stores like Hot Topic, and had little interest in what Gap had to offer. It was a "lose-lose" all way around.

The lesson for home business owners is a reminder that it's never safe to *assume* you know what your customers want. Research is an essential tool in your business, no matter what its size, and it doesn't have to be elaborate or expensive. Those of you doing business online have access to several methods, including some tools you may already have but are not using for this purpose.

That's great, but let's turn things around for a minute. What happens when YOU are potential customer?

Guess what? Others will be reading those same articles and trying those same tactics on you! That's ok, I mean, fair is fair, but what can you do to make sure you don't end up being counted among many thousands who feel they were scammed, betrayed, or ripped off?

AVOIDING THE HYPE

Good salesmanship is about showing your potential customers what your product or program can do for them. In other words, it's about expressing greatest potential benefits possible. Notice wording I used there. Good salesmanship is about expressing 'greatest potential benefits POSSIBLE'.

I believe many times when people feel scammed or ripped off it's because product or program did not live up to person's expectations created by those possible great benefits. However, that's not always fault of seller, especially when it comes to network marketing programs.

Running your own business takes work, and no matter how good sales copy for a program sounds, marvelous results will NOT come to pass if you don't do work.

Now, I know many programs claim it takes very little to no effort to be successful. That's HYPE of salesman expressing 'greatest potential benefit possible'. Sure, if you put in enough effort and build a solid downline, day will come when your organization will grow with little effort on your part. That's what hype of a sales letter is hinting at, and it IS potentially true.

However, your job when looking over a product or program is to sort through hype and think about what is really being offered to you.

Ask yourself how much work is really going to be involved and under reasonable circumstances how long will it take to achieve kind of results you are looking for.

It's OK to hype things up a little, and get people excited about potential benefits. If no one did that at all, would anybody ever buy anything? A real scam is defined by outright dishonesty, not expression of potential benefits. You've got to understand that as products and programs are presented to you.

FOLLOWING OTHERS