You see it all
time; someone, somewhere, is offering something free of charge, you might wonder why! You could wonder for a very long time, because there's no one, single reason people give quality items free of charge, in fact there are several. More often than not it's to create confidence, generate credibility, and increase trust between seller and often wary buyer!The Internet is one of scariest places to be, especially when seeing a product you'd like to buy, from someone you don't know and may never have heard of until today, and you probably won't ever get to communicate with seller in person. Difficult choice? Decide to buy, give your credit card number, take a risk?
By giving something useful free of charge you can establish a relationship of trust between you and your prospective buyer. And if you are prepared to do this, go extra mile, while rival companies focus always on Money First, Money Last, And Nothing In Between, you'll win a customer, not just for a day, but possibly for life!
Let's consider a whole host of reasons why offering free information can increase your business success.
- To Raise Funds For A Special Cause
- To Make It Easy For People To Enjoy Some Particular Experience
- To Overcome Resistance To Buying Online
- To Sell a Particular Product For Which The Same or a Similar Product is Available from Lots of Different Sources
- To Gather Names For Your Database
To Explain How to Use Your Product and Therefore Reduce Complaints, Queries and Requests for Refund
- Simply To Sell
- More Reasons to Give a Chapter, Introduction or Text Sample FREE
- To Use The Same Advert To Sell Dozens of Different Products
- To Solicit Testimonials
- To Help Others Sell Your Product
Let us consider just a few of those ideas.
To Make It Easy For People To Enjoy Some Particular Experience
In this case book normally travels free or for a token sum to cover costs. A few examples will illustrate purpose:
• You remember Heartbeat (if you're not in UK, you're missing a great TV series) where Claude Greengrass plagiarized a guide to walks over Yorkshire Moors so guests on his rambling holidays could find their own way around, saving time and energy for him? Well that's an example, albeit a bad one in Claude's case, of publishing a book to help promote some other, usually profit-making purpose.
• In 1930s to 1950s, major UK firms provided all manner of information products to help customers enjoy their product and to hopefully buy from them in preference to rival companies. Oxo gave famous tin container, Homepride flour gave cute caricature set of flour men designed as flour sifters, salt and pepper cellars, and other kitchen paraphernalia. Many more firms gave books and other info products, including Stork and Bero whose recipe books are now collectors' items, and many car makers whose motoring guides and atlases are also worth many pounds each. The idea was brilliant yet even so fell largely out of fashion and today it's quite rare to find such valuable freebies to help customers benefit from their purchase and to poach custom from rival companies. Shame, and an idea well worth resurrecting! To Overcome Resistance To Buying Online
