We recently received a plea for help from an entrepreneur who just started up a consulting business. She was having a hard time getting initial customers. A lot of people who are just starting up have the same challenge–they’re desperately seeking sales.
It’s tough to ramp up sales volume when you’re a new business without a track record, repeat customers or brand familiarity.
But here’s a strategy that you should consider to get your sales jump-started: give it away!
That may sound strange since you’re in business to make money and your instinct is to sell every product (or hour of service) for a profit. In reality, though, who cares if you lose money on some products as long as you make money in the end?
The idea behind giving away a limited quantity of what you sell is to get people exposed to your product, to get them talking about your product and to get them to coming back for more.
If you’re clever in how you use this ‘give it away’ strategy, you’ll be able to generate interest from the local press, giving you a PR kick in the pants, too. You’ll also be able to create written testimonials of people who’ve enjoyed your product.
This is just one strategy to kick start your business. Can you recommend others to the brand new startup entrepreneur?
