Create a goodie bag

Chandler: I’m not great at the advice, can I interest you in a sarcastic comment?

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Who doesn’t like receiving goodies?

Imagine you’re at a caravan expo. You want one after the pandemic and want to get some sort of trailer you can tow and sleep-in. On arrival at the expo you’re given a bag it has offers, stickers, vouchers, and other useful information from suppliers at the caravan expo.

Say you’re at a farmer’s market. There’s around 25-30 stalls at your local primary school. There’s a range of produce with some stalls performing better than others. You notice that the stalls with more people milling around them tend to have more colourful stalls, a jolly person who is quite chatty and excited to greet potential customers, and is giving away free samples.

Imagine it’s late at night. You don’t feel like going to bed yet you dust corn-chip dust off your television remote and watch a talkshow. You’re watching Timothy Ticklesworth interview Glenn Everydayman. Glenn is that celebrity you like. They’re nodding and smiling at Timothy’s questions and sharing a story about themselves you hadn’t heard before it’s quite funny. Maybe you should see Glenn’s new movie?

What do all of these have in common?

Each of these scenes contain freebies.

The expo offers arrivals swag to help them navigate the event and exhibitors have agreed upfront to offer small items to put in the bag to help the event be successful for all.

The farmer’s market has free yum-yums. You could also argue the jolly person is sharing free expertise onto help people decide if the product is right for them.

Glenn isn’t appearing on Timothy Ticklesworth’s show randomly the movie’s marketing team negotiated hard on length of the preview trailer to be shown, what questions can be asked on the show, whether anything exclusive will be shared, and how long the conversation (and movie promotion) will go for.

Your situation is no different to the caravan supplier, farmer’s stall, or movie actor you’re going to have to create freebies.

The beauty of digital marketing is that freebies are easy to create and provide bait for pitching channel partners.

At the start it is hard to think about what you can give for free as your goal is to sell things right?

Trust there is always a way to do this.

People have access to more information than ever before. Providing something of value first builds trust, helps people learn more about what you’re offering, and sometimes will want to buy more from you.

The fancy term for this is the rule of reciprocity.

But you could just boil this down to giving freebies = good.

Don’t be resistant to this.

I tried helping a comedian friend who worked in a niche that combined music, culture, and theatrics. Their style of humour had a big market but they were hesitant to put their stuff up online. They saw it as giving away something they could charge for.

Don’t make this mistake.

The best comedians will happily wh*re themselves on as many videos, TV shows, and podcasts there is. They understand people need to be aware to buy from them. So the more exposure they get the more ticket sales.

Find ways to give freely. Then increase that. Then spin it in a way that let’s you gift it. Or show it. Or teach it.

If your product is so fleeting and fragile that you’re hesitant to gift any part of it then you don’t have a product.

The next part shows you how you can figure that out.