Half a loaf is better than none
by Andrew Shedden
"Half a loaf is better than none." This is one of those old sayings easily applicable to marketing. Many business owners overlook a highly effective and simple way of getting more bread. The question you really need to ask yourself is whether you want 100% of a dinner roll or 50% of the world’s largest submarine sandwich. Few business owners I know would turn down more dough. (I know. I know.)
Many business owners spend enormous sums of money in an effort to reach prospects within their target markets. The fact is most prospecting activities will likely result in a predictably dismal 1% to 2% response rate. If you’re lucky you’ll receive business from a small fraction of these prospects.
If this is a one time promotional mailing or it doesn’t get into the hands of your intended recipients the results are more likely to be zero. This is a slow, expensive, and disheartening way of building your business.
Get sales rolling...today
You can quickly and easily reduce the time and expense associated with prospecting by obtaining partners and leveraging their established client relationships. Partners have spent years of time and thousands of dollars establishing their customer base. They have the contacts and credibility you need to quickly fuel tremendous growth in your business.
This practice is known as joint venturing and is used throughout the business world. Some of the largest companies in the world are involved in joint ventures. You can quickly and easily do the same in your business.
Having your partner’s sales force introducing your products or services to their clients is a form of joint venture relationship, as is having your company’s offer sent with one of your partner’s account statements.
Before you call
Joint ventures work best when you can clearly illustrate the benefits to your potential partners. Before you contact prospective partners you need to do a little bit of homework.
You must have testimonials and references to establish and reinforce your credibility with your prospective partner.
You must indemnify your partner and offer their clients an ironclad guarantee. Remember that they’re putting their company reputation and credibility on the line.
You must offer your partner’s clients a special deal or incentive as one of your partner’s valued customers.
You’ll create all of the marketing materials subject to their approval.
Their level of participation (and profit share) is strictly up to them. Some companies want a high degree of profit, others want the bare minimum. They may only be endorsing your company with a mailing to their clients. Alternately, they may be sending out an e-mail blast to their client list. Perhaps they will have their sales force directly selling your products and services to their clients.
If they are strictly doing a mailing to their clients you can offer to pay for all marketing materials, printing, and postage or make other arrangements.
You need to be willing to have all orders routed through them for verification purposes.
They need to be guaranteed payment from you. You may need to let them collect the money from the sale. Alternately you can have money deposited to a special trust account with payment instructions.
What you need to do
1. Find a company that is already servicing your target markets and is selling a non-competitive but related product or service.
2. Contact them and ask them to introduce your product or service to their customers.
3. Offer them a share of the proceeds or percentage of the profits or an equivalent charitable donation for each sale made by them.
4. Show them how they can more greatly profit from their existing customer list with minimal effort.
With your joint venture partners in place the sky is the limit.
