If I showed you a way to make a dollar, would you give me back a quarter?

Originally Posted by Jim Bettke

Let me clarify the question, "What specific actions would you take to increase the sales of any business so that you could get a share in the firms' additional profits?"

For example: Take a jeweller, and describe exactly what you would do for him to build his business. Remember, you are working on a contingency basis - no additional profits - no pay for you!

Your turn,
Jim

Greetings Jim,

Here is some action I would take.

When I think of jewelry, I think of my wife and 4 daughters. They love to look at it, wear it and show it off. So my target market is women and teenage girls.

I would ask the jeweller to give me 10 steps to proper jewelry cleaning. Then I would put together a 10 steps jewelry hotsheet, on the care and cleaning of jewelry, whether costume or genuine.

I would probably call it "10 STEPS TO FANTASTIC LOOKING JEWELRY!"

At the bottom or back of the hotsheet I would have a coupon for a free lesson, at the store, on cleaning jewelry properly or a 10% discount on the purchase of jewelry over $250. Of course address and phone number of the store would be printed on the hotsheet.

Next, I would open the yellow pages, and start looking at the different catagory titles. I would make note of those titles that cater primarily to women and teenage girls. In those particular catagories I would write down their physical addresses.

Once I exhausted the phone book, I would print out my hotsheets, and then one by one I would stop at each location. I would introduce myself and the business I represent.

Then I would ask them if I could leave a stack of my hotsheets on "10 STEPS TO FANTASTIC LOOKING JEWELRY!" and in turn I would offer to give them a free lesson, by cleaning one of their rings and demostrating the 10 steps.

When one of their customers picks up one of my hotsheets, then the person I gave a free lesson to, can give a first hand account of what I do and what to expect when they come to the jeweller for their free lesson.

To make sure there is a valuable incentive in place, for the contact person to want to tell others, I would let each contact person I spoke with and did a free cleaning for, that if they were to refer someone to us, and it resulted in giving a free in store lesson or purchase of jewelry, they would be given a 20% discount on their next purchase of jewelry over $500. That's a $100 savings on their next purchase.

Woody Quiñones
ImpactYourArea.com
PS. At the link below, I have a Seeds of Wisdom New Forum special going on.

I got the store owner to give me the names of 3 of his most influential clients. The first one I contacted was a lawyer and I explained to him that his friend in the jewellery store wanted to offer his clients a great gift. I then showed the lawyer a letter that I had written to 'his' clients that expressed his 'Thanks' for their past patronage. The letter further went on to say that the lawyer was expressing his 'Thanks' with a special $50.00 gift certificate at ABC Jewels.

The lawyer wins because he is actually thanking his clients by sending out the gift certificates. The jeweller wins because he gets an endorsement from an influential third party and gets access to many new customers.

Given the large markup in the jewellery business, the jeweller was only spending between $15 and $20 to acquire a new customer and the majority of the purchases were considerably larger than $50 - often resulting in a profitable sale! The jeweller understands the 'lifetime value of a customer' concept and he knows that these new clients will spend thousands of dollars in his store in the next few years. He is building his mailing list and plans on selling to these customers again and again.

This first promotion was just a test and it was very sucessful. We are working with the jewellers accountant now.

Jim

Wow!
Another of many great ideas that can be only found here.
So many times I come here and find, besides all the great ideas, something that is so timely to my own situation.
I have a situation that I came here to ask about and this thread is so related.
I won't hijack this one but will post a new one.
Thank you.
Larry Foster

You could do a mailing for any business. Start a part of direct mail for the business.

This is similar to the Mike Enlow jv information here:

http://www.enlow.com/jv.html

Originally Posted by Jim Bettke

I got the store owner to give me the names of 3 of his most influential clients. The first one I contacted was a lawyer and I explained to him that his friend in the jewellery store wanted to offer his clients a great gift. I then showed the lawyer a letter that I had written to 'his' clients that expressed his 'Thanks' for their past patronage. The letter further went on to say that the lawyer was expressing his 'Thanks' with a special $50.00 gift certificate at ABC Jewels.

The lawyer wins because he is actually thanking his clients by sending out the gift certificates. The jeweller wins because he gets an endorsement from an influential third party and gets access to many new customers.

Given the large markup in the jewellery business, the jeweller was only spending between $15 and $20 to acquire a new customer and the majority of the purchases were considerably larger than $50 - often resulting in a profitable sale! The jeweller understands the 'lifetime value of a customer' concept and he knows that these new clients will spend thousands of dollars in his store in the next few years. He is building his mailing list and plans on selling to these customers again and again.

This first promotion was just a test and it was very sucessful. We are working with the jewellers accountant now.

Jim

what I was going to give my employer, the school owner. An ad and booklet to give free, "Forging Ahead in Business" I did not give him all the information. But gave him a report in beautiful note book that the bastard kept. When he dies I think the business will die. He is not the biggest school in the area but rather the smallest. I could have made him number #1 or at least #2. But he had tunnel vision. Most people just don't get it. I forgot how it was said in Joe and the Vacano.