Do you have the feeling that Black Friday is all about ridiculous discounts and unmissable giveaways?
If you do then it is not your fault – it is simply because most of the people making offers on black Friday have little or no understanding of marketing and just discount as much as they can! – Especially those that start the offers a week early and run over by a week or more too!
Black Friday is just another excuse for a Flash Sale, unlike other times of the year, where we have holidays and other occasions to hang a promotion on, this time of the year it is scarce. The marketing idea behind a flash sale is it is a strictly time-limited offer and for that to work well you need work hard on the scarcity element. Not on a mega discount.
Rant over.
For many companies, there is not the opportunity to deliver some big discount on their main product. You may have some of the same reservations.
- Don’t have the margin to make such offers
- Don’t have a standard ‘follow-up’ offer to top up the margin.
- Don’t want to set a precedent on price
- Concerned that recent or current customers will demand the same deal
So what is the solution?
Making an offer with increased value is not limited to a discount. Increase the value by increasing the offer.
- Bundle in an upgrade product which few ever take advantage of
- Bundle in training or tutorial videos or booklet
- Bundle an open day or online Q&A
- Upgrade a monthly to annual with a discount.
Upgrade Product
Maybe you have a product that enhances the core offer, but that does not sell very well on its own. Now is the chance to use its value to improve the core offer. This could just be by offering a larger size of some consumable.
You could make a like to like upgrade offer to any customer who purchased in the past 90 days. That will stop them feeling left out.
Training, Tutorial videos or Booklet
What sort of advice would you give if you have an hour with the customer one on one? It is often not possible to even make such an offer in normal circumstances, but think what that time would be worth if you could offer it. £150, £250? – Now all you need to do is record the experience with a budget camcorder or quality mobile phone. Don’t be concerned if it looks a little handmade – In this situation that makes it more authentic. Maybe record it as a role play with another member of staff playing the customer.
Not happy with a video then write down the same conversation and add a few action photos and put it in a booklet.
Make sure you offer this product after Black Friday at a proper high RRP. You can always add it in as a bundle in the future.
Open day or Online Q & A
If people recognise and appreciate your expertise then they will see great value in the opportunity to ‘ask the expert’ You can have questions asked live, or sent in – in advance of the event
Upgrade to an annual contract
if you have monthly or annual contracts then this could be the change to persuade more people to upgrade to an annual contract. You can choose whether it is an annual fee, or just get the commitment for a 12-month renewal. If your product is more long-term then you could go for a 24 or 36-month commitment.
Such an offer can still apply to existing customers too.
Remember this is a scarcity offer.
Keep strictly to the time limits you set. You could even boost this with a limited stock.
Photo by Léonard Cotte on Unsplash
