This is Trumina. She works at the Best Buy in Mount Vernon, NY.
She’s a Free Prize. People come from all over to buy something that without her is just a commodity. All digital cameras from Sony are the same, for example, until Trumina sells you one.
She becomes the Free Prize by breaking all the rules at the store, by telling the unvarnished truth and by going out of her way for people.
It’s not rocket science, but it works.
Yesterday, my dad had his cronies over. Fiftieth high school reunion, and since we’re local, we hosted. It was really fun.
After brunch, I served chocolate covered pickles.
Yes, they were a big hit. Plenty of conversation.
But Mickey did NOT say to my dad, “I’ve got to go out and get me some of these chocolate covered pickles.”
It was a gimmick, not a Free Prize, for the simple reason that it didn’t catch on.
That doesn’t meant that it won’t work for some people. It just means that outrageous is not remarkable and not everything weird is a free prize.
The free prize is just a gimmick until it becomes the thing that people talk about.
Putting my book in a cereal box (Seth Godin :: Free Prize Inside) is nothing but a gimmick, of course, until people start putting the cereal box on their desk and then using it as a way of starting a conversation about the book. Then it becomes just as important as the book itself. Sort of like frequent flyer miles.
When was the last time you shopped there? Last year, more than 85% of all Americans did, with almost 50% doing it weekly.
If that’s not you, you’re not getting the massive thing that’s happening.
They sell 30% of all the Tide that gets sold. 30% of a lot of other stuff too. They have a huge share of their sales in private label goods, and it’s getting bigger all the time. Why? Because they’re C H E A P.
So…
If what you sell is an average product for average people, tell me why those people won’t try to find it at Walmart. And if they try to find it at Walmart and there’s a private label or a competitor that just as average, but cheaper, why won’t they switch?
The lesson of Walmart (for consumers) and the web (for business AND consumers) is simple: If it’s not worth crossing the street for, you’re in a commodity business. And if you sell a commodity, you don’t deserve a profit. Trying hard doesn’t count.
The profit comes not from making your profit marginally better (because no one will notice marginally better, because people don’t care about you). The profit comes from finding a free prize and offering it to people.
After more than two years (really?) of posting my own blog, here I am on Todd’s, guest blogging to flog (flogging on a blog…) my new book, Free Prize Inside.
It’s a very weird feeling. Sort of like house sitting, but worse. I don’t want to break anything, don’t want to rearrange the furniture or leave my socks in the washing machine.
Hey, Todd, thanks for leaving a full fridge…
One week from today, we’ll start the Business Blog Book Tour here with Seth Godin and Free Prize Inside.
Mark it on your calendar.
I am really excited to announce that the third Business Blog Book Tour will feature best-selling author Seth Godin and his new book “Free Prize Inside“.
What’s the Free Prize? Seth started to answer the question with this entry from his blog.
The tour will run from May 3rd to May 14th and you can find details about the tour this page.
Since we just finished the book tour, I thought I would give you some more potential reads.
Here is a list of books that Ben and Jackie recommend at the end of their Discussion Guide.
I want to thank Ben McConnell and Jackie Huba for sharing their thoughts on Creating Customer Evangelists.
I also want to thank all of the tour stops for their time and their hospitality.
If, for some reason, you haven’t purchased the book yet, go buy it now. This is the newest Essential at A Penny For… and I strongly recommend it.
Ben and Jackie have also written the Creating Customer Evangelists Discussion Guide to go with their book. It is great for using with a team as you build evangelism into your business.
Next week, we’ll be announcing the next book for our May Business Blog Book Tour.
Stay Tuned.
Q: Since this is a book tour, how would you tell a bookstore to create customer evangelists? How does a distributor create evangelists for other people’s products?
For bookstores, one model is City Lights, the legendary San Francisco hub in the Haight Ashbury district. It has a colorful history, a distinct political viewpoint and a rich selection of works from beat poets. In other words, it has a well-defined cause — the expression of a liberal political and artistic viewpoint via its inventory. It’s not for everyone, but it’s a Mecca for many people, both locals and tourists. Because it’s a Mecca, it is rich with evangelists.
Conversely, big-box stores try to be all things to all people. Just as the television networks are being marginalized by specialized content on cable, so goes the possible future of mass-audience bookstores. If they compete merely on price, they’ll lose to Amazon, which has thousands of evangelists for its selection, low prices, and ease of use. That’s where a bookstore experience really matters.
During our U.S. book tour last year, we did many talks and signings at Barnes & Noble and Border’s stores, and we loved meeting their hard-working and friendly employees. Those two companies have led the way in adapting the Starbucks model of a comfortable place of community, but with no disrespect intended to our many friends there who carry our book, they’re akin to McDonald’s in their sameness. How does the typical customer define the difference these days between Border’s and Barnes & Noble? It’s nearly impossible.
A distributor, like any B2B company, differentiates itself by its service. To generate healthy evangelism, the employees at a distributorship must believe in the products they’re selling. If they don’t, find something else to sell because your lack of authentic belief is easily telegraphed.
Second, a distributor must focus on creating emotional connections with customers. A distributor may not own the products, but it owns the customer. The connection must be so strong, and the service so valuable, that a customer would be heartbroken for switch. Some B2B companies may say their customers purchase on price, and only price, but try telling that to Southwest Airlines, which competes in the commoditized airline industry yet leads all of its competitors in word of mouth, top-line growth and profitability!
Q: I am a big believer in measurement and how they drive behavior. You mention over 30 potential measurements of evangelism. Where would you tell a company to start as they try measuring their current level of customer evangelism?
A: Excellent question. Here’s how we suggest an organization approach customer evangelism measurement:
Task 1: Strive to ask 100 percent of your customers “How did you hear about us/our product/our service?” An excellent response rate is at least 90 percent. Here’s why it matters: Build-A-Bear Workshop knows that 50 percent of its business comes from word of mouth, 40 percent from walk-ins at store locations and 10 percent from a aggregate group of various sources. As a result, the company smartly focuses its marketing on word-of-mouth.
Task 2: Cull the following measures from your most loyal and enthusiastic customer evangelists:
* What do they say, specifically, about your company/product/service? (Knowing their specific, word-for-word pitches should help you adjust your own marketing)
* How many networks do they belong to? (They can help you find more people like them inside their networks)
* Who are your top 10 evangelists in terms of generated referrals? (Think about developing a special “insiders” program for them)
* Who are your top evangelists for purchased products/new business?
Task 3: Ask as many customers possible if they have referred you — yes or no. Forget measures such as purchase intent or brand awareness; they’re useless because they don’t measure action. Ask customers if they have actually referred you to others. Whether the answer is yes or no, develop a series of follow-up questions to understand why.
Q: Talk a bit more about the two books that you recommend at beginning of your book, Customers.com and Futurize Your Enterprise. What did you like so much about those two books? Would you still recommend them?
A: When it came out in 1998, both Jackie Huba and I loved “Customers.com” because it presented a vision for ecommerce that was customer-centric, not design- or brand-centric. Unfortunately, too many marketing directors believe that a website is more about maintaining an image than providing real utility or function. The book was, and still is, a brilliant treatise on delivering an Internet experience that’s driven by a customer’s experience.
We both loved “Futurize Your Enterprise” because author David Siegel evangelized how the Internet was going to change the world. Even though the book was published in 1999, the chapter on “The Truth Economy” still resonates today.
If you have missed some of the BBBT, you can go the CCE tour page. I have compiled an index of the links from all the stops.
I also have the same setup for our last tour with Barry Moltz.
Enjoy!
Today is the final day of the Business Blog Book Tour.
Ben McConnell and Jackie Huba, authors of Creating Customer Evangelists, will be posting through out the day. We are also going to be cover some different topics.
So, give a warm welcome to Ben and Jackie [applause]…
If you were looking for the BBBT at Startup Skills.com, it seems we have been a victim of lost mail and spam filters.
You can pick up the tour tomorrow with Doug at the Small Business Blog.