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Creating Your Own Internet Marketing
Success Story
Part Four: Diversifying Your
Line of Offers
By Marty Foley
Another common element I've
found among most other successful Netpreneurs is that they diversify
their businesses by marketing several related products and services,
rather than one or just a few.
I wrote about diversifying along a central
theme in a report on catalog marketing a few years back (which
applies toward any business). To quote from it: "The most successful
catalogs have a theme. Every offer in them is connected to,
and reinforces, all of the others."
Marketing a line of products and
services that relate to one another - that cohesively fit together
along a central theme - has many important advantages over "one-shot"
sales. Consider the following.
DIVERSITY TAKES ADVANTAGE OF LIFETIME
CUSTOMER VALUE Many are content to sell one thing to a customer,
one time, and forget about that customer forever, only to continue
their quest for new customers elsewhere.
However, a customer is a valuable
asset. The best customer is one that trusts you and is satisfied
with his or her past dealings with you. Since people prefer
to do business with those they know and trust, additional sales
to existing customers meet with less sales resistance.
Your customers are like
gold. You've invested precious resources to acquire them, and
likely had to overcome a bit of initial distrust when they first
bought from your company. If you keep delivering your customers
solid value through related offers, and keep them satisfied
through good customer service, many will be glad to buy from
you again and again, perhaps even indefinitely.
Some marketers that have
calculated the lifetime value of their average customer are
even willing to lose money on customer acquisition, knowing
they can earn all of it back, and then some, in the future.
(Not recommended if you don't know what you're doing and don't
have sufficient capital resources.)
DIVERSITY INCREASES THE LIKELIHOOD
OF A SALE
When you offer a variety of related
products and services, prospects are more likely to find something
they want to buy, buyers are likely to spend more per order,
and previous customers are more likely to become repeat buyers.
NOTE: There is a possible exception
to the above statement: If a customer gets confused about too
many options to choose from, they may not buy at all.
DIVERSITY REDUCES MARKETING COSTS
Since there is no customer acquisition
cost involved in selling to existing customers, such sales are
more profitable than the initial sale.
What's more, because most of your
marketing costs are the same (or nearly so) whether you promote
one product or several, your per-item marketing expenses are
reduced as each new product or service is added to your line.
DIVERSITY REDUCES BUSINESS RISK
If you diversify your line of products
and services instead of putting all your eggs in one basket,
a dip in sales in one area of your business (due to seasonal
variations or other reasons) will have less of an impact. You
won't be totally dependent on a single income stream.
NOTE: Too much diversity
too soon can be detrimental if diving into another project spreads
you too thin and prevents you from getting the previous one
working smoothly.
CONCLUSION
No matter what goal a product
or service is designed to help your clients achieve, or what
problem it's designed to help them solve, there are always additional
related goals/problems within their field (related to the theme
of your line of offers) that they want to achieve/solve. One
of your jobs should therefore be to find out what these are,
and then find or develop other products or services designed
to help your audience achieve what they want.
Unless you stumble across
one of those relatively rare products or services that is enormously
successful on it's own, you will need a line of related products
to make any real money (and even then you can increase profits
by diversifying).
In short, once you've struck "Internet
gold" with one profitable product or service, you can extract
more gold from the same mine shaft, so to speak, by presenting
other related products and services to your prospects and customers.
Article by Marty Foley,
author of Internet Marketing Goldmine: http://profitinfo.com/catalog/v3.htm?rb
His ProfitInfo Newsletter reveals proven, often overlooked strategies
to build your Internet profits now: Subscribe@ProfitInfo.com
Part One: Running Your Online Business
as a Serious Business
Part Two: Marketing Your
Own Products and Services
Part Three: Giving Freely, Before Receiving
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