Promotional Strategies … The Aim of Marketing Is to Sell Without Selling

The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well the product fits him and sells itself. Awesome thought from Peter Drucker. Let me tell you two awesome stories on how successful marketers use promotional strategies to sell without selling. Both are stories that I experienced firsthand.

Promotional strategies … here is the first story:

A landscape gardener ran a business that had been in the family for two or three generations. The staff was happy, and customers loved to visit the store, or to have the staff work on their gardens or make deliveries — anything from bedding plants to ride-on mowers. For as long as anyone could remember, the current owner and previous generations of owners were extremely positive happy people.

Most folks assumed it was because they ran a successful business. In fact, it was the other way around…A tradition in the business was that the owner always wore a big lapel badge, saying Business Is Great!

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The business was indeed generally great, although it went through tough times like any other. What never changed, however, was the owner’s attitude, and the badge saying Business Is Great!

Everyone who saw the badge for the first time invariably asked, “What’s so great about business?” Sometimes people would also comment that their own business was miserable, or even that they personally were miserable or stressed.

Anyhow, the Business Is Great! badge always tended to start a conversation, which typically involved the owner talking about lots of positive aspects of business and work, for example:

• the pleasure of meeting and talking with different people every day
• the reward that comes from helping staff take on new challenges and experiences
• the fun and laughter in a relaxed and healthy work environment
• the fascination in the work itself, and in the other people’s work and businesses
• the great feeling when you finish a job and do it to the best of your capabilities