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Dear Business Owner,
In the current economic climate, in order to attract customers, many businesses think ‘discounting’ – 10%, 20%, 30%, 40% and even 50% (or more) off.
What this does to your bottom line and profits is horrendous. And while cash flow is important,
there are other ways of generating cash rather than going head to head with your competitors in the discounting battle.
Once you get known as a discounter then it’s often hard to regain lost ground since your customers will see you as such and simply wait for the next round of discounting rather than paying full, or near full price.
One of the best ways to avoid this trap, but at the same time boost business, is to
ADD VALUE with rewards which, although the value perception is high, (often very high), the actual cost to you, the business owner is low.
In a perfect world the value of the reward will be such
that it is not inconceivable that customers might purchase your goods or
services as much for the reward
(which they can’t get elsewhere) as for the actual item itself. It has happened
before.
One offer proven to meet this test is
Free Hotel Accommodation, where the perceived value is very high and can easily top £1,000 or more.
We currently have an exceptional offer that features over 200 hotels throughout England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, the Republic of Ireland and the Channel Islands. The hotels are offering
up to 7 night’s free accommodation
for two people on the basis that guests pay only for their meals.
The offer is made even more attractive in that for the very first time there are now THREE certificates in each booklet rather than one. This means that the recipient can take THREE separate breaks of up to 7 nights during the life of the booklet or go on an extended holiday staying at different hotels along the way. Look at the immense perceived value.
For example, 7 nights free accommodation that normally costs £125 night comes to £875. Since there are three certificates, the value of accommodation used can easily exceed £2,000. Why wouldn’t a customer spend say £50 with your business in order to receive up to £2,000 or more worth of free hotel accommodation? And the cost to you could be as low as £2 per booklet. Major brands to have used this type of promotion include:
You may ask how can hotels afford to do this – and why should
they? The answer is very simple.
Most hotels know that at any given time of the year they are likely to
have a certain vacancy factor. It could be 10%, 20% or 30%. Once a
particular night has passed you can never ever sell that night’s
accommodation again. It has gone forever. On the other hand the hotel
has fixed costs in the form of rent/mortgage, taxes, staff and
utilities. These need to be covered.
The cost of servicing a room may take 20 minutes of a chambermaid’s time
(£2.50) plus linen changes when a guest leaves. The actual cost of food
for breakfast / dinner may come to £7.50 (staff wages are a fixed cost
and already in place). Add this to the earlier cost and you have a
maximum servicing cost of say £10-£15 per room night. On the other hand,
breakfast and dinner may come to a perfectly reasonable £30-£40 (£10 for
an English breakfast; £20-£30 for dinner). If there are two people
sharing the total combined breakfast / dinner cost would be £60-£80.
The hotel, whilst it might be losing say £100-£150 in accommodation
costs, is at least gaining a reasonable margin on the food and at the
same time introducing the property to a couple who, assuming they have
an enjoyable experience may choose to return at a later date as a paying
guest, not to mention recommending the hotel to their friends.
It is also important
that the hotel appears to be reasonably well occupied in order to
create the right atmosphere. And if it means giving away a certain
number of free beds in order to create a buzz, then the price is worth
paying. Better that it is
your
customers who are getting the free accommodation and NOT your
competitor’s!.
Here are a few more hotels that are participating in this offer:
Marketing Scenarios
The following are some ways in which you can offer the promotion. The
permutations are endless and we’re happy to give suggestions to meet your
particular requirements if you wish
Receive up to 21 nights free hotel accommodation when you [what
ever it is that you require your prospect of customer to do]
Come into our showroom this weekend and test drive the new [car
model] and we'll give you a certificate entitling you and a companion up
to 7 nights free hotel accommodation. You only pay for meals and drinks.
Spend £100 or more on any ring from our current collection and you'll receive up
to 7 nights free hotel accommodation worth up to £500 or more. You only pay for
meals.
Buy one of our new widgets worth £75 anytime before [date] and
you'll get up to 7 nights free hotel accommodation at no cost – other than your
meals.
Join [Name of health club] anytime during [Month]
and you and your partner can stay in one of over 200 hotels completely free of
charge apart from your meals and sundries.
What our Clients Say
IAP Global offers its members property investment opportunities both within the
UK and overseas. Before joining, interested persons are invited to attend a no
obligation property seminar. As an incentive to take part in these seminars we
offer each attendee a
Free Hotel Accommodation directory giving holders up to 7 nights free
hotel accommodation. The promotion has worked very well for us and we can safely
say that one of the keys to our success in gaining new members from these
seminars has been our ability to make available the free hotel offer. We will
continue using this promotion on an ongoing basis.
Tina Halpin, Events Coordinator
www.iapglobal.co.uk
Here are Newbury Leasing we've tried various different ways of advertising and
promotions to give us the all important edge over our competitors. Contract Hire
and Leasing is an extremely competitive market place and finding something for
us to offer our customers as an incentive proved hard; until we spoke to Henry
at Eurocom Marketing. The promotion was extremely successful for us, and so we
re-ran the promotion in January, again giving us a very good return. We've lost
count how many customers have told us that they will be dealing with us because
we are offering something more than our competitors and so this has done exactly
what we wanted it to do. Thank you very much and we look forward to doing
business with you for a long time to come"
Mark Hewitson, Fleet Sales Manager
www.NewburyLeasing.co.uk
We decided to use the Free Hotel Accommodation programme to motivate our
resellers to recommend our products over those supplied by our competitors. We
have been astounded by the response and success of the campaign. We would
happily recommend the promotion to anyone who wants to drive sales (except of
course, to our competitors!).
Phill McGowan, Managing Director, New Media Software Ltd
www.nms-adaptive.com
Pricing
If you would like a sample booklet to try the offer for yourself then we suggest
you order one or two copies. If you subsequently purchase no less than 10
booklets, and refer to your earlier purchase we’ll apply a £10 credit to your
purchase cost.
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Quantity |
Price |
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1 |
£15.00 |
per booklet |
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5 |
£12.50 |
per booklet |
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10 |
£10.00 |
per booklet |
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25 |
£9.00 |
per booklet |
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50 |
£8.00 |
per booklet |
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100 |
£7.00 |
per booklet |
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250 |
£6.00 |
per booklet |
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500 |
£5.00 |
per booklet |
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1,000 |
£4.00 |
per booklet |
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5,000 |
£3.00 |
per booklet |
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10,000 |
£2.00 |
per booklet |
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All prices + VAT. We pay the postage |
Booklets
are available for immediate dispatch. You may also order online by using
this link.
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