Growing Small Businesses

Lesson 3: Getting new business

Presenting your product or service

You can't get any orders if your prospective customers don't know what you're selling. If you select your prospective customers properly, getting prospective customers is hard work but getting orders from them is easy. If you put in less work selecting your prospective customers, it will be harder to get orders. Either way, you have to let these prospective customers know that you have what they need.

The material which you use to inform your customers has three sections. It doesn't matter how you are informing them - whether you're sending them printed material, calling them or running ads. The material has to have the same three sections.

1. The subject
   The subject lets your prospective customers know what they're being contacted about. The subject has two parts.
   • The title is the name of your product or service. It is informative in the sense that it tells your prospective customers the type of product or service you're offering. It should be simple and brief. I offered computer training for managers through one of my companies and my title was simply, "Computer Training".
   • The body of the subject has the main solution that you're offering to this target market. The people who you're contacting are pre-selected to have a need which you can satisfy. This part should summarize the main feature which you're offering in a brief way. If it's funny or catchy, that's a definite plus. When I offered computer training to managers, my body was, "We train computers to do what you want."

2. The description
   The description summarizes what your product or service will do for the members of this particular target market. You know what their problems and needs are - the description addresses each of the problems and needs and gives a short outline of how what you are offering will satisfy each of the problems or needs.

   
   When I was offering computer training to managers, their prime concern was that they had to know how to handle e-mail and they also needed to be able to get and correct letters their secretaries had written, write short memos and get information on the company network. My description addressed each of these issues, briefly and in bullet form, and promised that they would know how to do each of these things at the end of the training.

3. The details
   This section has to let the prospective customer know everything he needs to make the decision to buy and to carry it out. In particular it has to include:
   • contact information for your business;
   • how to order;
   • the cost;
   • the details of how what you offer is going to be delivered.

The idea behind this way of presenting what you offer is to take the prospective customer through a decision making process which will result in his placing the order with you. He will see section 1 and say, "This is interesting." He'll look at section 2 and say, "I need this." He'll look at section 3, go though the details and place his order.

On a flyer, section 1 could be on the cover, section 2 could be seen when you open it and section 3 could fill the rest. For a phone call, you would introduce yourself with section 1 and, if there is interest, proceed with sections 2 and 3. On an ad, section 1 would be prominent, section 2 smaller and you'd have to use an abridged section 3.

Finally, your logo, phone number, e-mail address and web site address should be prominent throughout. Your web site should repeat what you present in your material and should have the same colour scheme and general image. Its function is to re-enforce what you are presenting. This course tries to give general information which will be useful for all kinds of businesses but if you web site is your principal marketing tool, try our recommended resource, "Growing Your Business Online: Small-Business Strategies for Working the World Wide Web," for more detailed information.

Once you've identified your target market your last step is to contact its members in a structured and focused way so that those orders will start coming in. Structuring the presentation of your material so that your prospective customer is taken through a process which will result in his placing an order with you will increase your success rate with the members of the target group and for the success of your business in general.

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