Think Out of the Box – Offer a T-Shirt Instead of a Free Report

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We all give away a free report or eBook as a bribe to make people sign up for our mailing lists. And what happens? People don’t even care to get it. They are so used to being served junk or only partly usable stuff that they don’t care about your free offer.

After all – free isn’t really free. They have to give you their name and email, and sooner or later, they know that you’re going to pitch them for some sales.

Nothing is free.

They also have to spend time reading your report, or at least the beginning, until they figure out what’s in it for them, and if you’re really offering them something of value, or just the old rehashed PLR report.

If you plan to offer something of value as a back-end product, why not give away something of real value that the receiver will immediately accept as being a waoooh offer?

And if you at the same time could make them remember you at least once a week?

This can be done, but it has a price, of course. You cannot just collect a bunch of free PLR, or jot down a report in an hour. You must cough up some real money and buy embroidered shirts, T-shirts or coffee mugs, keyrings or something else. It’s not even that expensive. Listen to this…

The Law of Reciprocity

Watch this short video (3:09), and think about the message in it. No, I’m not talking Jew vs Christian. There’s another message I want you to get:

Did you watch it? Did you figure out what the message was? Who felt bad in the end of the video?

Well, in fact they probably both did, but I bet that he felt worse than her, because SHE gave a very nice and valuable present, and he gave cheap stuff.

When normal people are given a present, they want to give something back. It’s in our nature.

This is why we offer something for free to our list. First of all, so they can see for themselves what wonderful things we have to offer, and second, to make them feel like giving us something back (like buying our stuff, just to say ‘thanks’).

And when you give them something they consider of little value (like a sock or a rehashed PLR report, written by some unknown student in a far away country), they don’t feel like giving you anything back. Actually, they will feel that they’ve already given you too much – their time, and their email.

So if you plan to sell something high-priced, you can start out on a good relationship with your prospect by offering them huge value.

Give Away Real Objects

If you can afford the small startup investment, you can make a big difference and really stand out in your prospects eye, by offering them tangible goods.

This place can make several objects on demand, like t shirt screen printing with our own design, as well as other items. I saw a nice Chronicle Spiral Notebook for as low as $1.59.

Of course, doing this would be an investment. You shouldn’t do it, if you plan to only offer $5 reports and your highest traffic ever was 5 visitors in one day. But if you plan on selling higher-priced products, this will work wonders for you.

2 thoughts on “Think Out of the Box – Offer a T-Shirt Instead of a Free Report”

  1. That was a tricky way of presenting your POV. The point was well taken nonetheless. If you give something nice, for free, then you will more likely than not, get something back in return. Thanks for the article.

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