Have you ever wondered about different ways to truly excite your customers or business acquaintances? A seldom-used yet highly effective way of doing so is through the “host beneficiary” method. Most people haven’t heard of the term, but when explored, it’s a great way to attract business.
The “host ben” strategy is exciting, because it provides an opportunity to think outside the box, gives you an added advantage to stand out from the competition and promises outstanding results. It really is quite clever, and worth giving a try before more people catch on.
The host beneficiary strategy ultimately gives your business access to the database of another. This immediately causes apprehension in some people, as it’s common to hoard databases and protect entries carefully. But don’t worry – no databases involved are accessed in a malicious way! Complete control over the database can, and usually does, remain the responsibility of its owner.
This method functions so well in part because it offers something valuable to the business through which you’d like to run a promotion. Essentially, the way it looks to the host beneficiary’s consumers is that the appreciative business is offering something to them for free, or at a significantly discounted rate. And best of all, it doesn’t cost the host beneficiary a cent.
So, why is this a good thing? You get to be exposed to another company’s clientele, and can in turn potentially improve the size of yours if people respond to the offer. To maximise its potential, you have to be prepared to sell the benefits of it to the host ben business and prove that it’s a win-win situation. How so? Reverse the favour, of course. Offer to next become a reverse host beneficiary, where you make the offer of the other’s products or services to the members of your own database.
Above all, it’s essential to remember that the potential host bens you target have a profile that matches yours. It needs to make sense for the two of you to partner on such an endeavour. If you have completely different target markets, you’re unlikely to see any returns from your invested time and effort or experience an increase in sales.
Remember – selling to someone one time is a promotion, but selling to him or her repeatedly makes him or her your customers. Have fun with your host ben strategy and you’ll get plentiful well-deserved rewards for trying something different to promote your business.
