"Promoting Your Business on CD"

In the Music industry, whenever most independent
musicians release a new recording today, a
certain aspect of their promotion entails their
distribution and giveaway of FREE samples of
their music on a separate promotional compact
disc. This serves as a 'teaser' in enticing
prospects to then go to record stores to buy the
full-length recording.

As 'writeable' promo discs can be purchased
inexpensively at stores such as Wal-Mart, after
which the music samples are copied from the
hard drive to the CD, or by using what is known as
a CD burner (high-speed duplicator), it should
come as no surprise that even the most financially
challenged musicians are now embracing this
invaluable and well proven promotional aspect for
bringing immediate attention to their music.

And, as this method has proven unanimously
beneficial in terms of ease of finance, promotion
and time, there is absolutely no reason that a
similar process cannot also work for your own
business, albeit, a few elements properly
customized (be sure your computer's compact
disc is a "writeable" type, and not simply a
"readable" one).

As such, I am providing a "from start to finish"
outline that you should find very effective, almost
immediately, whether you wish to reach out to your
prospects locally, regionally or nationally.

Hypothetically, let's say you are in the field of
Cosmetology, and own and operate a hair salon.
Though your industry has a ready-made market,
with women repeatedly visiting on a regular basis,
naturally, there is also a fair degree of competition
from other salons in your area as well.

And, as such, you've noticed that your business
sales and clients, have either begun to level off,
stagnate or, possibly, even diminish. What can
you quickly do to maintain and increase your
clientele and, accordingly, your salon's income?

1. Why not take all of the elements of your
business, such as your weekly specials,
information about your salon such as its history,
your web site address, email address, regular
prices, business hours, contact information, along
with the various products and services you offer,
then format them into attractive files and place
them on compact discs for distribution?

Your prospects are certain to be pleasantly
surprised with this new out-of-the-norm promotion
method and anxious to see what surprise awaits
them on the CD.

2. Next, consider all the businesses women might
patronize, such as women's shoe stores, women's
clothing stores, jewelry stores, supermarkets, mall
stores, cosmetic stores, etc. Your goal is to
consider businesses that are complementary to
your own services, yet, are not in competition in
any way.

3. Now, contact the store managers and/or owners,
informing them that you are a fellow local business
owner, and request to know if they will consider
handing out your CD of information to their
customers and/or clients who have computers and,
hopefully, have Internet service. You might even
request to enter into a barter agreement with these
businesses, whereby, you distribute their sales
information as well.

While all contacts you make might not be receptive
to this idea, undeniably, you will acquire more than
a few who will be interested, if for no other reason
than the opportunities to offer their customers a
little something extra and/or to get their own
business information into the hands of new
prospects (your customers) as well.

4. Also, be sure to not only consider distributing
your CDs hand-to-hand on your own, always
having them available on your person ready to
hand out, but also having them available at your
salon to give to your existing and new customers.

5. Another avenue, is to consider doing a local
or regional mail-out campaign. You could simply
contact prospects via telephone and attempt to
qualify them by simply asking if they own a computer
and, if so, that you would like to send them a CD of
info regarding your hair salon and its services.

6. If your budget allows, yet, another method is to
contact an area print publication that specifically
targets women and request if you can pay to have
your CD attached to one of their issues, or
included as an insert.

7. To backtrack for a moment, be sure that your
web site contains a form readily viewable on it so
that when prospects with online service access
your site, your form can readily capture their email
address, as well as their mailing address.

This is vital information that you need in order to
provide your customers with any updates to your
products, services, prices or any other changes
that might occur. And, speaking of the provision
of updates, you should also consider starting a
newsletter for this purpose as well if you have not
yet done so.

Again, you also want to be sure your CD contains
as much vital information for people who don't
have online access although, practically anyone
with a computer these days, also has access.

This aspect of promotion could serve to either
offset and eliminate any print, radio or television
advertisement costs you currently have, or serve
to complement them. Your overall production
costs (bulk rate price and time spent copying files)
on the compact disc will probably be between $.30
and $.40 per unit.

If you distribute, say, 1000 info CDs at a cost of
$400, and gain merely 10% (100) new customers,
I believe you will find that the $400 will be a very
wise and worthwhile investment, not to mention
that you can continue and/or repeat the process
as often as you wished.

And, if you happen to reside in a small rural area,
you could also experience great results by simply
distributing your CD information county-wide, or
regionally.

Again, this promotional analogy is applicable to,
virtually, any business. Further examples include:

1. Auto dealerships working with car parts
suppliers, or vice versa.

2. Lawn services working with lawn mower repair
shops, or vice versa.

3. How about photography services including their
CD of info in their yearly school/student packages?

4. Even in an agricultural community, feed stores
could include a CD of their info in farmers'
purchases.

5. Why not even go a couple of steps farther by
placing audio files or, perhaps, even video files on
the CD as well?

Your audio could include your voiceover giving a
welcome to the prospect at the beginning, and
also serve as a direction to the various business
elements on your disc. Likewise, your video could
integrate animated video for an even more
pleasing experience for your prospective client.

As I stated previously, virtually, everyone, in all
areas of your community has a computer and/or
the availability of online access through friends,
relatives, area schools, libraries, etc. And, the
creativity of any part of the promotional CD is
only limited by your imagination.

So, why not truly give some serious thought to
bringing the marketing and promotion of your
business into the 21st Century? At the very least,
your promotion via CD should certainly get you
noticed far above your area competition.