June 17, 2023
Canmore, Canada
“Come to the market...look for my beige/blue hat & rust jacket!”
(Can’t read the full email – click here for the online version.)
Like communities around the world, our town has a weekly market
of artisans and food vendors offering a wide variety of goods, many hand-made by the vendors themselves. We like to go regularly to taste a new delicacy and check out the wares.
This week was the first time I’d gone in a while. As always, it was a wonderful
experience. From the 18-hour smoked brisket made with genuine Alberta beef to a locally made pastry based on the vendor’s homeland’s recipe from Riga, Latvia.
As we wandered the booths, I couldn’t help but be impressed by
several factors. One was how lucky they all were that the weather had both warmed up and dried out from the day before. When it’s an open market – the weather can be a huge factor in the number of customers they might see.
Then there is the set-up and the tear
down. And the drive, for some. Some vendors had come from as far as our capital city of Edmonton – 4 hours at least, away.
The amount of detail and craftmanship on display is often astonishing. One vendor was selling an amazing line of beard and shaving
accoutrements. His shaving brushes and old-style razors featured hand-crafted and polished cherry wood. Absolutely beautiful.
Another lady, whose husband is from Ecuador, had the most elegant Alpaca hoodies, coats, jackets and capes. She’s the
designer and his connections get them the product. Plus, they now have a team of seamstresses sewing the garments back in his home country.
All these vendors and craftspeople display an incredible amount ingenuity, energy, and commitment. And
time.
But they all are making one fatal mistake.
They spend an enormous amount of time and money showing and displaying their wares with the hope that there will be a good number of visitors so they can make a sale.
And therein
lies the mistake. Can you spot it?
It’s not the market, that’s for sure. Markets from man’s earliest days have proven to be a wonderful method to bring vendors and buyers together. The fact that there are a number of vendors to choose from is the reason buyers
come.
No, the mistake is in seeking customers, to make a sale. That strategy is entirely transactional.
What they are all missing (and 90% of every other business makes the same mistake) is that they should view each sale as a way of attracting a customer.
What do I mean
by that?
What I mean is that once you have made a sale what is your strategy to encourage and ensure that you get both many more sales from that customer in the future and his or her referral? That’s where the real profit for a business lies.
But why stop there?
Why not incorporate a
system to collect names, emails and phone numbers from many of the visiting non-buyers as well. Each one of them represents a possible future sale and referral. Do they not?
What about your business? Are you spending all your time and energy frantically seeking a
sale from every customer or do you see each sale as a way to gain a customer, knowing that he or she represents a potential stream of future revenue and profit?
Until next week,
Stay healthy and focus on profit!
-
Hugh
The “Profit Accelerator” Expert
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