Attract More Customers While Spending Less ...

...with the right partners and methods. Here's how others have profitably partnered:

1. Offer the Special Extra (From Your Partner) That Tips Customers Towards Choosing You

Who knows how many people chose to stay at the Ritz Carlton rather than at another luxury hotel because of an added thrill - complimentary use of a brand new Mercedes during their stay?

Ritz Carlton became the top-of-mind choice with their kind of (upscale) customers. Mercedes warmed up prospective buyers the best way – getting them to take a drive while relaxed on vacation in a beautiful area.

The bonus benefit? Priceless media coverage of their "first-ever" offer.

Want to spend less time selling and promoting and more time doing the work you love?

You can. Forge a partnership other reputable organizations that serve the same kind of customers. Together you can generate stand-out value and visibility.

Act now, before your competitor grabs the best partners and uses the most profitable method.

Here's more quick snapshots of real life successful partnering methods that you can adapt to get your business growing faster …

2. Co-brand a Product to Gain a Positive Introduction to Your Partner’s Customers

That’s how Applebee’s and Weight Watchers attracted new customers without advertising more. When Weight Watchers designed and branded low-cal menu items for Applebee’s, followers of their diet program could eat out without guilt, at Applebee’s. Applebee’s fans got a first-hand introduction to Weight Watchers.


3. Become a One-of-a-Kind Business (With Partners’ Involvement)
Over 80 U.S. campus newspapers wrote favorably about a hip new Dutch fashion label called 50/50. After the years of controversy about clothiers’ use of sweatshops, it was the first time many of the students had seen a favorable story about clothes manufacturing.

50/50 designs clothing from Salvation Army cast-offs. It shares profits with The Salvation Army whose blankets, curtains and dungarees eventually show up on racks as skirts, pants and belts, each accompanied by a flyer with Salvation Army's and 50/50’s message: people need each other and nobody should be excluded from society.


4. Demonstrate a Partner’s Product in a Way That Attracts More Interest for You Both While Reducing Your Overhead

That's how T-shirt designer Tami Minatelli could exhibit at nine street fairs last summer without paying for her booth space. A manufacturer of a new, unique, no-stain suntan lotion paid for Tami’s booth. Because she wore their lotion and her T-shirts, with a sign above her head, describing her original painting-on-cotton method and the lotion’s “do no harm” guarantee. Next to burn protection, that’s the biggest concern of people who use suntan lotions.


5. Get Introduced to Prospective Buyers Where Your Competition Isn't Even in Sight

That’s why those who fly on Delta Air Lines airlines now see cabin interiors and flight attendant uniforms created by clothing designer Kate Spade. How can you display or use each other’s products and services?


6. Become a Bigger Customer Magnet by Joining Forces to Offer More Helpful Tips Than Your Competitors

That’s why, when pillow-maker, Leo Hollander decided to drop private labeling work in favor of launching his own brand, he recruited complementary partners. On his "Live Comfortably” web site, he provides articles by a feng shui expert, a chiropractor, and a color specialist. Result? He boosted all partners’ visibility and credibility – in front of their mutual market of customers.


7. Deepen Your Customers Emotional Bond With You,
in How You Support a Local Cause – With Them

A month after Hurricane Charley and tropical storm Bonnie, when a storm the size of Texas pummeled parts of Florida, their *neighbors* in Florida and Georgia were given a small way to help with storm relief efforts.

When they shopped at Winn-Dixie grocery stores they could "even it up" at the checkout counter. That is, they can round up their food bill to the next dollar or more, with the extra change going to the local Red Cross chapter for relief efforts.

Many of the retailers and non-profits who worked together forged a second alliance faster (they knew each other better) to create bus caravans for their food-direct-to-Katrina-folks.


8. *Give Your Niche Market Something They'll Love to Talk About*

To reach men in bars, sports arenas and restaurants, advertisers used the Wizmark, otherwise called an "interactive urinal communicator.” As men step up to the urinal they activate, with the slightest movement, a sensor that prompts red lights to flash, crunchy guitar chords to sound and a 30 second commercial to appear. Yes women, the male response has been positive.


9. Recruit More Partners to Attract More Customers at Less Cost – Together

Last Valentine’s Day, several neighborhood businesses including a womens’ medical clinic, florist, health food store, clothing boutique, shopper newspaper, museum store, gym, bookstore and beauty salon joined forces for a month-long promotion to attract and serve women, especially those 30 and older.

The bookstore hosted a series of “Beauty Inside Out” - themed series of in-store demonstrations and mini-seminars each led by a manager of one of the participating businesses and highlighting a book collection and the local partners’ related products and services.

Each presenter provided a handout that included reference to at least one of the other partnering organizations, plus a joint offer of services with one of them.

As well, each presenter wrote a guest column (based on their presentation) for the local shopper paper, with the author’s follow-up offer and e-mail noted at the bottom of the article. Of course each column author quoted partners in this mutually beneficial alliance.


10. *Offer Special Touches That Your Competition Doesn't*

That’s how guests at several Holiday Inn Express motels can now enjoy Kohler’s new multi-function showerhead and spa bath.


11. Become a Bigger Customer Magnet – Together

That’s what happens when pediatricians join forces with pizza store managers school principals, city health clinic directors and others to better reach and serve their common base of customers: families with young children?

Together, they did what they could not have accomplished on their own. They offered a highly valued, emotionally-loaded and media-attracting service AND increase foot traffic into their stores and offices: "I Got Shot" free immunizations for kids on Saturdays just before school started.

Pediatricians gave immunization shots at convenient times in a roomy, cheerful childrens' store, with a party atmosphere where the kids were the center of attention. Parents heard about the offer through all the participating outlets and received free snack coupons after the kids received their shots so they could reward their children with a snack from a nearby store. Partners could provide better, more news-catching service at less cost - and inspire greater community and customer loyalty.


12. Involve Your Cause Partner in Making Purchase of Your Product Good for a Community Cause

That's how firefighters in one town got a badly-needed but expensive piece of equipment, a deluge gun, without asking their cash-strapped city council for a single dime.

Here's how. Business was slow all over their town. The firefighters were getting nowhere when they asked for donations from business owners experiencing a weak economy.

Yet when they approached the manager of a local pizzeria, he said he had an idea about how to raise more money – together. "Here's what we can do. Pick a Wednesday, say four weeks from today for an “Fire-Fighting Pizza” party here. I make $500 or so on Wednesdays. On that day, after we sell $500 worth, every dollar after that I'll split sales 50/50 with you. You can raise more money than you just asked me for."

The firefighters loved the challenge. They prepared banners and asked permission from the local supermarket and gas stations to put them up on their outside walls. They had smaller signs and announcements printed for free by the local copy shop with a bright red *donated by * credit line to the copy shop.

The headline on the signs and flyers read, “Eat at Pizza Hut. Save a Local Life”. They visited offices complexes, even those with signs that read "No soliciting." (Who's going to kick out the fire department, right?) They went to apartment complexes, video rental outlets, grade and high schools. They put flyers and signs everywhere. Once people heard about their cause, handing out flyers was like giving away candy. The radio morning DJ did an on-air interview with two firefighters. The shopper newspaper ran a story with photos of firefighters holding up a sing while stand at the back of their fire engine.

When the Wednesday‚ comes around, the pizzeria is packed from noon through midnight. They made enough money to get the Deluge Gun. Most importantly ˆ it was a fair partnership because everyone contributed, so participants are likely to want to work together again.

Bottom Line Benefit of Partnering – the Smart Ways:
SmartPartnerships generate a profitable payoff for all partners because, at the very least, they get a credible introduction to each other's customers.

Read SmartPartnering to learn more methods, steps, pitfalls to avoid and success stories.