A penny for your thoughts?
That makes a nice phrase but in reality, free is better.
I recently read about the power of free. If you want the full version, the book is called “Predictably Irrational” by Dan Ariely. I highly recommend it.
Dan ran a little experiment to test the power of free. He set up a table at a mall. On the table, he offered 2 choices of chocolates. Choice one was a super premium chocolate which would normally sell for about 60 cents. These were very small, wrapped, pieces. Choice two was a Hershey’s Kiss. The premium was offered for 25 cents and the Kiss was 1 cent.
The vast majority chose to pay 25 cents for the premium bite. Few chose the 1 cent Kiss.
Then the price was lowered by 1 cent on each offering. The Kiss was now free and the premium 24 cents. The ratio of ‘sales’ completely flipped. The vast majority chose free.
Free is powerful. Free is attractive. But the difference was only 1 cent in Dan’s experiment.
The power of free can work for your business. Free gives me a chance to see if I’ll like dealing with you. If I do, I’ll probably buy from you.
I offer free service samples. Any business can come up with something to offer for free. Free works. Try it.
That’s free advice.
Chris Reich, Author of TeachU’s Business Talk Blog
Chris@TeachU.com