Product Samples

Should You Give Your Customers Free Samples?

Product Samples

Does your company offer samples for consultants or distributors to purchase?



If so, make sureyou take advantage of it!

It is extremely important that if samples are available, you are handing them out to your customers.

Why?

Once people try your product assuming they enjoy it, a number of things may happen:

--You gain add on sales and larger purchases

--Customers become more interested in your business and opportunity

--You build customer loyalty


Everyone likes goodies, product samples, or freebies.

They like to open the little sample baggies to see what’s inside.

They like the idea of “Something for Nothing”.

Its like Trick or Treating…for adults!

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Who Should Receive Samples?

Make sure you are giving out your samples to your new customers and prospects, as well as your existing customers.

I can remember my mother switching AVON consultants.

She had been ordering AVON consistently, for maybe 5 years, every two weeks from one consultant. That consultant never gave her a single sample.

When a new consultant opened shop in their small town and gave my mother a little lipstick sample with a catalog, my mother was hooked.

She switched consultants, and now orders every two weeks from the woman who gives her goodies every once in a while.

She also consistently purchases full sized versions of the samples she receives, so it is very much worth it for the consultant to keep handing them out.



You do not have to spend a lot of money on samples, or do it with every order, but make sure you are taking care of your best customers and introducing them all to your new products as they come out.

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Keep it Professional

In the past, I have given out free samples of healthy snack foods to anyone who was interested.

I once had a woman tell me that she had requested a sample from another distributor, online, and it had arrived in a plastic baggie.

I was appalled, and the woman who received the sample was as well. She promptly threw away the “sample” and never contacted the previous distributor again.

Yet once she had tried my sample, purchased from the company in an individual sample package, she joined my program immediately.

Why would someone send samples in baggies like that?

My only thought would be that it was cheaper for the distributor. She took the cheap and lazy way out, and instead of coming across as a person to do business with, she appeared cheap and lazy.

She might have saved a buck on the sample package, but she really lost everything, didn’t she? She lost the lead, and even lost the money she spent on the snack food itself, as the prospect threw it away without every trying it.

Make sure that you keep your samples professional.

Invest in company made product samples if available, and don’t try and send loose food or bath and body products in the mail.

If you are at a local event, then feel free to open a bag of your product and share.

You can keep your samples professional by investing in cellophane bags from Cello in a Box.

I would place a snack food sample and a business opportunity brochure in one of their 5 x 9 tape bags. It makes the entire presentation look much more appealing when someone receives a sample in the mail.

A very unprofessional tactic that I have experienced is consultants or distributors taking too long to send their sample.

I have requested samples or catalogs from individuals that have taken one- to two-months to send. Some I never received at all.

If you are going to offer samples through the mail, make sure you mail them promptly, within a week if possible.

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Car Kits

Another thing I suggest you do with your product samples is to have information packets ready to go in your car.

What’s an Information Packet?

This is simply a nicely presented package, again, I do mine in tape bags from Cello in a Box, with business information and a freebiein it.

For Direct Sales Companies, like Tupperware, an idea would be to have a current sales flyer, a page on current hostess gifts being offered, a VistaPrint business card, and a little freebie like a citrus peeler.

For Network Marketing Companies you could have a business opportunity flyer, an enrollment form, a VistaPrint business card, and a small product sample.

Store about a half dozen of these stored in your car, in a tote bag, at all times. This way, when you are out and about and meet someone who shows interest in your company, you have a packet on hand to give them immediately.

They know that you are serious about your business, and are prepared.

They can count on you.

They will do business with you.

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Opportunity Freebies

Another good idea is to offer larger freebies, samples or gifts for listening to an Opportunity Presentation.

For example, those who choose to participate in a Tupperware Dream Interview could receive a totally free, small piece of Tupperware valued at $10-15.

It is important to note that you should give these freebies away regardless of if the person joins the program. And, of course, send out your freebies promptly, within a week.

The majority of those willing to listen to a call or conduct an interview will, in fact, join the program.

Those that do not, should still remain in your Follow Up List.


Many will eventually come to the right place in their lives for your opportunity, and join at a later time.

All this from giving away a few product samples.

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