How to Build Trust Using
Pink Spoon Marketing

Have you ever walked into your local Whole Foods market and been offered a sample of something delicious? Let’s say it was a new brand of organic guacamole. One bite and you were hooked. You left the store with a nine dollar container, plus the bag of the blue corn tortilla chips they were serving it with.

Or you and your husband decide to check out the new vineyard a couple of hours from home. You walk in and they offer you a complimentary taste of their 2005 Cabernet Sauvignon, one of their best-sellers. You try the wine, plus three others and walk out the door with three bottles.

Here’s one we can all relate to. You take the kids to your local Baskin & Robbins for a Saturday afternoon treat. Your seven-year-old can’t decide which flavor she wants and asks for a taste of the Ice Cream Cake Swirl AND the Chocolate Peanut Butter Fudge. The guy behind the counter happily gives her a taste of each – on a little pink spoon. After multiple tastes all around, everyone walks out of the store with a double cone, and you’ve got the triple scoop sundae.

This, my friends, is Pink Spoon Marketing.

The little Pink Spoon, started by Baskin & Robbins back in 1945, has become the iconic symbol of the free giveaway – just a tiny taste of what you’ve got that keeps customers coming back for more.

Now more than ever it’s imperative that you connect with your potential clients in a meaningful and memorable way. Thanks to an unstable economy, corporate meltdowns and overzealous advertising, consumers are more jaded and suspicious than ever. They are looking for authenticity and value.  One of the best ways to build your “know, like & trust” factor, is to create something of value and give it away. Yes, you read that right. GIVE IT AWAY.

A successful free offering or Pink Spoon has five main characteristics:

1. It’s FREE.
2. It is compelling and sought after – something that people would actually pay for, but are surprised and delighted they don’t have to.
3. It contains valuable content that will help your target market in some way. It is NOT a throw-away item.
4. It’s easy to give away – a downloadable pdf or m3, for example.
5. It is a natural lead-in to your other products and services. It gives people a “taste” of your work and leaves them wanting even more.

Do you still have a static, brochure-style website – one that doesn’t engage or offer value to your visitors?  You know who you are if your website just has “About Us,” “About Me,” “Services,” and “Contact” pages, or something similar to this.

You have less than ten seconds to make an impression on someone visiting your website. Most visitors will bounce from a static website in even less time. If your website has an opt-in box front and center, with a valuable giveaway, how much more likely do you think it is that someone will not only stay on your site longer, but will also sign up, giving you their name and email address? BINGO!

In order to build your buzz online, you must engage your potential clients and offer something of value. To succeed with your business online, you must turn your website into a lead-generating machine that ultimately brings dollars to your bottom line.

©Liz Dennery Sanders 2010