CD Duplication to Promote Your Business on CD
Title: "Promoting Your Business on CD"

Author: Kenny Love

Article:
In the Music industry, whenever most independent musicians
release a new recording today, a certain aspect of their
promotion entails their distribution and giveaway of FREE
samples of their music on a separate promotional compact disc.
This serves as a 'teaser' in enticing prospects to then go to
record stores to buy the full-length recording.

As 'writeable' promo discs can be purchased inexpensively at
stores such as Wal-Mart, after which the music samples are
copied from the hard drive to the CD, or by using what is known
as a CD burner (high-speed duplicator), it should come as no
surprise that even the most financially challenged musicians are
now embracing this invaluable and well proven promotional aspect
for bringing immediate attention to their music.

And, as this method has proven unanimously beneficial in terms
of ease of finance, promotion and time, there is absolutely no
reason that a similar process cannot also work for your own
business, albeit, a few elements properly customized (be sure
your computer's compact disc is a "writeable" type, and not
simply a "readable" one).

As such, I am providing a "from start to finish" outline that
you should find very effective, almost immediately, whether you
wish to reach out to your prospects locally, regionally or
nationally.

Hypothetically, let's say you are in the field of Cosmetology,
and own and operate a hair salon. Though your industry has a
ready-made market, with women repeatedly visiting on a regular
basis, naturally, there is also a fair degree of competition
from other salons in your area as well.

And, as such, you've noticed that your business sales and
clients, have either begun to level off, stagnate or, possibly,
even diminish. What can you quickly do to maintain and increase
your clientele and, accordingly, your salon's income?

1. Why not take all of the elements of your business, such as
your weekly specials, information about your salon such as its
history, your web site address, email address, regular prices,
business hours, contact information, along with the various
products and services you offer, then format them into
attractive files and place them on compact discs for
distribution?

Your prospects are certain to be pleasantly surprised with this
new out-of-the-norm promotion method and anxious to see what
surprise awaits them on the CD.

2. Next, consider all the businesses women might patronize, such
as women's shoe stores, women's clothing stores, jewelry stores,
supermarkets, mall stores, cosmetic stores, etc. Your goal is to
consider businesses that are complementary to your own services,
yet, are not in competition in any way.

3. Now, contact the store managers and/or owners, informing them
that you are a fellow local business owner, and request to know
if they will consider handing out your CD of information to
their customers and/or clients who have computers and,
hopefully, have Internet service. You might even request to
enter into a barter agreement with these businesses, whereby,
you distribute their sales information as well.

While all contacts you make might not be receptive to this idea,
undeniably, you will acquire more than a few who will be
interested, if for no other reason than the opportunities to
offer their customers a little something extra and/or to get
their own business information into the hands of new prospects
(your customers) as well.

4. Also, be sure to not only consider distributing your CDs
hand-to-hand on your own, always having them available on your
person ready to hand out, but also having them available at your
salon to give to your existing and new customers.

5. Another avenue, is to consider doing a local or regional
mail-out campaign. You could simply contact prospects via
telephone and attempt to qualify them by simply asking if they
own a computer and, if so, that you would like to send them a CD
of info regarding your hair salon and its services.

6. If your budget allows, yet, another method is to contact an
area print publication that specifically targets women and
request if you can pay to have your CD attached to one of their
issues, or included as an insert.

7. To backtrack for a moment, be sure that your web site
contains a form readily viewable on it so that when prospects
with online service access your site, your form can readily
capture their email address, as well as their mailing address.

This is vital information that you need in order to provide your
customers with any updates to your products, services, prices or
any other changes that might occur. And, speaking of the
provision of updates, you should also consider starting a
newsletter for this purpose as well if you have not yet done so.

Again, you also want to be sure your CD contains as much vital
information for people who don't have online access although,
practically anyone with a computer these days, also has access.

This aspect of promotion could serve to either offset and
eliminate any print, radio or television advertisement costs you
currently have, or serve to complement them. Your overall
production costs (bulk rate price and time spent copying files)
on the compact disc will probably be between $.30 and $.40 per
unit.

If you distribute, say, 1000 info CDs at a cost of $400, and
gain merely 10% (100) new customers, I believe you will find
that the $400 will be a very wise and worthwhile investment, not
to mention that you can continue and/or repeat the process as
often as you wished.

And, if you happen to reside in a small rural area, you could
also experience great results by simply distributing your CD
information county-wide, or regionally.

Again, this promotional analogy is applicable to, virtually, any
business. Further examples include:

1. Auto dealerships working with car parts suppliers, or vice
versa.

2. Lawn services working with lawn mower repair shops, or vice
versa.

3. How about photography services including their CD of info in
their yearly school/student packages?

4. Even in an agricultural community, feed stores could include
a CD of their info in farmers' purchases.

5. Why not even go a couple of steps farther by placing audio
files or, perhaps, even video files on the CD as well?

Your audio could include your voiceover giving a welcome to the
prospect at the beginning, and also serve as a direction to the
various business elements on your disc. Likewise, your video
could integrate animated video for an even more pleasing
experience for your prospective client.

As I stated previously, virtually, everyone, in all areas of
your community has a computer and/or the availability of online
access through friends, relatives, area schools, libraries, etc.
And, the creativity of any part of the promotional CD is only
limited by your imagination.

So, why not truly give some serious thought to bringing the
marketing and promotion of your business into the 21st Century?
At the very least, your promotion via CD should certainly get
you noticed far above your area competition.



About the author:
Kenny Love is a business marketer, promoter and also authors
inexpensive handbooks on unique but highly-profitable businesses
that many people are unaware of, or simply overlook. His web
site is located at http://www.kennylove.net.

- posted by J @ 1:42 PM