Harry Beckwith on “Selling something that no one can see”

Whenever we have a product or a service, the key aspect lies on how you make your service available to the customer/consumer.The task should be to build a long term relationship with the consumer so that (s)he would get more people to use your service.Taking a simple example:

“How many times do you turn back to a restaurant, which does not give you a good personalized service?“

Service is not about selling but it is about relationships which should be long lasting, and this is what matters the most in business.

Just happened to check out Business Gyan, Aug 15- Sept14,07 which has an article by Harry Beckwith , author of the bestseller “Selling the Invisible“. He talks about 4 (simple and basic) key aspects on successfully marketing a service.A small gist of the article, which is worth mentioning here :

Service, what is it? Service is just a promise that at some future date; you will do something for someone;deliver a package, provide advice, deliver money in exchange of money and a million such promises.The key difficulty in marketing a service is to sell something that no one can see !!!

Price is not exactly price but it is a communicator , which communicates about the quality of your service.The higher the price, more better should be your quality.Hence, it is always logical to refer to a Premium Price because the added cost is like a premium.It is an added amount the client pays to insure the quality of the service.

When Reliance comes to your mind, you immediately think of low price and lots of free services(from Reliance to Reliance) , but there are many low end phones who are much better than other high end models.So, your price should be balanced with an excellent quality.

[ This point provides into what exactly is packaging and was really an eye catcher in the complete article !!! ]

This is an example from National Veterinary Service in America.Exit surveys showed that if a doctor wore a blue lab coat on a particular day, this clients would rate him 7(out of 10) for Medical Skill & Competence.If he wore a white coat, his score was more than half a point higher.If he added a stethoscope , his score went higher.

Hence, the better the package, the greater his perceived skill- from exactly the same person !!!

In 9 out of 10 instances, the smarter you dress ; better the chance to date a beautiful girl Final Packaging is really very important

Quality alone is nothing without a Brand.Branding is vital – especially for a service, that has so few attributes one can assess before buying. Brand becomes a direct quality substitute.

When you go to a shop for a photocopy, how many times , have you refered this word.If Photocopy seems new to you, than remember Xerox. Photocopying is no longer used(very often) but is refered as Xerox , this is the power of a Brand(the service is always associated with your product) !!!

This is the most important out of all of them.When you are markting a service, you are selling a relationship , and the qualiy of your relationships, trumps above all the other influences.

How many bloggers really thank the users who subscribe to their blog(this can be used when the no is in a manageable range)? This is what is called a “Give & Take relationship”