What Supermarkets Know That Network Marketers Need to Learn, Part I

They have been around for years; you know them well. They can be found in your neighborhood, or somewhere close by. You don't always need it, but it's good to know it's available, whether you need to pick up a couple of quick last minute items or you have to make a full-blown buying blitz for the sake of stocking all the shelves in your refrigerator/freezer, pantry, closets, cabinets, whatever.

I'm talking of course about your local grocery store, convenience store, supermarket. Whatever you call them, they are available, ready to serve, happy to meet whatever need you have that they can fulifll. For the most part they're pretty successful. They're good at bringing people in the doors, and don't have a problem attracting customers. They seem to make it look so simple: you open the doors, and there are people standing right outside, ready to walk the aisles, choose whatever they want, and go to the registers to pay for their selections. No big deal, right?

Well actually it is a big deal, and I'll explain why shortly. But first I want to present to you a scenario. For just a moment I want you to imagine this:

Suppose you local supermarket decided to try an experiment for the next three months. Let's suppose that each employee, from the store managers, to the cashiers, to the stock personnel, to the custodial staff, and everyone in between was given an assignment: they were to take turns during the week going into all the local neighborhoods to drum up interest for their store. But instead of passing out flyers, postcards, circulars, or any other promotional material, they were told to talk with anybody they met on the street at any time, anywhere they happened to run into them: at the movies, gas stations, post offices, libraries, schools and universities, day care facilities, churches, parks, family gatherings, drug stores, restaurants...you name it, that's where they went, up to and including other supermarkets to sing the praises of their store in an effort to convince everyone they met to walk through their doors and give them a try. Anything goes as long as they bring in new people and the end justifies the means (so they say) because after all, everyone's a customer with money to spend and everybody needs groceries, right...?

And just make things interesting, let's say that this word of mouth campaign is the ONLY form of advertising the employees are permitted to use for the entire three month period. No TV. No radio. No newspapers or magazines, no flyers, circulars, or postcards in the mail. Just word of mouth is used to promote the store. That's all. Nothing else. Everything else is 100% OFF LIMITS for the duration of this experiment.

At the end of the three month trial the numbers are crunched to compare sales activity during the experiment with sales from the prior three months. And when they looked at the numbers, do you know what they found...?

I'll tell you what they found...

...when you come back next time to read the conclusion...

Like they said back in the day,

Be sure to tune in next time,
Same Bat Time,
Same Bat Channel...

Y'all come back now, y'hear...?

Until we meet again, always remember:

Keep it simple, folks...

See ya!