Sean D’Souza’s latest ‘PsychoTactics’ article is titled “Why ‘Free’ Is Lousy For Consumption”. [PsychoTactics Article]

Sean D’Souza’s latest ‘PsychoTactics’ article:

Why ‘Free’ Is Lousy For Consumption

You’ve been told that FREE works really well. Well it does.

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But only when attracting a customer
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If you really want a customer to benefit, you have to stop the free dole out. Because the moment something continues to be free,
the consumption of those products/services plummets like a rock.

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You don’t have to believe me, but you might as well
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Because we’ve tried this concept several times over.

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So let’s take a real case study
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We used to have free marketing courses at a cafe and we called it ‘BizBrew.’ Each of the Biz Brew courses were complete in every detail.

It was the kind of course that you’d readily pay $75-$100 for, without the coffee. I say, without the coffee, because the coffee brewed up a latte, a frappe, or just about any coffee you wanted. And yes, it was free.

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Think about it: A free course. Free coffee.
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And a pretty decent presenter. Would you miss sessions? You’re shaking your head thinking there’s no way you’d miss it, but the converse is true. When given a free option, people turn up sporadically, and then not at all.

In fact, we were so sure we were wrong about this concept, that we started a new course series called the ‘Learning Rock’. While every session of the ‘Learning Rock’ was full, they were filled with 60% of new customers. Only 40% of the customers were repeat customers.*

Then we had paid courses. And 95% turned up for every course. Without fail. Come rain or shine.

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So what does this teach you about consumption?
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That the concept of FREE is wonderful for attracting customers. That FREE forms a beautiful attraction factor. But it’s only the first step in the sequence of attraction, conversion and consumption.

Once a customer has gone through the attversumption steps; once they’ve opted in for the FREE whatever, and consumed the FREE
product/service, the next step should be paid.

And that if you truly want to help your customers, you must make them pay.

Sean D’Souza

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*IMNewswatch would like to thank Sean D’Souza and Psychotactics for granting permission to reprint this latest article.

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