Life is Like a BAG of Cookies!!!

Forrest Gump's Mama might have had it right. Life is like a bag of cookies. Okay, well she actually said it was like a box of chocolates but given she ain't here and it's MY BLOG, life is now like a bag of cookies. Let me explain.

Over the course of the past few entries we have explored putting the relationship in relationship marketing. Marc Schwartz did a wonderful job on his guest BLOG entry this past week. Many good things to think about and hopefully stimulated some ideas as to how you can go about leveraging the power of relationship marketing for your business.

When I owned my office equipment company, we found a unique and fantastic way to deliver our message and to build relationships with our clients and prospects. You guessed it....COOKIES!!! Hot, fresh baked, personally delivered cookies! Even the most difficult gate keeper or hardened office manager could not resist the very personal, the very unusual and unexpected gift of a bag of cookies. They simply turned to goo when we showed up holding that bag.

Though I know since then many companies in Austin have copied us, I know that our approach was unique and still is! How? We put personal heart into it. We showed a level of detail and design with each delivery. We never used the same color bag more than twice. We always had season appropriate tissue paper and ribbon and most of all, we did the cookie delivery at the most unexpected and unscripted times. We didn't wait for someone's birthday or the next holiday, we did it because it was Monday at 2PM or Thursday at 10AM. We did it when we felt like it but not too often to kill the allure. It was the unpredictability of our delivery which added to the excitement and anticipation.

I found myself getting into doors of companies that had previously been locked for me. A CFO who had received a personally delivered bag of warm home baked (well office baked) cookies and a personal hand written note was all the more open to take my call the next day when I called to inquire about an appointment. It was nothing short of amazing! Prospects loved us, clients loved us and most importantly the entire staff of the organizations loved us. I wasn't the copier guy, I was the cookie guy!

Life is like a bag of cookies, you simply have no idea whose hand your double chocolate macadamia nut special might land it. And like a bad line from a B rated movie, it always gets asked, "So who brought the cookies?"

"Well, Steve Harper did."

BITE

"Hmmm...good cookie (cookie monster voice). Who's Steve Harper?"

"You know the guy who has been calling on us for three years. He sells XYZ," the employee offers.

"Hmmm," as the CFO grabs another one or two cookies, "we should really set something up with him next time he calls."

BINGO!!!!

Relationship marketing comes in a variety of flavors. Cookies, newsletters, brochures, BLOGS, you name it, you got it. Whatever it takes to get your name in front of the right people who make the right decisions (of support those who do) boils down to relationship marketing. It may sound cheesy but I turned an investment of $ 55/mo in cookie dough into hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of business. Would I have gotten it doing the traditional BS way of going about getting business? Maybe eventually....maybe not. LIKELY NOT!

Whether you use cookies, newsletters, or whatever you use, be creative, be personal and always, always be sincere. Relationship marketing takes work but it’s the companies and individuals that put the effort into it that stand head and shoulders above the rest.