When marketing your business it’s important you know how to create an offer for your products and services…

This applies more so to acquiring new customers because the cost to acquire a customer is much more (sometimes 7x more) than getting a previous customer to return.

Because of this, it’s worth the effort to incentivize a first-time purchase knowing a customer is worth more to your business over the long-term. (Think customer lifetime value!)

And know your customer is crucial.

Lessons from 100 years ago…

In the wise words of copywriting legend in the 1920’s, Claude Hopkins:

“An offer that is limited to a certain class of people is far more effective than a general offer.” from Scientific Advertising

This is more truer today than ever. Competition is fierce. So crafting irresistible offers from the learnings in your buyer persona is crucial.

…and Claude Hopkins should know, he’s responsible for the success of Palmolive and Schlitz Beer.

Here’s what you’ll learn…

• The role of the offer in marketing
• What’s an offer
• What isn’t an offer
• How to make an offer irresistible

Why Create Marketing Offers

You may be thinking…

“Isn’t the offer…my products and services?” Yes—if you want to sell a commodity.

If you want to create a strong brand and future-proof your business, then no.

The offer in marketing is how you structure your product or service for the sale.

Your goal is to craft great offers that are a no-brainer to your target customer and is the last step in the sales process.

We’ll get into what makes an offer further down, but for now, let’s look at what an offer isn’t…

What Isn’t An Offer

Often times businesses owners interpret an offer to be a the products, call to actions, or even common offers.

Products or Services

What you sell is what your target customer is buying, but not the offer you communicate to them when you’re selling it.

• Your products and services

CTA

Call to actions are also not the offer, they’re what

• Contact us – asking the visitor to submit a form
• Call us – a phone number on the website
• Email us – an email on the website

Common Offers

While at one point, these free “things” were legitimate offers, there is a good chance that they be overused in your industry. So they will need to me modified a bit to be considered an irresistible offer.

• Get Your Free Consultation
• Request A Free Quote
• Download Your Free Guide

Now let’s get to what an offer actually is…

What Is An Offer

The offer is the additional value your customer receives along with your product or service.

This includes the benefits, features, messaging, bonuses, add-ons, etc.

The offer formula

Perception is everything…

[High Perceived Value + Low Perceived Cost] x [Urgency + Scarcity]

For an offer to be truly irresistible it must be perceived as high value from your customer, it must be perceived as low cost as well (cost in terms of risk and price), and multiplied by urgency and scarcity.

Remember, it’s the value your target customer perceives, not what you perceive to be valuable for them.

Therefore, the same applies to the cost, it doesn’t necessarily have to be cheap monetarily for you, but in their eyes it has to be so. You don’t have to heavily discount for a cost to be perceived as low, instead you have to pile on value so the worth is considered high for the price—a real steal.

On top of that, layer in a bit of scarcity and urgency.

Scarcity means have a limited supply for that offer, urgency being a limited time for the offer.

This is used to create a reason to take action now rather than sometime in the future.

Take for example, if you were a plumber…

Your product or service would be plumbing.

The offer however would be an entire package of: bathroom plumbing services with a free on-site assessment using a signature process valued at $500 but is free this month if your services are hired.

Alright, let’s craft an irresistible offer…

How To Craft An Irresistible Offer

When you are creating an irresistible, no-brainer offer, be mindful of where the visitor is in the customer journey.

The reason being, the offer you create will be different in your marketing funnel.

Types of offers

Core Offer

Your core offer is your flagship product or service mixed in with the rest of the buying experience.

Included is: urgency, scarcity, any monetary discount, features and benefits, description of your unique mechanism, bonuses, warranties, guarantees, etc.

Examples:

• Lifetime Warranty
• Money-Back Guarantee
• Added bonuses

Entry Offer

An entry point offer is value exchanged for a micro-commitment of time or (low-dollar) money. It’s meant to get your foot in the door so to speak.

So, let’s say a lead isn’t ready to commit to your core product or service. This is when they’ll take a smaller step to your entry offer.

Keep in mind, the entry offer should logically lead up to the core offer.

Examples:

• Routine pipe cleaning (entry) to complete pipe replacement (core)

Lead Magnet

The lead magnet is a free offer meant to acquire personal information from a lead such as name, email, phone number.

This means it is offered up to visitors who are not yet ready to make a purchase but are still curious to learn more.

Also, lead magnets typically provide one quick win and are easily consumable.

Examples:

• % off on first purchase coupon
• Guide that answers a specific question

Final Thoughts

So now you know how to create an offer.

Remember, your options are endless for making an offer irresistible.

But don’t forget, it’s all about what your target customer feels will be valuable for them.