The best way to sell anything is to give away a free sample

Oh man. You've made me remember Portland's Lloyd Center mall a few winters ago, when Starbucks had hired these beautiful young men and fitted them with sci-fi-looking backpacks that could shoot hot cocoa out of a special nozzle. They wandered around the mall, offering everyone little cups of it for free.

The best way to sell anything is through sex and free samples.

the best way to seel something is to get someone's attention, convince them they have a need, and demonstrate that you can fulfill that need better than their money can.

giving the first hit free is one often highly effective method of achieving that, but i don't think it's the best.

It depends on what you are selling, several things just aren't likely to be bought once you have one, such as appendectomies and coffins. Oh sure, you might need to buy more than one for different people in your life, but still, the free sample model doesn't seem like it'd work well.

@patrick:If you are serious about your business and want to make big money, you wouldnt be selling crap. If you are selling crap, you wont be selling much because crap and reputation dont mix that well. Im assuming everybody wants to make more money, so no selling feces.

@Vynce: You give them a sample to grab their attention (everybody loves freebies). Once they use the sample, they realize that they have a need. I didnt quite understand the last part, so i cant argue there.

@Rachel: uh... okay thats true. But if you have to choose between 2 things. One is bad, and the other is worse. You are probably going to choose the bad one over the worse one. Sampling is not the PERFECT choice, but its the best one out there.

thanks dude. appreciate it

I would point to Rolex and Mercedes as examples of where not giving anything away for free, aside from the air in the stores, still generates a good volume of sales.

the claim doesn't say you have to do it to be successful; jsut that doing it works well. but...

wow, Mercedes won't allow test drives? they should. i bet it would help their sales.

hell, at their budgets, they could probably provide shuttles to and from the store in their cars and bring in even more sales.

as for rolex, i'm sure a little product placement in TV shows would raise their sales even more.

See a free sample for something a person only needs one of, at any given time, is a lousy idea.

I don't need more than one dishwasher. Giving me a free one means I won't buy one.

A free sample in that case could be a free week's rental or something.

c.f. vacuum cleaner sales techniques that include a sample in the form of vacuuming a room of your house.

It depends on what your selling. Free doesn't get the deal done all the time.