I just finished reading an excellent (and perfectly short) book called Integration Marketing by Mark Joyner.  As an excellent marketing professional and businessman, Mark really knows his stuff!  I highly recommend it as a read, but here is the brief overview of the main principle.  Integration marketing is leveraging your opportunities to market to your potential, existing and past clients by finding ways that you already are in contact with them.  Also by leveraging other business’s contact with their clients (in related fields of course).  Give this book a read and then go through your business systems to see where there might be holes in your funnel that you could be taking advantage of!

This is just a phrase that I have coined for getting into joint venture projects with others.  You need initial business dealings before you can just jump into a full blown joint venture.  I mean, you need to know who you are working with…Are they reliable?  Do they keep their word?  Are they as committed as you are?  So I proposed to a few clients of mine not too long ago this idea of letting me contact related services and products for a type of “co-op marketing”.  Basically, someone else was selling a service or product, and I created an offer that was enticing enough to average as much as a 30 conversion rate when offered!  This means around 1 in 4 people that the business I teamed up with sold to converted to a sale from me.  What did I offer to get this great deal?  A special offer flyer to be handed to any new client at the time of the sale from the other business.  You see, I call it parasite marketing because our offer is basically a parasite of the original sale that was made by the other company.

I know, at first parasite marketing sounds kinda off, but hopefully when explained, you understand the power of this significant increase in your sales force.  Remember, parasites usually help in more ways than one their host.  Hosts are grateful for their parasites.  Its only humans who have given the term parasite a negative connotation!

Think about why this works so well for just a second:

Let’s say you offered a pest control service.  If you targeted any other service professional that visits homes like yard companies, air conditioning services, roofing, remodeling, etc.  you would be able to hit a home owner right when they have just made a purchase from someone they trust.  This sales person/technician etc. hands them your special one-time offer to the new client.  This action without even any words (although some words would be nice, like “We recommend these guys, they are a solid performer”) is a type of referral.  It is one of the best types of referrals as the offer is made when the wallet is still warm.  The buying mood is still present.

So what does your “host” get?  Besides a regular thank you gift, I recommend a commission based setup for a solid incentive.  Also, offer their services in the same way!  The business relationships and partnerships that can develop from doing this pay out exponentially, every time.  Try this for six months and watch you business explode!