Free samples work well, regardless of the industry you’re in.

You see it all the time in supermarkets – free samples of tasty food get more sales.

Sometimes it can take a bit of thought to work out precisely what you could give away for free but it’s almost always possible…

The simplest kind of free sample is exactly what the supermarkets do – a very small portion that’s just big enough for you to decide whether or not you’d like to buy.

The next simplest is a time limited sample – Microsoft and other software companies do that on a regular basis. The amount of time should be enough for you to be able to get used to the software (or whatever other product) but obviously not so long that you can no longer be bothered to pay when your time expires.

Premium memberships of things like websites are another way of giving out free samples. If there’s anything similar you can do in your business, that would be worth trying.

If your industry doesn’t lend itself to giving out free samples, consider a free trial. Everything from puppies to cars and all sorts of other things has been sold this way. Indeed, in sales, it’s known as a puppy dog close because most people once they’ve experienced the fun of a puppy around the house for a couple of days can’t bear the idea of giving the dog back to the pet shop.

And if neither of those work, how about giving out a related – or even unrelated – sample?

If you’ve written a book, that’s a great free sample. It has the benefit of not only showing that you’re an expert (after all, you’ve written the book) but it also has the benefit that books are generally kept a lot longer than things like business cards, regardless of whether anyone actually reads the book.

There are lots of different ways that you can use samples to get more sales. I’ve included more ideas in this video: