Helping Hands

On Monday morning, I was heading into restaurant to conduct a BNI training in one of their private rooms. It was raining and slippery and my hands were full of boxes with training materials.

A gentleman, who had just came of the restaurant, turned around, and opened and held the door for me.

"Thank you very much, " I said.

He said "God gave us two hands for a reason: one for our use and another to help someone. Have a great day!" And off he went.

I stood in the entrance for a second and thought about what he said. It's amazing how something as simple as holding the door for someone whose hands are full, can have an impact on a person's day or even life.

Next time when I see someone struggling, I'll remember the words of that stranger and instead, offer my free hand to help somone else. I know it will come back to me at some point in the future.

That's truly what Givers Gain is all about.

Are your Samples worth Sampling?

I was recently at a Panera Bread to enjoy a rare 30 minutes of free time during my day. I noticed that they introduced a new breakfast sandwich which I decided to try with a nice cafe mocha. It looked great in their ad and looked (and tasted) equally as nice when my order was delivered.

As I was finishing up with my meal, one of the employees came around offering samples to the patrons sitting at tables. It turned out to be a sample of the same sandwich that I ordered and just finished eating. I politely declined but I did look at how it looked on the tray and noticed that it looked identical to my sandwich and their ads. Not only that, but the lady who was coming around knew all about the product right down to the number of calories, allergy information (such as if it contained or was made near anything that contained allergic ingredients such as peanuts), and even described it in an appealing manner.

Contrast that to my experience at Costco a few days ago.

As almost all Costco members know, there times during the day when they have people hired by an outside company, whose job is to offer samples of whatever new or special product they are pushing. These folks are easily recognized by their trademark hairnets, green aprons and white shirts. They stand behind rolling carts, some have a microwave on it while others just have the product. They cook, cut, scoop and otherwise just "throw" these samples on small, white cocktail napkins. Because people are naturally attracted to "free stuff", they tend to draw vast lines, (but I always have to wait for another batch to be prepared by the time I get to the front of the line).

Sometimes these samples look horrible. It looks nothing like what is on the box or bag it comes . Nor do the people offering these samples have enough knowledge about the product. For example, whenever I've asked any of these sample people some specifics about their product, I always get answers like "they're very good" or "this is delicious" or "these are in the frozen food aisle next to the frozen shrimp".

Every once in a while, a special vendor brings in their own "sample staff" to promote their specific product. While at Costco, one vendor was promoting their new line of sausages and meatballs. They had a vibrant, excited group of demonstrators who made you want to try all of their samples. They were presented nicely and the people doing the demonstrations looked like they were having fun compared to the other sample people who are at Costco each and every week. I even noticed a few "evil eyes" being cast towards the sausage vendor's staff because they were attracting more folks than the others.

If your business offer samples of its products or services to potential and existing customers, it must be consistent. If you're a baker and are allowing the public to try your chocolate chip cookies before they by, please try them yourself before you put them out. Make sure whoever is doing your promotions knows about your product/service and your business. Don't just give them a tray with food or some pens or whatever it is you're promoting and throw them to the lions (i.e. the potential customers). Granted there will be freeloaders who will want anything you put out because it's free, but your job at this point is to create a "want" so that they buy from you. After all, you can have the best product in the world but if that want isn't there, then you're not going to make money.

There's the old saying: "you can lead a horse to water but can't make him drink." Someone once added the following phrase: "....unless you know what makes him thirsty." I agree. If you're going to offer samples to "make them thirsty" please make them worth sampling, otherwise you may find your business dying of thirst.