{"id":4614,"date":"2025-01-31T10:00:39","date_gmt":"2025-01-31T04:30:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/delhicourses.in\/?p=4614"},"modified":"2025-12-26T17:06:41","modified_gmt":"2025-12-26T11:36:41","slug":"tripwire-marketing-customer-conversion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/delhicourses.in\/blog\/tripwire-marketing-customer-conversion\/","title":{"rendered":"Tripwire Marketing: Convert Prospects into Customers Faster"},"content":{"rendered":"

Customer conversion looks like a massive and difficult exercise to small businesses, but it\u2019s less daunting than you think. In fact, it\u2019s very much easier for small businesses to convert prospective customers into actual customers if a small bit of customer psychology is brought into play. I have heard many small businesses lament that the long gestation times involved in content marketing can kill their small and meagre starting budgets and leave them with no income for overly long periods as they try to keep up their patience and motivation. But the good news is that the wait needn\u2019t be as long or hard on your finances, or drain your excitement and happiness, if you can strategize differently on the goals for your business! Read on \u2026<\/p>\n

The big secret of the small sales \u2026 learn this lesson and never forget it!<\/h2>\n

In digital marketing, there\u2019s is this beautiful concept called the \u201ctripwire\u201d. It\u2019s the analogy that comes from the electrical world described as \u201c\u2026 a wire stretched close to the ground, working a trap, explosion, or alarm when disturbed and serving to detect or prevent people or animals entering an area.\u201d The military also uses the word tripwire to describe \u201c\u2026 a comparatively weak military force employed as a first line of defence, engagement with which will trigger the intervention of stronger forces.\u201d<\/p>\n

In other words, you, as a small brand marketer don\u2019t have to wait to nurture and woo and cajole your potential target audiences for long, fallow periods to sell them your big product or service \u2026 you can aim to sell them small opening products that reset their mental image of you and themselves and your relationship! Just like a tripwire helps put people into a state of mind ready for the \u201cbigger thing\u201d, a series of small sales, slowly growing in price-points, will help bridge that trust deficit so fast, that you will wonder why people say it takes so long to build trust!<\/p>\n

Think of a Tripwire like dating. If you ask a girl or a guy, a random stranger to marry you, what do you think they\u2019re going to say? Chances are they\u2019re going to end up saying no. If they say no, or if they actually say yes, there\u2019s something wrong. But the reason they\u2019re going to say no, is because they don\u2019t even know you. But if you ask a random stranger, \u201cHey would you like to go out for coffee?\u201d There\u2019s a much higher chance that they\u2019ll say yes. And if the coffee date goes well, then you may ask them for dinner, and if the dinner date goes well, you may go on a few more dates, do a few things with them.<\/p>\n

Then you may end up moving in together, then fast forward a few months, then you may continue dating for a year or two. And then if you ask them to marry you, the chances of them saying yes are much higher. It\u2019s \u201cmicro commitments\u201d. By getting people to take small little actions, you\u2019re much more likely to get them to say yes to your big core offer. A good example of a business who does this is Pizza Hut. I remember when I was 13 years old, there were commercials all over TV for two toppings\u2014any toppings that you want\u2014at pizza hut for $7.99.<\/p>\n

When I was a little kid, I used to order Pizza Hut because that was such a good deal. Sure, they may not be making that much money of that pizza or that offer, but if you fast forward I\u2019m over 30 years old now, I\u2019ve spent thousands of dollars at Pizza Hut because of that initial offer. That Tripwire, which is a \u201cmicrocommitment\u201d, got me in and now I\u2019m spending much more money with that business. After the Tripwire, you want to sell them on your core offer. \"Quotes\"<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Here\u2019s a simple diagram that shows you how trust and sales and the time factor are linked. In the shorter duration, you need less customer trust to sell small things. But the important thing is that by changing the \u201cprospective customer\u201d into an \u201cactual customer\u201d you\u2019ve changed the nature of the relationship you have with him. You\u2019ve also changed his perception of himself in relation to you, his perception of his experience in dealing with you, and his sense of \u201cstatus\u201d in your eyes. As time grows, you can have more and more trust built up \u2013 enough trust to make that bigger sale.<\/p>\n

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Contrast this approach with the usual tactic that people in digital marketing advocate. Don\u2019t people tell you that you have to give loads of free information which will eventually lead to trust in your content, and then trust in you, and finally trust in your big product? Just think for a moment whether this approach of a \u201cfreebie\u201d will change the mind-set of the potential customer in any way? Will this approach help your finances in any way? And finally, will this approach create any real experience of dealing with you in a financial transaction \u2013 which is where the rubber hits the road and a customer gets hand-on experience of dealing with you \u201cwith security\u201d rather than just downloading a freebie?<\/p>\n

4 big changes that happen in a prospective customer\u2019s mind when he becomes a \u201ccustomer\u201d of yours!<\/h2>\n

The customer stops comparison-shopping and grows towards brand loyalty with greater ease!<\/b><\/h2>\n

One of the big plus-points of getting a customer to buy smaller products from you before getting mentally ready to buy your flagship service or product is that with every \u201csale\u201d, brand loyalty starts kicking in. Notice how even with a brand of toothpaste, you get into the habit of mindlessly buying the same brand unless competition is particularly aggressive in making you change your mind. People are creatures of habit and brand loyalty too is a form of habit. Habits require less brain application and feel easier to do because you know the rigmarole involved in the process of buying. So if you strategize to sell small things to a customer and thus deepen the bond with the customer (as against offering a series of freebies, say) you get the brand loyalty factor beginning to work in your favour.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s take an example here: let\u2019s say you have a software tool you\u2019d like to sell which is your premium product. Now you may be tempted to offer a free ebook on the same topic that your software addresses, but after reading the ebook what are the guarantees the customer feels any loyalty to your product to want to invest in it? On the contrary, if you were to sell your ebook for a very small sum (say, just at a price of about $3 to $5), if the customer is really interested you will, firstly, get a surer signal that he\u2019s in for a \u201cbuy\u201d. Secondly, he will tend to want to validate his investment of that $5 \u2026 it\u2019s human nature to self-justify even the smallest expenditure! He will therefore get into the loop of searching the ebook for reasons why the software would be ideal to buy, so that his $5 spent was really worth it. He will start looking for reasons \u201cwhy\u201d and not reasons \u201cwhy not\u201d. And when he starts looking at your product with these \u201cpositive blinkers\u201d on, he will stop comparison shopping, because after spending the initial amount on your brand, it seems like he\u2019s throwing out his own investment \u2013 and has to begin all over again with someone else and his re-investment with that brand.<\/p>\n

Trust is a progressive emotion and you can help create the trust continuum in the customer!<\/b><\/h2>\n

After you have sold your first small product, it pays to keep the momentum going with your \u201ccustomer\u201d. With every progressive sale, trust increases, and with every sale at a slightly higher price than before, trust also increases proportionately. You may want to start with a few low-priced e-books, then offer a slightly higher-priced online course, then a bigger priced webinar \u2026 and before you know it, the customer may be ready to invest in a much bigger purchase with you. It is entirely up to you to have enough products created at various price-points if you want to keep the hold on the customer. You want him to stay in the buying cycle with you and get into a relationship that progressively feels more and more satisfying and self-validating! (Of course, you also have to ensure that every buying experience is top-notch!)<\/p>\n

The customer no longer needs external validation when he has first-hand experience dealing with you!<\/b><\/h2>\n

This is a simple but very important point. Most people these days look for external validation of their brand purchases \u2013 like from the social media or their online network of friends and peers. So long as a person is not yet your \u201ccustomer\u201d he will look for external validation and even tend to agree with negative opinions as a form of self-restraint. But the minute he becomes a customer, no matter even if it\u2019s a very tiny product bought from you, he will no longer want to hear contra-opinions that he has made a poor choice. He is not defending your product against criticism, he is defending his own actions against criticism. So this is a very smart way for marketers to inure their customers against getting brainwashed against their products by the social circles.<\/p>\n

You can help the customer progressively shorten his buying cycle with every small purchase!<\/b><\/h2>\n

Very few marketers realize that the buying cycle is tedious even for the customer. When he has to make big ticket purchases, there is a lot of effort needed even from his side on research, testing and trials, forming good decisions and setting out budgets. The buying cycle often wearies marketers, but they need to realize it wearies buyers even more. Customers often find themselves trapped in a cycle of their own expectations which becomes arduous. Think of yourself. How often have you been frustrated by your own meandering as a buyer going through a buying process?<\/p>\n

When you offer tripwire products as small sales, you help the customer shorten his buying cycle, because \u201can ounce of practice is worth a ton of theory\u201d. The customer realises that by going through the small sale he has settled in his own mind many niggling doubts that may have called for a lot of reading and research on many vendors and their products and their reliability and their credibility. You have answered his doubts and queries with a product rather than by an endless to and fro via reading many blog posts and endless emails. Try this tripwire sales approach and you will find customers will be silently grateful for the small opportunities you are giving them that make it so much easier to make big decisions.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s natural for marketers to ask: Can a small product worth about $5 make such an impact on a customer? I know that skeptics will find it hard to believe, as will most customers themselves \u2026 but this behavior is psychologically true, apparently, even if a buyer will never admit to it and a marketer may not readily buy into it.<\/p>\n

If nothing else, at least the next time you think of offering a freebie as a bribe, you will ponder about what you could be missing. You could be losing your small but important opening to create a \u201ccustomer\u201d!<\/p>\n

Instructions<\/strong><\/h3>\n