Marketing 101 Being Used By A Young Girl Scout? Yes, If Her Dad Is A Marketing Wiz
Want to Double your Paycheck? Look to Girl Scout Cookies
This is truly one of my favorite stories to tell.
We don't always realize what lessons we are transferring to our kids, but when my younger daughter had Girl Scout Cookies to sell and she didn't want to traipse all over town like all of her friends (because she saw that they were not very successful), she sought some help.
We chatted about what her option were for selling this annually-available product, and here's the story.
When my daughter, Liz, was about 8 years old, she had LOTS of Girl Scout cookies to sell.
It those days, kids didn’t park in front of a grocery or convenience store and hawk their wares to every passerby. They canvassed the neighborhood door-to-door. And they went by themselves down the quiet suburban tree-lined streets, something no parent would allow these days. (Ahhhh, pity that things have changed THAT way!)
When Liz and I chatted about the task in front of her, she told me some of the kids would be selling lots of boxes and she just wanted to get rid of hers as fast as she could.
(Whoops... maybe she should have thought about all the joy she'd bring all the people who were fortunate enough to purchase cookies from her, but moving on with her task was utmost in her mind!)
So… what to do?
1. MARKETING was the act of putting notes in people’s door to tell them that she would be stopping by the next weekend to let them have their boxes of delicious Girl Scout Cookies… BUT they could preorder and send her a note and a check.
2. MARKETING was leaving a note in their door when they weren’t home the following weekend, letting them know that they had missed their chance BUT… Liz would rush their order to them once they called her.
3. And SELLING was either face-to-face when she was at their home OR over the phone when she told them that in addition to their favorite Thin Mints, she could also offer them the smooth and delicious, chocolate-covered, peanut butter-filled Tagalongs. And she often sold more when doing that.
Dan Kennedy writes in his Ultimate Success Book, “Here is the harsh reality every adult should come to grips with as quickly as possible, every young person should be taught: one year, three years, and five years from now, the particular job (task) you do will not have appreciably increased in value. YOU will either have stayed the same in value or increased in value through your own initiative; that’s the only way.”
If you have not increased in value at some point, your employer can’t or clientele won’t pay any more - regardless of inflation. It is at that point that your economic status shifts into reverse. Your income stagnates or declines.
The gradual decline in your buying power as a consumer will prevent you from saving, investing, and creating financial security or erode what you have already accumulated. And your vulnerability to layoff, termination, or replacement increases.
This is true of the self-employed business owner as well. If you are not increasing your value to your customers, if you are not making yourself indispensable to them all over again, every day, then you are declining in value to them. You are either increasing in value or declining in value.
If you really would like to double your paycheck, simply take action to triple your value!
One of three things will absolutely happen: one, your present employer will respond with raises, bonuses and advancement; two, a new employer will find and grab you; or three, you’ll discover some entrepreneurial opportunity and move on to writing your own paycheck.
And if you already own a business and would like to double your paycheck, simply take action to triple your value to your customers. Your compensation will always catch up to your value.
And who knew such a lesson was available from an 8-year-old Girl Scout selling her cookies to her neighbors.
Charlie Seymour Jr
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