For either "market share" or "growth share" markets, there are a few techniques which have proven effective to get people to switch to you or to choose to begin doing business with you. Remember, unless the existing supplier alienates his customers through some form of poor service, they will not make a lateral move without cause. There must be an incentive to change old habits.

1. You can offer a reward card when the customer completes a reasonable number of purchases, give him/her a reward with high perceived value and low hard costs. The incentive should be significant enough to warrant switching.

2. The customers can get a referral coupon with their name on it, to be given to another party who is a new customer. When the new customer presents the coupon, the original customer gets a "credit" (worth some reward), while the new customer gets his own coupon to pass along.

3. Offer free labor (or additional labor, service or product) to try the product the first time. Remember, discounts used to get customers to switch represents marketing "costs," just lik

e advertising does. You will get your expected profit margins as long as you keep a new customer. All three of these techniques can allow larger-scale promotions, if used all at once, such as:

"Call us today about our unique three separate discount opportunities; three ways to save while getting what you want!"

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