This week’s Fifteen Minute Pitch Post is hardly cutting edge, but then, most of the things we do in marketing aren’t.

A large client – the Marketing Director of the industry’s biggest player — has always used a merchandise offer to build his e-mail list. A plausible approach – and one that’s stood the test of time – but I wondered if he couldn’t update his methods.

My suggestion? Test an information-based offer against his merchandise offer.

Call it a short e-book, or his market’s equivalent of a white paper, but I pitched an 8-12 page Acrobat file jammed with information his prospects would find useful.

Of course, this is hardly new to most marketers, but my research suggests no one in my client’s market has done it.

The pitch?

It included benefits like:

• Instant gratification (online fulfillment) for prospects

• No hard product fulfillment costs

• Ability to customize the e-book for specific markets/regions

• Ability to promote his brand in the e-book

• Higher response? (Information is often worth more than goodies)

(And probably a few others I’ve forgotten.)

The moral? Even successful marketers can run a few steps behind the leading edge. If your client is one of them, take the chance to add value to the relationship – and secure a little extra paying work for yourself.

Keep writing, Tom Chandler.

[tags]writer, copywriter, freelance copywriter, freelancer, marketing, new business, fifteen minute pitch post[/tags]