Law of Reciprocity
July 20, 2007
When you do something for someone else, they feel a compelling urge to reciprocate. I was thinking about this lately after reading a post James Brausch wrote about how Michel Fortin sucks. Paul Hancox recently wrote about the same subject on his Internet Influence Magic blog.
James that he has it on his daily activity list to “Do something nice for someone.” This puts the law of reciprocity into effect and snowballing for you.
An obvious example is when you link to others on your blog. They see the link and want to give back to you in someway. They’ve been affected by the law. Thinking about it myself…the moment I see a link coming in I start thinking about someway of giving back (even reading additional posts of theirs for a future link to one).
I’m going to have to copy his simple strategy of doing something nice for someone every day.
I saw his strategy in action this week. Yesterday I received a huge box from him with 100 copies of his “Earn An Income By Creating Your Own DVD.” On the top of the box, it simply said it was a gift and I could do with them as I wish.
While I own many of his of products, I hadn’t seen that one so I watched it through…and it definitely teaches you step-by-step how to put together your own DVD and send it for duplication. Recently I found out how easy this was to do so I’ve created several DVDs for my business and he is using the same strategies I am for it.
He sells this DVD for $100 through Kunaki (the same duplicator I’ve been using). So this box of DVDs is a value of $10,000. And since I only needed one, which I’ve already watched…this means I have 99 still in shrinkwrap and 1 used one to give away to my customers in someway.
Over the weekend I’m sure I’ll come up with a promotion to let you get ahold of this DVD at a very deeply discounted price…perhaps as a package deal with one or two of my other products on a 48 hour special (obviously only 100 available). If you’re wondering why I’m waiting…it’s because I have a 2 DVD set of my own almost ready to be released…which would fit perfectly together with this as a package deal.
Think about it. James gave away something free. I’ll benefit by making a profit from what he sent over. My readers benefit by getting a great deal of some type. He benefits because he gets promoted with more of his products being put in the hands of customers. Everybody wins.
Oh and by the way, thank you James.
How will you use the law reciprocity in your business this week?
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16 Responses to “Law of Reciprocity”
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Hi Terry
Great post. What James did is a brilliant example of the law of Reciprocity in action. Hopefully you wouldn’t mind if I write a post based on that example? Naturally I’d link right back here, so people could get to the source.
Actually, the more I think about it, the more I realize what James did was a stroke of genius… reciprocity, viral marketing, and depending on what you do with those DVDs, you could be triggering more reciprocity
That’s just brilliant!
Best,
Paul Hancox
http://www.InternetInfluenceMagic.com
Hi Paul,
Did you just ask if you could link here? Of course you can…feel free to link directly to anything on this blog.
I’m testing this idea in a new program I just launched last week - The Wealth Spa Client Adivsory Panel.
The first 100 people who sign up for the panel (which is free) get a free copy of my book coming out in November 07, their name & contact info listed as a Panel member in the book, and may get featured as a case study in the book itself.
All they have to do is fill out some surveys for me.
The idea is that by giving away a book and some publicity in the book, I am getting someone who is appreciative to me and wants to share me with other people. They will open the book and show it to people, because their name is listed in the book.
And, the idea is that these people will be the seed of my inner circle of readers/clients/customers.
We shall see how it works out!
Elizabeth
[...] Law of Reciprocity [...]
Great article Terry and a great concept. It certainly has my brain alive with ideas.
Janice
[...] Dean recently wrote on his blog about the law of reciprocity. In it he describes how he recently received a box from James Brausch, containing 100 copies of [...]
[...] Christmas in July at Terry Dean’s house too and he already wrote a great post about using the law reciprocity in your business. var a=new Date();var q=’&tz=’+a.getTimezoneOffset()/60 [...]
[...] Dean recently wrote on his blog about the law of reciprocity In it he describes how he recently received a box from James Brausch containing 100 copies of [...]
Dean, while I can appreciate your concept of how reciprocity works as a marketing tool, let us not forget that true reciprocity is not about the rewards from giving, but about the spirit of giving. Meaning, if I chose to provide something (a service, a gift, a product) to someone or to some cause, I must be content in knowing that someone has benefitted from it, PERIOD. The payment or reward for my generousity is the service provided toward the “greater good”.
The “bonus” of reciprocity is that we, as givers, set ourselves up to become receivers. Perhaps we’ll never come to know the full benefit from our generaousity, but we should know that there is a higher power that gives “favor” to those who give freely. I hope to make clear to the readers that if your reason for giving is simply for repayment purposes or as cheap marketing tool, true reciprocity will not fully be realized. Expecting a return can not be the reason why we give; it is the joy of knowing that our generousity contributes to someone or something.
[...] His answer of how to get people to like you and establish long-term contacts is pretty old: “Give first and then you get”. Or as others call it more scientifically “the law of reciprocity”. [...]
[...] Law of Reciprocity | Internet Business Coaching by Terry Dean [...]
Hi Terry,
This is my first visit to your site, but will surely not be my last. Thanks for the great post.
And to answer your question:
This week, I’ll use your “Law of Reciprocity” or, as I call it “Giving for the Joy of it” to give the readers of http://www.centerofmuse.com & http://businesscoach.bellaonline.com more than just the usual “Wednesday’s Shameless Self-Promotion” opportunity and bundle even more of my coaching and webinar goodies for free and for cheap.
I get to see what folks want most from a special, they get good stuff for free and for extremely discounted, and hopefully some good connections and outcomes happen.
Thanks for the friendly challenge!
Meg
http://www.centerofmuse.com
[...] to your network of contacts before you need to request something from them. Some people call this The Law of Reciprocity. It’s the same basic premise: if you do something nice for somebody without asking for [...]
[...] according to the law of reciprocity, that friend owes you the same favor in return. This is how you gain your interest on the $1. This [...]
Hmm, something is missing there…. If Your friend gives You free 100 DVDs which he is selling for 100 $ each and You sell them at a discount (and advertise-tell everybody- that), than Your friends authority can be seriously compromised.I mean, why would somebody buy anything from him when he can buy it elsevere bundled almoust for free??. Not good. Please DO NOT expect me to send You free dvd-s. And as I do, use reciprocity to send me 100 dvd-s from Your production free. Than You bundle mine and sell I will bundle Yours and sell, everybody will win. Somehow I think that was Your friends idea.Or there are some details You did not tell us??
regards, Miroslav
Hi Miroslav,
I think you’re missing out on the lifetime value of a customer. Obviously when you do something like this, you’re not planning on making a big profit from THAT DVD. What you would be doing though is generating new customers who had never purchased from you before. These customers will then be likely to buy other products from you (assuming the one you offered helped them).
I’ve had deals like this multiple times. The obvious factor is you MUST have other products you profit from also for something like this to make sense.
In other words, you’re getting your products in the hands of people who may never have purchased from you…who can purchase other products from you.
In fact, I’m doing a deal like this soon where I’m providing products totally freely to someone else who will be discounting them in a package. My actual return gift -zilch…except the fact that now that person will be saying great things about my product with a limited number to offer (100 sales is a very small number for example).