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Accessorize Your Low Margin AV Sales

projector(beamer) lamp macro-shot

If you have ever been in the position of pursuing large sales opportunities, you would know that there are a lot of little things that come along and just aren’t worth your time to deal with. Although there isn’t a lot of money to be made on av accessories, there are still some compelling reasons your company should develop a delivery system to offer these add ons to your customers.

Visibility

Providing an easy way for people to order accessories through your company goes a long way in keeping you in the customer’s mind. Items such as lamps are reoccurring purchases and can allow you to get in front of your active and inactive customers on a regular basis. If they aren’t purchasing these accessories from you, they are getting them somewhere, and if you can make the process easier you can solidify your relationship.

Easy Referral

Being the “go-to” source and offering a competitive price will naturally bring referral business. This can even be though of as a lead generator to bring in completely new customers. It is widely accepted through many industries that once you have sold something to a customer, the barrier to the next sale is lowered. While this doesn’t guarantee future sales with a prospect, if certainly improves your chances.

But what about the “Cost”

It is true that in order to be competitive at pricing these additional parts, you may have to go in at pretty slim margins. Depending on your objectives and how you have your business set up, this may simply not work for you. That’s perfectly fine – I recognize that this is never going to be strategy that everyone can make work. I do however believe that if you can get past the “cost”, the advertising potential may outweigh the transactional margins.

Think of it this way… In order to grow a business you need to constantly attract more customers. Usually this can be accomplished through various forms of advertising, and there is a reoccurring cost associated with them. If you are able to mentally discount the “lost” sales margins and chalk them up as a form of advertising, it might make perfect sense. (keep in mind I am not an accountant, and there are probably some legitimate tax strategies that you might affect my argument)

Status Quo Need not apply

If you are able to think outside the box, there are ways to actually make money off of this as well, but it requires that you automate a lot of the work required for handling volume transactions. The bad news is that you probably don’t have a structure that lends itself well for volume. In order to actually make a profit at this, you could look at entirely different business models for that side of your business. There may also be some co-branded partnership opportunities that you could investigate.

Sure, the internet has hammered down our margins on AV accessories but I believe there are still opportunities in this market. I’d love to hear your thoughts on this – do you agree, or do you think I am totally missing the point? Please leave a comment below and let me know what you think!

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