A Special Black Friday Message

A Special Black Friday Message

On a cold Black Friday morning in 1997, I remember standing in a long line outside of a Circuit City with my Dad, brother, sister and Grandma in Clear Lake, Texas.

As a 12 year old kid, I was constantly hungry and across the street was a Waffle House.

I wanted nothing more than to ditch this line we were standing in and go get an All-Star Special (eggs over easy, grits, bacon, waffle and raisin toast for those of you interested in the details of how I get my All Star Special).

With a sign, I turned back to the line hoping they would hurry up and just let us in.

Here's the reason we were there.

The first 50 people got a free 20 pack of blank CDs, valued at around $10 and access to a bunch of other discounted electronics.

My dad had his eye on a TV which was the belle of the proverbial Black Friday Circuit City sale.

Black Friday is an interesting day.

The term Black Friday has its roots in Philadelphia when police officers had to work extra shifts and deal with hoards of people that would come to the city to shop after Thanksgiving.

Eventually, in the 1980s, retail marketers started to use it to promote sales and drive buyer action with scarcity.

You have two options as a business owner when it comes to Black Friday.

You can participate or you can not.

If you choose to participate, you can make some quick cash and it can become part of your annual marketing calendar.

It can be a great way to boost cash flow in businesses before the slow Christmas season.

You can also choose not to participate.

In this case, it's just a regular day and you keep sticking to your overall plan.

We have done Black Friday sales in PT Biz and Athletes' Potential before. We do not currently offer Black Friday sales anymore.

The reason why is, what we do is incredibly valuable and difficult to fulfill. It's also not right in our opinion to discount something that someone may have bought for the full price literally a week prior.

Here's what you have to ask yourself as a business owner — not just about Black Friday but in general.

If you want to be the sought-after professional in your market, you have to act like it even if you aren't yet.

I know that might mean turning down some quick cash in the short term but in the long term, your business reputation will carry a lot more weight.

The only exception to this that I think still lets you be the sought after professional but participate in marketing events like Black Friday is selling hands off programs or products.

If you have a great lower back program that you usually charge $200 for, make that bad boy $100 and get some more paying customers in your ecosystem.

If all you sell is solutions to problems and it requires time from you or your team, do not discount that.

Time is so limited and by not discounting your services, you visually look like a superior option.

Do you want to be the sought after professional with a waitlist or the discount business that is essentially giving out free CDs?

P.S. If you have a practice, check out our friends at PtEverywhere. We switched to their software to run our cash practice and it's been a game changer!