Creating and maintaining the right personal image for you and your company

Yesterday I shopped at La Senza for a few camisoles. I bought some. I didn't buy them because of gimmick they used. There was a special price of 3 camisoles for $36. I would have gotten one even without that, because I needed one and the ones that were on the racks looked pretty. Moreover, La Senza usually have reasonable pricing .

What was a turnoff however, was that the salesperson tried to sell me the loyalty card ($20 to buy one, in which I'd receive 10% discount off purchases, plus I'd get coupons from time to time). I thought about it and said no, since I'd have to spend $200 in order for the purchase to be worth it. I don't buy a lot from La Senza - this is the first time in years. Then, she tried getting my email address - she said: it's free, and you get the coupons. I thought about all the junk mail I'd be getting if the company chooses to sell my email address to others. So I said no thank you once again.

The market place, as well as marketing experts, are telling us that we need to play gimmicks to promote our products, and play more gimmicks to make our customers loyal to us. Is it true?

I got the answer from a TV show yesterday, and also from a blog entry. In the TV show, grandpa told his grandson: if you have what it takes, you don't have to play gimmicks, nor do you have to be a "kiss as*. If you have to do those things, it's because you don't believe that you've got what it takes. You can always use gimmicks and rely on them for a while, whether those gimmicks are sucking up on people or some other things. But in the end, when those gimmicks leave you, what have you got left? Yourself!"

That was a big wake up call for me. I have been racking my brains trying out different promotional methods (gimmicks) to attract more prospects, and hoping to turn some of them into customers. They didn't work. After the TV show last night, I thought about my personality, and how I handle things, because there was a saying: how you do anything, is how you do everything.

I am not a person of gimmicks. People have said that I am a straightforward person, an honest person. Unpretentious. Genuine. I have never had to play gimmicks to make friends. In between relationships, I never had to play gimmicks to attract guys. In my current relationship, I never used gimmicks to attract my boyfriend (and this is what was, and still is, attractive in his eyes). In business, those who are my customers, haven't come to me because of any gimmicks I used. Yet, I had bought into the idea of playing gimmicks in order to have a better end result: more business. The whole process made me uncomfortable and unhappy.

I thought about the purchases I made - those that were from gimmicks, I have put aside and rarely touched them again. Those that I bought out of my own pleasure, I have used over and over. I am the type who researches on the product or service before using them. This way, I know exactly what I'm getting into. Gimmicks do not usually work on me. So what does that tell me about gimmicks? That they may attract customers the first time to use a product or service. But for the customer to be loyal, they have to have a need/want for further use.

So, I am returning back to my true self. No gimmicks. For those who want image consulting from me, they get what they see.