A host beneficiary program is an alliance strategy where one business owner (the beneficiary) supplies another business owner (the host) with the offer of something of value to pass on to their clients.

As a new business owner you would typically be the one passing on the gift offer to a more established business owner to pass on to their clients or data-base. It's a great way to get exposure for your business. And the only costs are the ones that apply when the new customer actually walks in the door.

Host beneficiary programs can take many different forms and open up almost unlimited possibilities for business owners with a creative streak.  However typically they fall into four main categories.
Category 1 - Gift vouchers
With a gift voucher host beneficiary the beneficiary supplies the host with gift vouchers or incentive offers for products or services which the host passes on to his or her data base or clients.
Examples:
.    The Coles/Shell Alliance is a perfect example of a Gift Certificate
system working in big business.  Every time you spend more than $30 at Coles you get a discount voucher off your next fuel purchase at Shell.
.    You are a real estate agent.  You arrange with local businesses to
provide you with gift vouchers that you can pass on to new home owners - these can include restaurant vouchers, a gift voucher for a local mechanic a complementary lawn mowing or pool clean.  Whatever works for you and for the new owner of the house you have just sold.
.    You are a massage therapist - you provide a local dentist with
vouchers for a complementary neck massage to pass on to their client. Once again a WIN all around when they happy clients come back for another massage.  And they will certainly be talking about that dentist!

Category 2 - Complementary Services
With a Complementary Service Host Beneficiary the Host company allows the Beneficiary company to provide some form of free service at their place of business.
Examples:
.    You are a naturopath  - you arrange with a local health food store
to provide their clients with a free initial allergy assessment.  The health food store is able to provide added value to their clients at no charge.
You benefit when some of those clients decide to continue with your services.
.    You are an image consultant  - you arrange with a local fashion
house to provide their clients with free introductory image consultations.
Not only do the fashion houses clients feel special, obviously you use clothes from that shop as part of your recommended solutions so sales are up. You use the opportunity to build your data base so that later you can up-sell  higher value services.

Category 3 -  Competitions and sponsorships With a competition/reward  Host Beneficiary the Beneficiary business provides the Host business with one or more gifts or prizes that can be used as incentives or rewards.
Examples:
.    You are a gym - you arrange with a local bicycle shop to provide you with at cost or below bicycles to include in your gym memberships over a limited period of time. The gym benefits by selling more memberships.  They bicycle shop benefits both from the exposure during the gym's promotion and from the return business from the customers who received the bicycles.

Category 4 - Thank Yous & Rewards
With a "give away" host beneficiary the client or customer is given a free gift or promotional product (provided by the beneficiary) when they purchase another product or service from the host.
Examples:
.    You are a massage therapist.  You approach a house cleaning company
and offer to give complementary massages as a loyalty reward to their best customers .
.    You are a hairdresser. You provide a local fashion salon with gift
vouchers for shampoo, cut and blow-wave to give to all of their customers over the course of a one month promotion.

Next week we'll look at the steps and "rules of the game" of effective host beneficiary strategies.

In the meantime please tell us about any host beneficiary strategies you have been a part of and how they worked out.

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