6:43 PM



Freetures Defined

You say "Enhancements", I say Freetures! You say "Added Value", I say Freetures! You say "Free Features" I say Freetures! No, this is not about gremlins, not about anything resembling gremlins or any other animal for that matter; but it is about value. An enhancement, though it does increase value in most cases can cost a buyer more. Added value means exactly as stated and can also be tacked on to the price of an item. Free features, the source from which freeture(s) originated are adornments and added benefits delivered with the purchase of a product or service at no extra charge/cost to the buyer, but I rather not repeat free features in rapid succession; thus the term "freetures"

For the purpose of this page, a freeture is defined as, "anything of value that is added to a product or service in order to enhance its attractiveness to a prospective purchaser without extra costs/fees to the purchaser". Freetures are utilized on a daily basis in the sales and marketing profession to attract a larger portion of the buying public and gain better market share.

A good example of a freeture would be a printer which usually retails for $200 that is added to the purchase of a $1,250 desktop computer and delivered to the purchaser for a total price of $1,250. In this example the freetured value of the package would be $200.

It must be pointed out that any item which has traditionally been provided with a purchase at no extra cost, like a sipping straw with the purchase of a soft drink or a refrigerator with the purchase of a single family home - in most places - would not fit the description of a freeture.

In the example above, if the waitress/waiter poured an additional glass or half glass of the same soft drink for the patron without adding it to the tab, the extra portion would be considered a freeture; or if a second refrigerator of comparable value to the first one was delivered to the home purchaser at no additional cost, the second unit would fit our "freeture" definition.

There are many instances where a freeture has made the difference between sales and non-sales of products and services. From automobile showrooms to insurance and real estate agency sales offices, and retail outlets throughout the world, freetures are helping to create sales and the various markets are better off for it.

The internet market has traditional been one of the largest utilizers of freetures but did not identify the various product enhancements and added value features as such simply because the term as it is being used here had not been introduced in such a manner; but nevertheless it remains that, based on our definition, freetures are abundant throughout the internet market place. We'll just have to find them.

Take websites, for example. Some websites cost money to build, and others don't. How do we recognize when a freeture is being utilized by a web host provider? Or you may ask, is it the website that costs the money or is it the hosting of the website that you pay for and the website is the actual freeture used to sell the hosting? Since a website is almost useless without web hosting, maybe we should explore this needed resource in an effort to answer our website freeture question.

Here's the suggested approach to searching web hosting companies for freetures. We'll look at five companies that currently offer web hosting packages to website owners who are entering the internet market place.

We'll compare what they offer with what we consider minimum website hosting requirements necessary to get a website up and running satisfactorily. We will then search for freetures in each of the web host's packaging.

For the sake of clarity, we will look at only one hosting package per 72 to 96 hour interval because we must then identify what we believe to be specific freetures when compared to our minimum standards web hosting package as outlined in the following paragraph. It should be a lot fun. Join me!

Our basic web hosting package will fit the following description:

At a minimum, a web host package should include server space of 10 MB, CGI-BIN, Server Up-time of 99%, Three Email Accounts, FTP Access, Web-based Email, A User-friendly Control Panel, Free Scripts and an Interface to let website owners know their website statistics. These are the minimum requirements based upon our basic plan standards.

Although we will only look at one web host every 72 to 96 hours, the names of the five companies will be provided here in order to establish a degree of continuity and keep the exercise as simple and balanced as possible. The five companies are Globat, Host Gator, IPower, Lunar Pages and Think Host. Each one can be accessed from the "Freetures" page on this the author's “Marketing Internet's Niche Treasures” website or simply by doing a search of the names mentioned above. More Freetures available at the site mentioned above.