Finding customers isn't usually the hard part of selling.
It's "closing" that can drive you crazy. You know the
excuses. They want to shop around a bit longer, they're not
sure they can afford the price, they need to get approval
from a superior. The list goes on and on. Your challenge is
to find ways to close prospects at a higher rate, and
thereby speed growth and increase revenues.
One sure fired way to increase revenues without damaging
your reputation, is to educate your customers into your
price increase first before doing it. You don't want to be
worried about raising your prices. Most people are afraid
to raise their prices.
For example, one of my original companies operated at a
marginal price just under the standard for the industry. We
got a lot of business and kept the customers coming
however, we didn't get much more business than the next guy
whose prices were higher. We were always afraid to raise
our prices and lose customers.
Finally, we did. We got just as many customers and
increased our bottom line by 35%. We then decided to raise
our prices again. Still - same amount of customers.
We ended up raising them even higher to almost double what
we had originally started at. We did lose customers at that
point. However, we had increased our fees so high that our
margin was still much higher than it was before and we
doubled our business. All by simply raising our prices.
We had already delivered quality work and were confident in
our products and services. All we did was raise our prices.
To overcome people just looking for price, educate them.
What we did was let them know about some of our follow-up
services, our customer service plan, things that we
naturally included in our service that other marketing
companies didn't. By educating them and showing them what
they were getting, they were more than happy to pay our
pnces.
Why would anyone pay more for the exact same thing? Once
they found out what we were offering, they didn't perceive
us as offering the same thing as the other marketing
companies. When you don't educate them, they perceive you
the same as the next business.
If all things are equal, they will choose the cheapest
price. Once you convince them and educate them, you no
longer have to worry about it. Price is simply what you pay
for something. Value is what you get. The customer wants to
know what he's going to get. Every customer wants to think
they're going to get good value.
Your customers don't really care about the low price,
especially if they're going to get bad workmanship and poor
products or services. They want value. If you give them
value, you might as well charge them for it.
Don't wait for them to tell you you're expensive or they
can't afford it. If they're telling you this, it's too
late. You haven't educated them on the value they will
receive from your products and services. You need to
educate them right from the beginning from the time they
request your no cost book or report. Your customers are not
automatically inclined to buy the cheapest thing they can
get.
Raise your prices. Get paid. You're worth it. If you've
built in a great guarantee, which should be one of your
strategies, then you are on your way to deliver quality
products and services to your customers at all times. You
do great work, give them great quality, educate them,
you're better than your competitors you should get paid for
it. If you believe you're worth it, then your prospects and
clients will believe it also.
It's "closing" that can drive you crazy. You know the
excuses. They want to shop around a bit longer, they're not
sure they can afford the price, they need to get approval
from a superior. The list goes on and on. Your challenge is
to find ways to close prospects at a higher rate, and
thereby speed growth and increase revenues.
One sure fired way to increase revenues without damaging
your reputation, is to educate your customers into your
price increase first before doing it. You don't want to be
worried about raising your prices. Most people are afraid
to raise their prices.
For example, one of my original companies operated at a
marginal price just under the standard for the industry. We
got a lot of business and kept the customers coming
however, we didn't get much more business than the next guy
whose prices were higher. We were always afraid to raise
our prices and lose customers.
Finally, we did. We got just as many customers and
increased our bottom line by 35%. We then decided to raise
our prices again. Still - same amount of customers.
We ended up raising them even higher to almost double what
we had originally started at. We did lose customers at that
point. However, we had increased our fees so high that our
margin was still much higher than it was before and we
doubled our business. All by simply raising our prices.
We had already delivered quality work and were confident in
our products and services. All we did was raise our prices.
To overcome people just looking for price, educate them.
What we did was let them know about some of our follow-up
services, our customer service plan, things that we
naturally included in our service that other marketing
companies didn't. By educating them and showing them what
they were getting, they were more than happy to pay our
pnces.
Why would anyone pay more for the exact same thing? Once
they found out what we were offering, they didn't perceive
us as offering the same thing as the other marketing
companies. When you don't educate them, they perceive you
the same as the next business.
If all things are equal, they will choose the cheapest
price. Once you convince them and educate them, you no
longer have to worry about it. Price is simply what you pay
for something. Value is what you get. The customer wants to
know what he's going to get. Every customer wants to think
they're going to get good value.
Your customers don't really care about the low price,
especially if they're going to get bad workmanship and poor
products or services. They want value. If you give them
value, you might as well charge them for it.
Don't wait for them to tell you you're expensive or they
can't afford it. If they're telling you this, it's too
late. You haven't educated them on the value they will
receive from your products and services. You need to
educate them right from the beginning from the time they
request your no cost book or report. Your customers are not
automatically inclined to buy the cheapest thing they can
get.
Raise your prices. Get paid. You're worth it. If you've
built in a great guarantee, which should be one of your
strategies, then you are on your way to deliver quality
products and services to your customers at all times. You
do great work, give them great quality, educate them,
you're better than your competitors you should get paid for
it. If you believe you're worth it, then your prospects and
clients will believe it also.
