The most
common complaint we get today from business owners is
that they can't compete with the big guys on price.
The perception in the market place is that people are
shopping on price alone. If that were true then car
parks everywhere would be filled with nothing but Fiat
Uno's.
The only reason your customer asks the price up front
is because that is what they have been trained to do.
How many times have you phoned or gone into a business
not really knowing what model, style, colour or features
you were looking for and just asked for the price? At
this point did the sales person come back with "that
is £29.95" or did they ask you some questions
about what you were looking to use the product for?
Let's look at an example and let's say you are looking
for a coffee maker. Now in most people's eyes a coffee
maker is a coffee maker but they have many different
features and offer different benefits. So what if the
sales person simply said to you when you inquired about
price, "just so I can help you best is it OK if
I ask you a couple of questions about what you are looking
for?" Would you have answered yes? My bet is that
the answer would have most definitely been yes!
The sales person could then ask questions like; are
you looking to replace an existing coffee maker or is
it a gift for someone? Do you regularly use your coffee
maker or is it rarely used? Are you looking for something
to match your kitchen? So what colour are you looking
for? Is it important that it has an automatic shut off?
Coffee makers come in different sizes; do you require
10 cup, 4 cup or is a single cap capacity a better size
for you?
From these questions the customer gets the idea that
the salesperson is genuinely interested in their needs
and is able to offer options on the most suitable coffee
maker for their needs. The price is therefore negated.
It is just a matter of now asking the customer for the
sale.
A good salesperson would then ask, "based on what
you have told me and what we have discussed there are
two options to choose from, model X and model Y, which
one suits you best?"
This example was based on a coffee maker, a relatively
small dollar item, and you may be asking yourself how
does this apply to my business? This process works equally
well on cars, appliances, furniture, service based business
and any other product I can think of, including funeral
homes. We just need to work out what our customers
are actually looking for when they ask for the price
and what's most important to them in their buying decision!
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