As an entrepreneur and business manager it’s frustrating to be asked to lower your price.
It’s very frustrating for salespeople too if you have a salesperson or a team of salespeople on your team. And it’s frustrating for marketing too because they want to bring in the type of customer that will pay you for your product and service and appreciate it.
But being asked to negotiate the price is something that goes along with running a business. It’s part of many cultures in the world that price is negotiable and if you’re not prepared for that you could lose out on business or lose out on profit for your company.
Here are a few tips I have from experience – both my own dealings and observations of some really good businesspeople.
1. Offer Other Packages
One thing we do at Ghost Blog Writers is offer a few different packages. Our main package is the Standard option, which is a blog post that is 600-800 words. We don’t offer frequency discounts. Most of our customers are looking for 1-2 posts per week.
When we get potential customers interested in blogging, but who have a lower budget we recommend the short posts package. The posts are 300-400 words. The price is lower. The quality of the post is still good, but we write different post formats and styles. Maybe one quick tip instead of five in-depth tips or something like that.
So when people say they have a budget to work with or if they’re looking for a discount I often let them know we have that short post option.
You’re not de-valuing what you offer. You’re just offering something that fits the value of what the person can afford.
2. Discuss The Equal Customer Concept
Over the course of operating GBW I’ve learned that it works best for our situation if we treat all customers as equal as possible. It’s not always entirely possible. Some clients bring more work to the table, but for the most part we’re pretty equal here at GBW.
This works well for us because I don’t want us to rely too much on any single customer or even a small group of customers. I think that’s a dangerous and risky place to be. If you rely on one customer too much and that customer leaves you’re in trouble.
I don’t mention this strategy all the time when people ask for discounts, but I have mentioned it a few times. I say that I also don’t want the price to be too low because I know our tendency will be to de-value that client because they aren’t as profitable. It’s not something that happens on purpose, but it does happen.
3. Look For Partnership Packages
We offer agency partnerships here at GBW. Since our inception we’ve worked with a few agencies – marketing, design, etc. – and provide blog posts for their clients.
These customers are a little different to us. They do bring quantity in the form of posts and clients so we offer a slightly lower price point for agencies.
But I look at this as a partnership situation. We partner with all our clients, but this is one way we can work with different kinds of clients and prospects.
4. Identify Additional Business Ideas
Sometimes when a person comes to you and is interested in your service, but there is a price issue you might be able to find a new business model.
This has happened a bit in the website design world. Not every person or business that wants and needs a website can afford a custom website. So there have been new models that offer templates and themes. These are less money for the person that needs the site and because of the model it’s less money for the designers to develop and maintain so they can charge less.
If you get multiple and repeat questions about price maybe you can identify a different business model that you can start outside of your current business. I would start a new brand and business to separate the offerings so there isn’t brand confusion.
For example, a design firm might offer custom sites through their main brand while creating a different brand with a different name and website for templates and themes.
5. Recommend Other Options
If you can’t come to terms with what you offer and if you can’t find a new business model it’s still in your interest to provide something that will help the person who’s asking.
I’m a believer that you at least want to try to leave people with an option and solution even if it’s not with you. I’ve had to do this with GBW. I think you have to look at it as a long-term strategy for business and for life.
You never know if someone will come back to you in the future and you always want to make people happy because you never know when you’ll cross paths again. You don’t want to be out there burning bridges.
6. Be Selective With Your Customers
Finally, the main concept here is that you have to sometimes be selective with your customers. You’re not going to be able to please everyone and you also have a limited amount of energy and resources at your company. It’s better to focus on the people that appreciate and find value in what you offer than to try to win over the people that you’ll probably never satisfy.
That’s the approach I take with GBW. I would like to be able to satisfy everybody, but it’s just not possible. So instead of getting caught up in that I try to focus on doing the most for the customers that appreciate what we offer the most.
Final Thought
It’s a tough thing to deal with people that ask you to lower your price. Maybe you’ll just give in and do what they’re asking. That can be okay, but it can also be a slippery slope. It’s a balancing act and I’ve played it over the years with GBW, but the concepts and tips here in this post have helped me and I think they will help you too.