Assuming you have turned up on time, you have asked lots of questions and noted down the answers, done a great sales presentation, measured up or whatever else is needed, clarified the questions and answers to the customers questions, walked through the quotation sheet properly, confirmed your guarantee, and focused on offering your customers tons of benefits and value, often the only objection you will get is the dreaded “price objection.”
NOTE: Price is always the last thing you discuss in the sales process, as you want the customer to focus on your quality offering and benefits in your sales presentation so they really want your products or services well before price is even mentioned.
Try to put price in its place. Price simply is not the issue many people think it is in business.
As with everything, handling price objections needs practice practice practice.
Here is how to manage a price objection:
- Don’t respond right away, slow it down. Because the prospect has not bitten your arm off at your offer then they have to be re-engaged.
- Ask if there are any other areas of concern to:
- a) buy you some time and
- b) get all objections out in the open so you can deal with them all
- Re-structure the deal and say something like …” If price is the issue, would you like me to take away this or that, or remove this aspect of the quote?”
- Since your customers will generally want real quality work, try this tip I use quite often …”We made a decision from the very start to compete on the quality of our work, not on our price. We lose a little business because of this every year but we gain a lot more than we lose, and we hope that’s the case here. And remember, we are the only company whose work is backed up by a 150% no quibble quality satisfaction guarantee.”
- Show them again written laminated testimonials from your impact folder
- Show how the cost is broken down into a daily amount eg “Do you feel that just .20 p a day is too much?”
- Show how you can spread the payments if you do a pay monthly scheme
- Be miserly, negotiate other things than price (use something with high perceived value but low cost as a bargaining tool)
- Sell packages, so if one level of service is too expensive, they have the option to go down to a lower level of service.
- Say something like … [look surprised, like people rarely find your price too high] “Oh ok. What sort of figure did you have in mind?” By indicating you are surprised about the objection the prospect is far less likely to come back with a very low figure. Then see if it is worth doing.
- Confirm the benefits, and restate the list of all the points that have been covered during the quotation.
You have done all the hard work to get the quotation in the first place … you want to save it if you can.
IMPORTANT:
If a customer quibbles about the price, often this is because you simply have not done a good enough job of proving how the benefits you offer match the price you are asking, or you haven’t asked enough questions to prove that you can meet and exceed the customers’ needs and expectations. But always remember that 10-15% of customers will moan about the price, no matter what the price is.
Exercise
You job today is to work out a number of scripts that can occur when the customers raises an objection.
For example, what are you going to say when the prospect says …
“That’s too expensive”
“I was hoping it could be done quicker”
“I wanted it in blue”
“I want something for that price that lasts longer”
Have a good think about how you can professionally answer any objections that will stop you from heading towards your closing pitches.
