‘All our customers care about is the price.’
I’ve had many CEOs tell me that over the years.
But it’s rarely true.
In fact, it’s been my observation that very often it’s ‘the business’ that is actually more price sensitive than the customer.
Any pushback from customers triggers that sensitivity.
Competitors lowering prices triggers that sensitivity.
Sales peoples ‘feedback’ triggers that sensitivity.
(Oh boy, that last one can really mess with your head!)
Anyhow, that constant preoccupation over whether prices are competitive enough is then projected onto the customer …
Who then only ever seems to care about price!
Seth Godin made a good observation about this when he said, ‘The reason it seems that price is all your customers care about is that you haven’t given them anything else to care about.’
And my colleague John Williamson put’s it like this, ‘All things being equal people buy on price. Which is why an entrepreneur’s first job when they get up each morning is to make sure things aren’t equal.’
To overcome this price sensitivity you have to get out of your own head and get inside your customer’s head.
Which means no more brainstorming or conjecture about what your price should be.
It means talking to customers to really understand what they value, what they value about what you do and ultimately …
What they value more than money.