Avoiding price challenges

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I’ve addressed my principles for handling price issues previously, but I thought I’d share three tactics I follow when faced with immediate price issues.

You might be interested to know that I implemented these ideas after running across them years ago in a non-sales resource, Roger Ailes’ book, You Are the Message. He introduces them as ways to overcome attacks by an opponent, particularly in the political arena. I have found they work well for handling price challenges. They are:

Do something special. In other words, do something to differentiate your offering from your competitors. Offer additional services or follow-up products that build the value of what you sell.

Cause some confusion. Disrupt your competition’s message by raising legitimate questions, diplomatically, about their ability to match your quality over time.

Shift the argument. Focus attention on other aspects of the decision: your track record, their track record, guarantees, warranties, experience of your people. Focus on anything that will change the argument from a dollar for dollar comparison.

Buyers have to try to boil things down in an apples for apples manner. They’ll never make decisions if they don’t. But your job is to ensure, when it’s all said and done, that the money they will spend with you is money better spent for the value they’ll get in return.