Here are two marketing strategies you might like to try. Photo / 123RF
A marketing challenge for many businesses is how to compete successfully against low priced competitors.
Here are two marketing strategies you might like to try.
Strategy 1: Collect "it's worth it because" testimonials from your best clients.
All you do here is interview a number of your best clients on the phone.
Ask them why they chose your product or service instead of buying something cheaper from someone else.
What your client will tell you is "why" your more expensive product or service is 'worth it'. Then get permission to use your client's comments in your marketing.
I collected a number of client testimonials recently for a business in Sydney called Guru Projects. Guru Projects build and renovate cafes and restaurants.
Here is a small part of what one of these client testimonials says...
"Pricewise Guru Projects are not the cheapest in the market place. I could have probably had my café fit out done for $60,000 - $70,000 cheaper if I had used a shop fitter who was happy to do the work for a low price.
However, you have to compare apples with apples. I've seen the work of a number of shop fitters who undercut anyone at any price.
You definitely get what you pay for when you use people like this.
Their work is always rough around the edges. Now I'm very fussy about the finish and look of everything in my café. I want my stainless steel and tiling and everything else to look and feel great. If it's not perfect I'll rip it up and have it done again. With David all his edges were filed so there were no sharp edges for staff to cut themselves on, the tiles are all nice and even and look great."
Notice how this testimonial has a happy client saying this business is not the cheapest in the market place. However they are worth the extra money because of xyz etc.
When a happy client says it's worth paying more money for a particular product or service because of xyz, that is compelling proof for other potential clients to consider using this same product or service.
Strategy 2: Choose 'who' you will sell to
I had a fascinating interview with Scott Stickane President, House of Sticks.
House of Sticks is a marketing agency and they create websites, mobile apps and do high end video production.
Their typical project ranges from $30,000 - $150,000 USD.
Scott told me that his business has intentionally not sold to smaller businesses in order to keep their service quality high.
So they do a lot of business with companies in the Fortune 1,000.
He explained that his business 'House of Sticks' charges premium pricing for premium products.
They only make premium products, they only work with experienced professionals, they only want to work with companies that understand the value of marketing.
If clients are looking for very cheap prices they will either turn them down or pass them off to other businesses they know who will charge less but won't be in business long term.
Scott realised very early in business that there are a lot of low priced competitors in his space.
He saw that many of these people price their services to the point where the hourly rate is below the poverty line, but they never look at the total time spent as an investment or overhead, they just see the small final payment.
This has caused the market to accept and expect low prices for services and forced people like Scott who understand the actually cost of doing business to have to defend premium prices for what they do.
Scott is a big fan of educating the market about "why" it's worth it pay high prices to get great work done.
So he writes a lot of helpful articles on his blog to educate people on the basics of practical business school, how to price your service, how to collect payments, how to write contracts, why use a book keeper etc.
I particularly enjoyed his blog post on Good Cheap and Fast-Choose One.
Scott also makes sure that clients are impressed with what they get when they use any of the services his company offers.
So when they shoot a video for a client they might turn up with a crew of 12 people and do a two camera shoot. A low priced competitor will usually turn up with one or two people only and do a one camera shoot.
Clients can see instantly the value of using Scott and his team when they do this.
The reality is that there will always be low priced competitors for most of us in business. Two useful strategies to compete against low priced competitors are to collect and use 'it's worth it because' testimonials from your best clients and choose "who" you will offer your expensive products and services to.
"The quality will remain long after the price is forgotten" - Henry Royce
1: Collect 5-10 testimonials from happy clients about "why" your product or service is worth paying more for and use these testimonials in all marketing.
2: Choose "who" you will offer your expensive products and services to. You want to offer them to people who appreciate why it is actually great value to invest in a higher priced product or service because of the many benefits they will enjoy from doing this.
Discontent as KMD's sales for Q1 FY25 were down compared with last year.