Have you done your research?

I had an interesting experience the other day while requesting a quote. I was looking to find a bulk SMS service provider for one of my clients and while asking for prices one lady said to me, “When it comes to this kind of product, you get what you pay for.” Now normally this would be a good marketing line, right? As any high-end supplier would tell you – We are all about the value that comes with paying that little more for extra service or higher quality. However it slightly backfired for this company, in that at that time they were the cheapest of the 5… So how does a well-used marketing line that works for many high-end companies completely backfire? When you don’t know you’re competition! At the time I was definitely interested in the product, and for what we needed we just needed a low-cost service, but when she said, ‘You get what you pay for,’ all of a sudden my perceptions changed – it actually made me want to go with one of the higher-end companies for their extras! And I’m sure that’s not quite what they had in mind…

Moral of the story – Make sure you do your research, you don’t want to be trying to convince your customers to pay more, because you’re the best if you’re the cheapest – and you don’t want to be marketing yourself as the cheaper option if you’re not! Likewise, if you’re middle of the range, you have to make the most of it and focus on the value. Customers want consistency and if your branding and pricing strategy aren’t consistent they will get confused and go somewhere else! Even if it means paying a little more, and wouldn’t you rather be the company they were coming to?