Perceived Value Depends Entirely On The Person…
Often we fall into the trap of assuming that our clients and prospects already know what our products and services are valued at. We figure that they understand the work and effort involved, we expect that they know what they would normally pay for the service.
These assumptions we make are sometimes true, but some people are clueless as to value, or some people don’t mentally calculate value without being told…
A good example is the person who walks into the grocery store and only buys products which have “Special” on them… They don’t calculate and just assume that they’re saving money! Personally I’m a little bit of a scrooge and always try to get the best value possible, But I’ve met plenty of people who have completely different buying habits to me.
Anyway… The main point of this post is that I want to show you some simple ways that you can control people’s perceived value of your products and services to ensure people don’t under-value your product or service.
Here are three easy tactics that are so simple, yet are rarely used.
#1 – Put a Dollar Value On Your Product / Service / Time…
It is such a simple technique and works amazingly… This works particularly well when you are adding value to a product or offering something for free or at a discount. The key here is to show people what great value they are getting.
I know plenty of real estate agents who offer “FREE Appraisals” – now this over-utilized term has ZERO impact in the market-place now, the perceived value of this is $0. If I was an agent I would put a value on my time and call it something different so people actually value it. “Detailed Property Value Calculation, Normally $197, but yours FREE if you act now!” as you can see it suddenly has a higher perceived value!
Anytime you offer something FREE – put a value on it. – FREE Quotes, FREE Consultations, FREE Trial. – If it has no specified value then it is often heavily devalued in your prospects eyes. Do not let your prospects assumptions set the benchmark for the value of your products.
#2 – You Already Offer Massive Value – Tell People Everything!
Decent businesses tend to already be heavily customer focused and they usually offer a huge amount of extras to their clients, but these extras are only ever found out about after the purchase…
It’s insanity in my eyes. If you are going to offer all the little extras, you should at least tell them up-front in case it is the deciding factor between using you or a competitor.
A good example of this is when you sell a product that may require a few questions answered from time to time after the purchase. Most businesses will happily answer questions and queries about the product, and they don’t even mention it at the point of sale… Instead what should be mentioned before the sale is “2 years unlimited phone and email support (valued at $397)”
Another thing I see a lot of businesses doing is 2 services, but only charging for one. An example that hits my head first is someone who does massage. They charge $90 for a hour. But during that hour they also spend the whole time giving health and lifestyle advice, plus if the client is sitting they’ll give them a foot spa too!
Now saying you’ll get an hour massage for $90 sounds okay, but it’s not irresistible. Try this on for size, nothing done different, just presented differently!:
| Limited Offer! – This month, when you get an hour massage for just $90, you’ll also have the opportunity to also spend the hour receiving FREE expert health and lifestyle advice which is normally $90! Plus you’ll get a FREE foot-spa bath that’s normally $45.
That’s $225 value for just $90! But you must book in before <DATE> or you’ll miss out! |
As you can see it makes a normal service seem like a great offer, and the little extras are all valued for what they are and not just assumed to be worthless Freebies. And the best part is people buy on value – not price…
EG – would you prefer the above $245 service for $90 or just a regular massage from a competitor with no extras for $75? – 7 / 10 people will buy the dearer one based on value not price!
#3 – Case Study Proving The Amazing Value
Much like testimonials, case studies use a client’s experience to prove that your product or service delivers what you promise.
What you want is case studies where someone has used your product and it has saved them a lot of money. Eg. – for a quit smoking program it may be $500, but if you use a case study of someone who has been spending $100 a week on cigarettes for the past 10 years (over $50,000) and now just 6 months later, they have not only got their health and lifestyle back, they have also saved over $2500 on cigarettes!
In the above example, someone else’s experience proves the potential value of the product. Usually you can somehow work a dollar value into an experience because people tend to calculate value in dollars.
A Quick Summary
Just to sum up what I’ve said here is basically that you need to tell your prospects what your product / service / time is worth in dollars otherwise they could possibly under-value it. The three suggestions I made were put a dollar value on everything, list all the little extras and use case studies to prove the value!
I hope you try the above tactics out in your business. – It’s amazing how much more appreciative clients are when they are aware of the great value that they are getting.