Are You Charging Too Much or Too Little?

Why do people buy milk or bread or cereal or soda at the gas station convenience store when those items are far less expensive at a grocery store? Obviously, they have a need for the items. More importantly, buying at the convenience store is quick, and you guessed it, convenient. And "quick" and "convenient" represent value. They fill up with gas, run in and pick up the items they need, and they're on their way. No hunting for a parking space. No grocery carts to dodge. No long checkout lines. How much prospects are willing to pay for your product or service is tied directly to how serious the problem is that your product or service solves for them, plus how much value they believe they are receiving. The combination of how badly they need it, plus how much value they receive calculates into the amount they are willing to pay. So, the question is not how much to charge for your product or service, but rather how to correctly identify their real pain and then add value. The process for finding pain with a prospect should be consistent with just about every prospect. As we've said, "If there's no pain, there's no prospect and no sale." Good salespeople have a series of discovery questions that they learn to ask to diagnose if there is really a problem they can solve for their prospect. The more pain they can identify to solve for the prospect and the more serious the problem that is being solved, the higher the price! When it comes to value, certainly tangible value can be added by bundling in additional products or services at little or no additional fee, but so many salespeople never capture a truly significant value for which the prospect is willing to pay - YOU! Prospects need to feel comfortable with you. They need to feel confident that you not only understand their situation, but are also competent to address it effectively, boldly and efficiently with your product or service. So, your people skills, your ability to create rapport and communicate effectively with prospects, and your thorough understanding of their needs, wants, pains and goals are intangible, but critical elements that add value to your product or service. When you focus your attention on developing your people skills and your knowledge about how your product or service addresses your prospects' needs, you won't have to wonder about how much to charge-price will take care of itself. Let me give youseven ideas for creating "You" value with your clients. • While it's true that clients do business with people they like, it is equally true that people do business with those who "like them." • Two on-off switches when meeting new prospects:

 Find something to like about them.
 Treat them as the smartest person in the world until proven differently, not as the dumbest person in the world until proven differently. • Be curious about your prospects. Become really curious about who they are, where they're from, why they believe like they believe, and why they are doing what they are doing. It will be infectious with your client and with those around you if you have a serious curiosity about other people and what they are doing. • Take your job seriously - not yourself. As someone once said, ego is a serious disease; it affects everyone but the person who has it. • Smile a lot. Listen more. Talk less. • Learn to tell great stories. People think in stories and relate to people who can tell great stories that connect to their subject. • Learn to ask questions - it will serve you better than learning a second language