Price consistently

Importance of maintaining price consistently

Price consistently, one of the key issues we address when coaching small business owners is the importance of maintaining their prices. We know the impact discounts can have on profits, but there is a more invidious impact, namely unduly influencing your buyer’s behaviour in the long term.  If you discount frequently, what happens is it becomes the norm.  Rather than acting as a great call to action, pushing prospects to make a decision before the offer is withdrawn, the opposite can happen.

value price concept on balance scale

If they know you offer discounts frequently, then’s what’s the rush? There is simply no need to ‘buy now’ as they know another offer will be around the corner before too long!

And this can become embedded in the prospects thinking. It means they will be reluctant to buy anything you offer at full price, especially if other alternatives are freely available.

Discount code

Just recently Pizza Express has announced they’re struggling financially. They acknowledge that part of their problem is they discount so frequently, that few diners visit unless they have a discount code. And if Pizza express doesn’t have one, plenty of other restaurants will! Indeed type ‘pizza express dis…’ into Google, and it automatically completes the search to ‘Pizza express discount codes’.

And the sites listed are not just affiliates but the company’s own website! Pizza Express offers

The same issue comes with using the likes of Groupon – if people are only buying because of a big discount, in a highly competitive market, why would they ever buy at full price? And we all know if you compete on price alone, it’s a race to the bottom and can’t be won.

Price war

Don’t compete on price. Competing on price feels like such a natural path to take – but for most small businesses, it is the road to ruin. A big part of our coaching advice, is concentrating on delivering value and move out of the price war, leaving that space for your competitors.