slowed me out of it....

[greenoak]

i have a new phrase for you maybe....we learned it from an old customer....slowed me out of the deal....
it happened yesterdsay to me....i am so busy right now, with getting ready for a big store event that really transforms the store parts, and have new people in working , and just a lot going on.
..this man comes in looking for work, he is a laid off carpenter.....my 3 carpenter crews ore older guys and i might be interested in a new guy.. ...i figured i should see what this man was offering and what his price range would be....so i broke away from my work to talk to him...i gave him 3 chances to let me know if he could do what my guys do and what he would charge....roughly....
he had made something that we make....and my question was what would you charge me to make that? we were looking at church pews and i ask him what he would charge to cut one down, he had just cut one down for someone....
he just couldnt answer....he didnt have any clarifying questions.....he wanted to talk about the one he had done for so and so....he went on and on..i tried again on the other example.. ,
he had no imagination he couldnt generalize, he couldnt give me a ballpark idea...he couldnt see that i was kind of interested in his work and was giving him a chance ,,,, and needed him to try and show me what his price range would be........... he couldnt think i can do this in 2 hrs, i need 20 an hr it would be 40$..... and more if i had to pick up and deliver.... and this is a guess...
so i just dropped the idea of talking to him anymore...i wasnt getting anywhere....maybe we would have been a good match...and i have a lot of work for carpenters....but
he slowed me out of the deal........ ...

ive thought of that phrase and the bad situation it describes a lot.....and definitely try not to do it to customers....
ann

[billbenson]

Different sort of business, but I have done a lot of work to quickly make quotes. I can't always do it, but customer calls, he's looking at the web site, I say click on the contact us link, he gives me some information or part numbers, it takes me 20 seconds to do a quote. Copy and paste and he has a quote in front of him. Doesn't work all the time, but I get a much higher closure rate by getting the quote out fast.

[vangogh]

I like the phrase Ann. I've had things like that happen to me. Not just with my business, but in general where I've been interested in buying something and asked a question question about it, but never got an answer. It doesn't take all that long to lose interest.

I guess this is the idea behind ABC (always be closing)

[KristineS]

I like that phrase.

It just goes to show that you have to be attuned to your potential customer. Adjust your style to theirs and you'll probably make the sale.

[greenoak]

another part of it is being able to generalize.....so often i need a general ballpark answer , if the carpenter wanting a job said , most would be around 80$, that was all i would need.....and i can realize that the exact answer might be a bit different.....
like if im trying to sell something and they want different handles, i know its around 10$ so i would say 10$ more ....that is much better than going away from the customer and getting the real number which would be within 1$....or if i have a store owner on the phone and they want to talk about counters, im going to say betwween 350 and 400, thats the correct ballpark, im sure not going to say i cant answer that ill go get the numbers and call you back....that would be slowing them out of it......
love bills example of giving a quote so fast...wow, i bet they are happy to get that!!
ann

[vangogh]

Just to throw in the opposite side to the discussion there are times where people don't offer enough information to be able to give them even a reasonable range for the cost of something. I don't think that's your case Ann, but I know some people approach me asking for a price without giving me the information to give them one.

I get emails all the time that ask "how much for a website" I always respond asking for more information. How many pages? What functionality does the site need? Without at least some idea of what's the site needs to be it's impossible to quote a price.

[billbenson]

Just a thought VG. Have you ever thought about putting up an online quote generator? You could have a form with check boxes for WP, Joomla, custom, etc., number of pages, SEO, copy writing, graphics etc.

I don't know if it would work for what you do or not, but I have never seen it done. You could give a price range and disclaimer as well. Maybe mandate an email address and phone so you can call and close?

I don't know if that makes sense for you or not; just a thought.

[greenoak]

or maybve a sample with a price...and another higher....
i can do this for you for this$$$$ and this better one for this$$..
it might save you some time on your emails....
my dh is great at details and he can hardly ever talk ballpark or generalize....luckily im the buyer and seller and he does the books....he cant brainstorm either...he needs all the info...its so good to have someone like that do the books or look at the final idea and say it sounds good....but i need someone to brainstorm with too!!! its just too squishy for him.....

[vangogh]

Bill I used to see those, but not much recently. I don't think people filled them out much. The hard part is you can't really price things based on simple form questions. Price isn't really about number of pages. When you design a site the majority of work goes into the first page, which becomes the template. It's more about the functionality of those pages.

I still see people pricing based on a rate per page and then add additional for a form on the page. But even with a form is it a simple name, email, comment, or is it something complex that ultimate is reading and writing to a database.

Ann when people send me the quick email without much detail I send them back a quick email asking for details along with a low and high price. The range is pretty large, though. Experience has taught me that anyone emailing with the question "how much for a website" is probably not someone who's going to turn into a great client. Still I don't like to assume so I respond as best as I can. I ask a few simple questions to get the details from them and give them as good a range as possible.

I describe how I price on my design rates page. On the old site I did the math for people and displayed a table with prices, but no one ever looked at it. At least no one who ever contacted me for work.

I'm not complaining about any of this by the way. I don't see it as much of a problem for me or my business. Those quick question emails actually help me sort out serious inquiries from not so serious inquiries. I just wanted to offer a counterpoint to the idea of being able to give out a quick estimate for how much something will cost. For some products and industries it's easy to quote a price, but for others it can be hard without knowing the details of the project.

I can tell you my hourly rates before you finish asking for them, but in order to tell you how many hours something will take that often depends on the details.

[billbenson]

I would think, Steve, that a web designer is either hired on price by someone who doesn't really know what they are doing, or on reputation / recommendations by someone who has either done their research or knows something about web design and web marketing. Probably not a lot of middle ground. Especially a one man show such as yourself. It doesn't surprise me that you don't think a form would be effective in your business.

Just as a footnote, the place I have bought my last several pc's from is a clone shop with a pc builder form on the site. It's nice to be able to select the configuration you want and get a price now. I think certain businesses can close a lot more business using that approach.