Dear all,
I live in a fairly small country with a small market.
I recently launched my company, finally, but I have an issue. Out of 9 out of 10 requests are from competitor companies who are fishing on prices.
To be honest, having companies set up fake domain names and pretend to be original clients is somewhat puzzling to say the least, is this normal? Do other’s experience this problem? Maybe I am missing something.
what’s wrong with telling anyone, including your competitors, your prices?
sounds like the general public might want to know too
aren’t your prices displayed on your site? if not, why not?
I love your questionning, no my prices are not displayed on my site.
Each solution is catered towards each client, and no single client is likely to have the same price as their all different. I do have some packages, but I’ve not put anything on the site. Maybe I could add my prices on the site. I don’t see there to be a problem with that in particular. I thought it might be best to send them an official proposal for the work carried out after gathering a solid idea of what was needed.
The general public are more than welcome to know the prices.
You will get competitors fishing for your prices, plus they’ll also be on the look out for your sales and proposal techniques. You seem to be able to spot these competitors, so hopefully it won’t be too much of a problem.
As for displaying your prices, that’s really personal choice and practicalities. If you just charge hourly or offer set ‘packages’, I can see why it would seem obvious to put the prices on your site. Beyond that, if you offer bespoke services for fixed fee per project, it would be hard to put anything up beyond ‘guideline’ pricing, which can quite often backfire as customers can fixate on the lowest price and feel disappointment when their project is quoted higher.
Sega, my advice for you is to first arrange for an initial phone or face to face meeting with any potential clients, so you can gather info and give them a rough estimate of costs - most of your fishing competitors will naturally wish to avoid such direct contact so will walk away.
Avoid writing ‘proposals’ for any general enquiry, you’ll end up wasting a lot of time. I’m also weary of any prospect who demands a ‘proposal’ upfront - I’d rather spend an hour talking to them and get a verbal agreement to do business, and then write up that agreement for them to sign. That way, every ‘proposal’ I write always gets signed.
BTW, how did you work out these enquiries were from competitors?
Do you talk to them over the phone, or do you see them in person? I really have to change the way to I do things in order to progress.
BTW, how did you work out these enquiries were from competitors?
One of those companies had a domain name registered to their web design company and not an individual person or other organization.
Another company did not want to arrange an appointment.
Another did not want to give me their contact details.
That’s not necessarily indicative of it being a competitor, you’ll get plenty of enquiries like this from all sorts of people. Some people won’t want to make an appointment because they are just in the early stages, or are worried they may be pressured into something - many genuine customers simply have no idea of the costs involved in getting a site up there, and just want to get a rough idea before they dive into choosing a vendor.
There’s plenty of different ‘buying processes’ out there, each prospect is different, you just have to adapt to each customer accordingly. Just make sure whatever you are doing fits well with the way you wish to conduct your own sales processes, but be prepared to make some compromises when required.
Do you talk to them over the phone, or do you see them in person? I really have to change the way to I do things in order to progress.
There’s no set answer to this, and in the end, it’s something you have to make a judgement call on, which is where experience will come into play. I always try to engage the prospect over the phone or email for as long as I need to suss them out and work out what stage of the buying process they are (10-15 minutes, or a couple of emails usually). I also try to assess whether we’d be a good ‘fit’ and whether or not I can actually do what it is they want, at a price they’ll be happy to pay. If they tick all the boxes, we can spend more time talking, phone, face to face, whatever seems suitable.
I’m not a fan of driving around all day in meetings with potential clients, it’s very time consuming, so I save that for only when I am confident I have a good sale on the cards. Of course, if a big company rings and wants a meeting, I’m in my suit and straight down there. You just have to take each prospect individually.
On the flip side, some developers seem to do everything by email or instant messaging. Again, different clients, different methods.
Thanks for your advice. I had an appointment yesterday and it went quite well. Giving quotations over email probably isn’t the best solution.