In the previous article I talked about the reasons for having websites where prices simply aren’t mentioned. The first of these reasons is, I suspect, the driving one for most companies: it’s just a bit unprofessional/not very British/potentially offputting to discuss prices up front. Nobody does it in our market. That’s just the way it is.
Few suppliers will admit this, of course, and will cite one of the more tangible reasons. But there’s definitely a widespread school of thought that the job of the website is just to get the sales team in the door, and they’ll do all the grubby money stuff further down the line.
I do think this is a mistake, and increasingly so. I’ve mentioned the number of potential sales simply being written off by not discussing price on the website; there’s a group of people who won’t even enquire without having a decent idea of cost, and this may be significant.
A more practical reason is that the price list looks very expensive. But I assume there’s a good reason for this, based on features, benefits, tech specs, performance, reliability or even brand name. Presumably keeping the price list hidden in this case is because the traditional sales process has always been to get someone in the door who can be trusted to explain how the price/performance is actually quite competitive.
In the days when a website was just a bad brochure, this might have made sense. Today, a website should be able to get the price/performance story over as well as anyone in the sales team. In any market, consumer or business, the pitches which appeal to most customers are: “Our product does the job at a lower price”; or “Our product gives you extra at a justifiably higher price”. That’s what they want to know about. Anything else, and we’re going to be thought of as hiding something.
More tomorrow.