The question that comes up EVERY time I teach price segmentation: “What if one customer finds out another got a better price?”
Think about how you would answer this before I give you the answer.
Preliminary answer: It rarely happens. When is the last time you told anybody how much you paid for something? When is the last time you asked? It just doesn’t happen.
I’ve been in business for many years and only once was this a problem. We sold a component to a smaller company at a better price than we sold it to a larger company that bought higher volumes. When the big company bought the small company, they found out and questioned us. We said, “Oops, we’re sorry. We will honor the best price for all of your business.”
Ok, but I still haven’t answered the question. What do you do when someone does find out and asks you? The answer is, “They bought something different.” Maybe they bought when …
- we had excess inventory,
- at the end of a quarter,
- when it was on sale,
- before we raised prices,
- before we changed the product,
- etc.
There are a myriad of reasons why one company pays a different price than another.
My advice, don’t let the fear of one company learning someone else got a better deal stop you from price segmentation. You’ll be missing out on a huge opportunity. After all, no two buyers get the same value from your product.
What other reasons could you provide? Share your comments on the LinkedIn post.
Now, go make an impact!
