A potential client feels that crap at a bargain price is a bargain, not crap

[Amerigo Vespucci]

Earlier this week, I went to the office of a potential client who was referred to me by an existing client. This guy saw the site I did for my client, loved it, and wanted to talk to me about re-doing his. He called me on the phone last November, we talked 15 minutes, and when I tried to call him after that, he wouldn't return the call. When I stopped by the other day, the receptionist said "He's on the phone right now but said he'll call you." He's said this before. I knew there'd be no call.

So I emailed him today and he responded. He said he "may consider upgrading his current website with his current provider, who is willing to give him credit for money already spent, even though you have a superior product."

I responded, thanked him for his candor, and said "You know, I've had bad meals in restaurants. And when I approach the restaurant owner, they almost always offer me a free meal to make up for it. And as much as I appreciate their desire to make things right, I never accept the free meal, because a second bad meal at a discount isn't a bargain. It's just a second bad meal." Then I wished him continued success and said "Please feel free to contact me if I can ever be of service to you."

PEOPLE! They still think bargain-priced crap is somehow no longer crap. But I can say from experience that clients who base their decision primarily on price shopping are almost always the worst clients. I feel better taking this one off the list after this morning's exchange.

[elleng]

1. I absolutely agree!

Crap is crap; Cheap is cheap.

[rufus dog]

2. No doubt

A couple of time I did a favor for a partner and took on cheap clients. Major pain in the ass, always asking for freebies then complaining about not getting enough.

[Amerigo Vespucci]

4. Sales Guru Jeffrey Gitomer put it this way:

This is from page 74-75 of his EXCELLENT book "The Little Red Book of Selling."

It's all about the relationship. It's all about perceived value. Let's get one thing straight before we go any further. Not everyone will buy value. Thirty to forty percent of all customers will buy price. That's the bad news. The good news is 60-70% of all customers will buy value if you provide it to them. Lowest price is lowest profit. Every time you take a nickel off the top line price, you are subtracting that same nickel off the bottom line profit of the same sale. And here's the reality about people who buy price only: Cheap bastards are also a pain in the ass.

[Wait Wut]

9. "Cheap bastards are also a pain in the ass."

Ain't THAT the truth!! They're the ones that will come back time and time again with the most miniscule adjustments to a layout and then whine because you charged them for THEIR changes. Not my problem. I tell them up-front that customer changes are chargeable. They must think I'm kidding.

They're also the ones that want you to cover insane deadlines.

[Wait Wut]

3. Same boat.

I just gave up doing web sites in Arizona because there was always "some college student" that would do an entire site for $100. Didn't matter that they couldn't spell and wouldn't cross platform/browser check the sites. $100 is $100.

Now, I have people asking for full-color business cards. When I give them the price they say, "I can get them at Vista Print for $10". My response? "Okay." Then I stand there and wait for them to leave while they stare at me, expecting me to beg for their $10 order. Not gonna happen. Most of them come back after they see their $10 full-color business cards. The others just don't give a damn what they look like.

Experience and quality mean squat in Arizona. Faster and cheaper is the way to go.

[Amerigo Vespucci]

6. I got the "my son is working on one for us" line at a restaurant a couple of weeks ago.

Of course, it never happens, and if it does, it looks like hell, but their son did it, and it was free.

I normally charge $140 for business cards. I've gotten the "I can get them for $10" line too.

One time I was at a business group I attend and a friend was talking to me about doing cards for him. Another guy at the table said "You can get them for $50!" I wanted to knock this guy on his ASS. It was none of his damned business. But these days, price shopping is the norm. It just means that people who do this for a living have to be more aggressive and persistent in their efforts, and they can;t get discouraged if it takes as many as two or three times more passes to close a sale as it did in 2008.

[Chan790]

7. The world is infested with websites selling inferior results dirt-cheap.

Yeah, VistaPrint sucks.

FormSpring is the bane of my existence. I've developed a good rule, I won't work with or for people that have used crowdsourcing sites like Formspring to obtain shit-work at low-ball price. It's a meatmarket for bottom-dollar cheap-skate clients and freelance workers that lack the talent to hack it in their fields.

[Chan790]

5. Ugh...

been there.

They hire an inferior writer or marketer then wonder why their copy sucks. Come crawling back to me with their crap in-hand and are shocked that I'm still not asking less than I did the first time they approached me.

I tell them all "Good work pays for itself...bad work costs money. My work will pay for what they cost you and what I'm charging you ...or you can keep being a discount-shopping sucker."

[Wait Wut]

8. Oh, I love it when they bring crap to me...

...after they walked out huffing about pricing and ask if I can "fix it". Nope. I can completely redo whatever they need, but I won't "fix it". They pout and moan, but give in. Yeah, they saved a ton of money by having it done twice.

I have a customer I've been working with for over 10 years. Great guy, but his daughter started working with him and had taken a "graphic arts course" and said she could do all his layouts. He was hurting after the housing market crash (he's a big shot realtor) so he let her do it. He came in last week and handed me a stack of new ads he needs and said, "I'm sick of typos and crappy layouts. Just don't tell my daughter."

[Amerigo Vespucci]

10. One of my prospects had his daughter "working on his Website."

Met with him and his son.

The daughter fancies herself as a "graphic artist." She had a page design for the site, but it wasn't HTML...it was done in Photoshop or Illustrator.

So during the meeting...WITH ME SITTING RIGHT THERE...the son said "Dad, why would you want to pay him when (forgot the sister's name) has already designed the Website?"

I kid you NOT. This guy was a 20-something college student who, I am sure, was convinced that he knew everything, especially when it came to Marketing and Websites.

Then the dad told me he really wanted to do it, but all of his money was invested in his third location he was opening at the San Jose airport.

Two years later, his location in the mall has shut down due to lack of business. The airport location ended up in a "dead terminal"...hardly any traffic. That story made all of the local papers. He went up to his eyeballs in debt thinking he was going to have to grow extra arms to handle all of the business. Instead, on most days, he passes the time watching the tumbleweeds roll by and listening to the sound of lonesome ol' coyotes in the distance.

He still has the tiny hole-in-the-wall original location, which has been a family-owned business for over 100 years.

And the Website?

STILL DOESN'T HAVE ONE.

[SwissTony]

11. My brother is/was a carpenter and he started his own business 40 years ago

premised on the idea of "Good work for a good dollar" i.e. quality without the ridiculous prices. And my brother is/was a Nazi when it comes to good woodwork. Trouble was...he couldn't get a sniff from potential clients. He was seen as being too cheap and therefore as offering inferior workmanship. Funnily enough, he was often asked to come in and repair some of the expensive "work" carried out by his competetion (which he described as extremely shoddy) probably because he was "cheap". His clients often said they had wished they had got him in beforehand.

He left the carpentery scene. He's been a psychiatric nurse for 35 years.

[Amerigo Vespucci]

12. Japan

I have a friend from Japan. She told me about prices and perceptions in Japan, specifically in the area of "street bites," little snacks you can get along your journey. They amount to ridiculously small "snacks" for exorbitant prices, but because there is a perception in Japan that if you are paying more for it, it MUST be better, people pay the money and scarf down their tiny snacks.

So I have to go back to the Gitomer remark I posted above regarding selling value. In this economy, the numbers might have changed. The people who are buying strictly on price might have gone up...based on my ongoing sales efforts, I have to believe that's true. But the people who buy value are stil out there. They're just harder to find. MUCH harder to find.

[Throd]

13. That person did you a favor by revealing themself up front.

Being cheap is often expensive. A lot of tightwads are unable to see beyond the immediate cost. They can't see that saving a few bucks on the front end leads to long term negative consequences, often costing far more than the initial savings. In my design business I offer great service at a reasonable price. If people can't recognize and appreciate that, then they won't know a good design from a shitty one anyway, so I tell them to save money a get a shitty one.

About once a year I get to be unflinchingly blunt with some cheap idiot bastard.

[Amerigo Vespucci]

14. I agree completely

The fact that I've been burned in this area in the past is what led me to force his hand.

[HopeHoops]

15. Trust me - it's best to just drop a client like that. Nothing but grief. Been there, done that.

[Amerigo Vespucci]

16. Absolutely.

When a potential client asks "how much" and I tell them and they say "OK," that's a good client. When they tell me they need to think about it or talk it over with their spouse (or respond with anything other than "OK&quot it's time to say "goodbye and good luck" to that individual.