Is it time to re-evaluate your product and service pricing? Jason and Bridget are joined by eCommerce expert Wes Chyrchel
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How Often Should You Re-evaluate Pricing?
If you are running a business a large volume of with inventory updates, you may have to update your pricing daily. If you have a service-based business, update your pricing twice a year. A lot can change in six months. Maybe the service was too big or too broad, Wes mentions.
Be Aware of Your Costs Before You Price
You have to absorb hidden costs like shipping, handling, storage, item returns, software costs, hosting costs, and more. You have to charge to make a profit beyond these costs.
That said, automate as much as you can.
Video and Photo Matters – And Add Costs
The first rule of sales is to put the product in the customer’s hand. Online, that has to be done with compelling images and copy. Video and photo as well as powerful descriptors are very important in eCommerce. You’re competing against other eCommerce shops who have lover overhead.
“No question video is a big part of eCommerce these days.” Wes Chyrchel
How Much Do You Want To Make?
If you want to make $10,000 a month and you can do a 5-10 page website for $2500, then do a couple of those. Add in a few more features for a $5k site. If it’s complex like eCommerce, charge $10,000. Package your sites and understand how quickly you can complete the work.
“You have to convey overwhelming value.” Wes Chyrchel
Your customers come to you by talking to them. Part of conveying the overwhelming value (and preventing scope creep) is by creating the feature list with the client. Do this BEFORE the project starts. Anything not on the list can be done in Phase II (at a cost) after the website is launched. Protect that boundary and acknowledge the client at the same time.
Those conversations reinforce trust and helps build the list of features for each phase.
Publish Your Service Pricing
Don’t be afraid to put your pricing on your website. Price anchoring is really important; Nathan Allotey talks about it a lot here.
Believe in yourself, you skillset, and your worth. Set boundaries. Don’t allow customers to take advantage of you. Customers want the connection. Your site is your storefront. It exudes confidence or it doesn’t.
“You have to believe. You have to trust in yourself.” Wes Chyrchel
“Just because I learned to do something fast, doesn’t mean I charge less.” Wes Chyrchel
It may be better to not even look at your competetitors, Wes suggests. “It’s really a race to the bottom.”
What Kind Of Work Do I Need?
To keep the cash flow, well, flowing, you need a good mix of work. Long-term and short-term work are a much-needed combination. Also, don’t be afraid of having recurring revenue with products and services.
“A healthy month for a developer has long-term and short-term work.” Wes Chyrchel
Tool or Tip of the Week
This Tool or Tip of the week is brought to you by VendorFuel. VendorFuel is a next-generation shopping cart plugin that will ignite your eCommerce. Built using AngularJS VendorFuel lets you keep your customers on your website for the entire checkout experience. Start a 90-day free trial now and Ignite Your eCommerce at VendorFuel.com!
Wes says:
- If you’re doing drop shipping, don’t be afraid to go back to the manufacturer and renegotiate the pricing.
- Keep track of the brands that have the most problems; use that as a credit.
- Build in time to touch base with your service-based clients (30, 60, 90-day meeting).
- Advertise in the top x amount of states, not all 50. Look at your analytics to see where people are buying.
Jason recommends Keeper Tax. It’s an AI bot that helps you keep track of expenses than can be written off.
Bridget recommends woebot.io. It’s a really cool and free app for mental health checkins.
Do you have any tools or tips we should know about?
We’d love to hear from you. What are your experiences with this subject?
Tell us in the comments below.
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