I am sitting in a cafe on the island of Crete, writing this email, drinking icy lemonade and enjoying the beautiful view but my thoughts wander a few years back. I think about 2015, during which I was almost wiped off the market. I smile to myself because it was one of the most valuable lessons from the market I ever got. Since then, my business tripled in terms of turnover, profit and money for me. I have also gotten precious experience about business, especially the effect of low prices on your sales.
Curious what the lesson was about?
Yes? Then let’s dive together into the topic 🙂 It will be about prices! Surprised? Maybe, because if you know me a little, you might already know that I have never had low prices in my different businesses. What is more, I am an advocate of high prices aimed at the premium customer segment and creating premium products and services with high margins.
So what was my mistake back then in 2015 if it wasn’t low prices and low margin? Could there be anything worse than low prices and a low margin? YES! Average prices and average margin!
Now pay attention here. The problem didn’t lay in the lack of possibility of achieving my financial goals with the average margin! I can assure you that everything was right in terms of finances,
financial possibilities of the client segment, the maturity of my business in terms of the ability to reach the right number of people with my ads.
So what happened? What did I not foresee?
Well, I will tell you honestly that it turned out I targeted the most saturated part of the market! I had to face not only the greatest competition of other business coaches and business mentors (maybe it would not be such a problem, because my brand always differed greatly from others) but over 80% of offers from other industries that they targeted at this part of the market! In other words, millions of ads were targeting the same wallets.
And the person or even business budget of a given customer segment does not resemble Hermione Granger’s magical purse. This customer segment makes its decisions in a very different manner than the premium customer segment. If you target this client segment, you will face the situation in which they need to make the selection of what and when they will buy because they cannot afford everything they want and need at the same time.
So it is obvious that first they will choose e.g the renovation of their roof or visit at the dentist clinic or paying for new winter boots and coats for their kids. But that’s not all.
As a result, I decided that I had to increase my workload in active marketing and promotion to meet my financial goals. And of course, in the end, I generated the money I wanted to generate but … at a completely different cost. The cost was exhaustion, loss of energy and burnout.
What’s more, at that time I was alone with my kids from Sunday from 5 p.m. to Friday at 11:30 p.m., so I had to take care of the house by myself, take the children to school and extra-curricular activities, spend time with them, feed them and run the business of course. Does it sound familiar? Yes, I remember December 2015, when I asked myself – so what next?
Are you letting the business go, or are you changing products, prices and the customer segment?
What did I do? Well, since I am writing to you and I am doing well, the answer is probably clear. 🙂 And you? What are your prices? Do you feel that there are tons of offers for your customer segment and sometimes you feel like there is so much on the market that your customer is having a hard time hearing you? If so – check your prices and products – maybe it’s time to change yours too?
And if you feel like you need guidance here and some answers to questions like:
- How to start doing it?
- What is needed to transform my business?
- Or if it is at all for me and my business?
Then I want you to know that you can schedule 60 minutes strategy online meeting with me (meeting not selling pitch). On the call I will be able :
- to analyze the situation of your business,
- tell you what needs to be done,
- set new goals with you
- and give you a roadmap to your business success and check if I can help you achieve them.
You can schedule a meeting below.
Also, check out our other articles:
Take care!
Anna
