Finding a middle way
The other day, I reached out to a company that offered a product priced for (a) nonprofit companies and (b) corporations with up to 15,000 employees.
As you can imagine, (a) was cheaper than (b) by a significant degree—think $250 versus $2000.
As a small business owner who uses a few subcontractors to handle things I can’t/don’t have time for, I’m not quite in the (b) arena. I don’t have any employees. I also don’t run a corporation (Club Ed is an LLC). But I am also not a nonprofit.
So I reached out to the company and said, “I know I don’t qualify for (a) but I’m not really in the (b) league, either; that price is far more than my budget. Is there a possible intermediate solution?”
The answer was that I could take (b) or fuck off.
So I fucked off.
I mean, I was perfectly happy to pay some amount between $250 and $2000, but I’d be just as happy to give that money to their competitor, or to stick it back in my pocket and not bother with the product at all.
Now, I don’t know the ins and outs of their business, obviously. But apparently they can sell the product for $250 and make a profit (or they wouldn’t be doing it), so you would think that they could therefore sell it for more than $250 (which is what I was offering). It’s a digital product, so it’s not like selling one to me at $500 impacts their ability to sell one to a huge corporation for $2000.
Of course it may be that there is some reason why picking a number between $250 and $2000 is impossible; maybe they’ve never heard of averaging or of the existence of random number generators. Mostly, though, I think they’ve staffed their sales desk with an employee. Someone with an entrepreneurial mindset would have come back to me with the question, “Well, what is your budget?”
As an entrepreneur myself, I personally never get tired of counting money and don’t mind at all if people want to pester me with it. So, here are some thoughts about negotiations (which is what I was trying to do in the above-described scenario) that may just help you put a few more dollars in your pocket:
1. Don’t let negotiations freak you out, whether you’re on the delivering end or the receiving end. Don’t just say “no” as your default answer (or “yes” either). Use “give me a few minutes/a day/a few days to think about it” and then take that time to actually think about it.
2. Decide what your bottom line is ahead of time. I wasn’t paying $2000 for that product, bottom line. I don’t accept $650 to do a DE, bottom line. And so on.
3. If someone wants to pay more for something, let them.
4. If someone wants to pay less for something, don’t just say “yes” even if you’re desperate. Change the deliverables. If your coaching package is $375, maybe you can reduce that to one hour of coaching for $150, if that’s what’s in your client’s budget. If your DE is $2500, maybe you can offer a ms evaluation for their $650. You don’t just give up something; the client has to give up something, too.
5. Talk to some colleagues if you’re not sure what to do (after you’ve followed #1).
