Competing with Other Suppliers who have a Lower Price

by Dave Kahle

Q.  How do you make in-roads with a prospect who is happy with another supplier, who is providing a similar product at a lower price?  Product is lower quality, but perceived as the same.

            A.  Sounds like a tough nut to crack.  Let’s think about this together.  The first question I have is this:  Is the potential of the account worth the large expenditure of time and effort that it will probably take to make progress in it?

            Some accounts just aren’t worth it.  It’s OK to make a cold-blooded business decision not to pursue some accounts and some business.  (Assuming, of course, that your manager agrees.)  The situation you described will take a lot of your time, and your success is certainly not assured.  So, first decide if your time is best invested in this account or some place else. 

            Let’s assume that you have decided that the potential is worth the time, or that your manager has directed you to hang in there on this account.  Now what?

            “Happy with their current supplier,” is the most common thing prospects will say to you.  It doesn’t necessarily mean that.  It could mean that they are too busy to spend time with you, that they don’t know you or your company and have no motivation to get to know you. It’s the catch-all comment that means a thousand different things. 

            Your job is to find some point of “unhappiness”– what I call “discontent” —  and then leverage that to create some interest in your solution.

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  Let’s start out with a little review of our own thinking and attitudes.  Your competitor is supplying a product that you think is not as good as yours.  But your customer is happy with it.

            In this case, your superior quality is a non-factor.  Who cares?  Evidently, not the customer.  The lower quality product is OK with him. 

            When we are selling expensive products, this is difficult for us to accept, but when we are in any other aspects of our lives, we understand this position totally. For example, I drive a Mercury, not a Mercedes.  Now I understand that a Mercedes is a higher quality product than a Mercury.  But I don’t care.  I’m not a big car person and I just want something that is comfortable and reliable.  The Mercury fits my needs perfectly.  So, while you can make a case that a Mercedes is a better quality product, the point is that I don’t want it.  So, it’s not a better quality product for me. 

            This is not difficult to understand.  I suspect that you, too, have not spent the additional money to purchase a  ... CLICK HERE TO READ FULL ARTICLE