When you have a product or service for sale, your main goal is generally for people to exchange money to acquire what you’re offering. They key to remember is that your product needs to literally be the best use of their money in that time.
Whether you’re selling a $2 soda or an $80,000 car, in either case that customer needs to feel that giving you that money is the best thing they can do with it.
I’ve shared before that once I bought a 20oz bottle of Coke for $5, and I considered it to be an amazing deal! At that moment in time, there was nothing else that I would have rather done with that $5 in my pocket. Particularly at lower price points, instant gratification will seal the deal.
In other cases, though, people need to believe that your solution is in their best interest in the long run. If someone spends $20,000 on a website, they’re not expecting huge results tomorrow but they’re confident that investing $20,000 on a new site is a better use of that money than anything else that $20,000 could do.
Josh Kaufman summarized this whole concept by simply saying:
Every time your customers purchase from you, they’re deciding that they value what you have to offer more than they value anything else their money could buy at that moment.
As a consumer, that really makes me pause and think. The next time I buy something, I’ll wonder if it’s really the absolutely best use of that money at the time.
As a business owner, though, it makes me remember that we always need to be showing a higher perceived value than what the monetary cost is, and then back it up with actual value down the road.
A great reminder to check in with the client along the way to ensure that not only am I delivering that higher perceived value, but that they also perceive they are getting it!