The Sebastian

Just a quick note to wish y'all a Merry Christmas

I'll be back here for some more serious blogging when I get back from my vacations in Buenos Aires...

I'm not a pricing expert, but the $9.99 (or $19.99 for that matter) pricing strategy is looking old to me. This guys say it works well. I say change the rules. If you are selling to a “smart” market, the $9.99 might even sound insulting. This can also be true in general for some cultures. So stop insulting your customers. Start respecting them, show them you know better. They are smart and they will appreciate that. Develop trust. Differentiate yourself.

How does a "Simply $10" sound instead of "Only $9.99"? Doesn't the first one sound more honest, fresher, uncluttered and more stylish? Aren't you tired of reading $9.99? If you were the customer, which one would you prefer? Do you really care about that penny? Are you really tricked into thinking it is less than $10 with the first one? I bet nowadays even your unconscious mind ain't buying. Change your strategy, give it a try, see what happens. Don't forget to measure and compare conversion rates.

Oh ... and also, with all those extra pennies, you could implement something else. For example, you could add a simple “win a free gift :-)” big, green and fun button with a fancy sound and display at the check out and give away a little something (personalized with your brand?) every 10 or 100 customers. Now that's something your customers will remember and may talk about.

P.S.: Here is a short review of the different marketing pricing strategies and concepts.

Go have a look at http://www.eff.org/share/petition/. Then go ahead and electronically sign the petition if you agree with it (I do).

I've decided it's time to continue a little bit on this series. If you haven't read them yet, here are part one and two, where I wrote about Why you should be blogging and What you should be blogging about.

Now it's time to talk about the Who. Depending on the mission and objectives (see part one) for your blog, you will want to write so that you can capture the readers that can help you get there. Your intended audience, that is. Think about existing and potential clients, investors, partners, suppliers, employees, etc.

As I've mentioned in part two, you should consider dividing your blog into different categories, each of them grouping articles that talk about the same main topic. One of the basic Marketing techniques is segmentation and orientation. Your categories help you do exactly this. Each category could very well represent a segment of your market and help you orientate your message to them.

A few targeted messages to each of your segments will be more efficient that only one message sent out to everybody. Tell the story that goes well with every segment. Even better, try to connect at the individual level (e-mail, comments, etc). Warning: telling different stories is tempting and is the right thing to do, but thy must have a common kernel among them, or otherwise you wont be building a consistent message (always respect your brand global message, your values and, once again, your mission).

For instance, if you are a Realtor (TM), you may have, for example, the following categories: Houses and Downtown Condos. Let's suppose Downtown Condos are very expensive and exclusive. Only very successful, wealthy individuals and families can afford them. Then you will want to tweak your message so that it is most appropriate for the wealthy readers interested on this market. This will allow you to create a better connection with them. For the Houses category, you may want to write having a family mother or father in mind. These are just examples, but you get the point.

Don't just limit yourself to think about the different content you will use for articles orientated to each segment. Think about the best way to connect with them. Be creative. Think about slightly tweaking your writing style. Include links or information regarding services, products, brands, referrals, free online tools, e-books, manifestos, lenses, books, movies, advise and other content your target audience is likely to be interested in. Remember to be human. Connect brands they already like with your own brand (e.g. review an Apple stylish product in your design category).

In other words: don't clog your blog with selfish content promoting your products or services. Offer your readers more than that, and they will come back often.

Once things start to work, care about Who is reading, and Who is reading each category. Use a good web statistics system to learn about them and how they use your website (I use, for example, phpOpenTracker). Also, keep reviewing and adapting your segmentation and orientation as needed. Flexibility and speed are some of your big advantages for being small, so profit from them! Warning: do not change your message too often, or you will end up confusing your readers and consumers. They need some time to digest your material. Be patient.

On the next part, I will talk about some clever and inexpensive ways to promote your blog by leveraging readily available technology and on-line services.

I hope you've enjoyed this part. This is just a collection of small ideas. Please help me improving them with your comments

A few days ago, I called my auto insurance company to pay my semi-annual bill. I usually send in my payments through online banking (a very convenient, free service with my bank), but this time I had been traveling a lot and was too close to the due date to do that. I had my credit card ready with me, but they wouldn't take it. They wanted a check-over-the-phone thing. I didn't have my checkbook with me (who uses checks today anyway?). How much more expensive would it be, for a company that size, to accept credit card payments online and over the phone? A small percentage, plus the setup, training and maintenances fees, minus the cost of processing checks from the people that actually use the credit card instead, minus the cost of handling the (first and) second call(s) (read ahead).

Although I don't think it is necessary, nor a good strategy for them, I would still be happy to (at least) have the option to pay a small extra fee for the convenience of using my credit card. How many clients change companies because of them being so restrictive (and cheap) at the time of accepting payments? Don't force your loyal clients to search for alternatives! Even if you are cheaper, most unhappy clients will be happy to move and pay more for a better service!

So, anyway, I called the following day with my checkbook in hand. This time, their routine was different. Unless they changed the process somewhere in between those two days, their guys were being pretty inconsistent (another expense to them). This time, they went through all possible discounts I could get, trying to lower my premium before I payed. I liked that. But the funny thing is, they got me a $2 annual discount because I am now parking my car in a covered garage.

A few days later I get my policy update in the mail (about 10 printed pages -in a kind of cheap paper-, inside a big envelope), indicating the new discount. The policy was good until next year, so they only had to send a new one because of the discount itself, not because of the payment. They never asked me if they could e-mail me that instead (not sure if that would be legal though). Oh, and yes, also their website looks like a big mess promoting all their services and products (instead of helping you get done fast with what you want). Now let's think about all this for a second...

What's the point of giving me a 0.25% discount when they had to pay for two calls (instead of just one, or zero if they would be really online), each of them about 4 to 5 minutes long to process my payment, plus the costs of printing, packaging and shipping the updated policy? What about my time? Am I happy with their service? No. Is the discount going to change my mind? No way! I'd rather have them streamline their website and processes so that they can save on unnecessary administrative burden, be more efficient, and use that to cover for the added costs (*) of accepting credit card payments and improving service level --and retain more customers (*).

To be fair though, they did get something right. The phone answering machine menu was very fast and there was a human answering the phone right after the first few seconds. So they are not that bad after all.