Do all you ever hear is “Price, Price, Price?”

That is all I ever hear in any dealership that I walk into. If you want to learn how to deal with “Price, Price, Price,” then you need to learn why people actually buy. The answer is actually very simple, when value exceeds price by one dollar, your customer will buy. There are five major categories that build value to a customer. Before you ever try to sell anyone anything you must understand these five value building categories.

1. Saving the Customer Time – Typically a vehicle will not really save a customer a lot of time. However, you can build value in your dealership and your services by showing the customer your value their time and offer ways to save them time during the sales process and after the sale.
2. Saving Money or Making Money – There are several different ways that your vehicle or offer can save the customer money, such as the vehicle being on sale or your offer already being discounted. The vehicle may also save the customer money compared to their current situation. For example: their current vehicle gets 10 less miles per gallon of gas than the vehicle they are looking at buying from you. This can add up to significant savings over the life of the vehicle. Additionally, a vehicle can help a customer make money. Such as a van being able to carry more deliveries than the businesses current large car. You must be prepared to do the math and present the value in the saving or making money.
3. Fear of Missing Out – This is a natural human instinct, no one wants to miss out. This builds value by creating urgency. If your product is newly released, in limited supply, or maybe the incentives or pricing is only available for a short time. You can use this to create urgency and build the value in that your product is extremely popular and the customer needs to purchase now before it is too late.
4. Providing Pleasure – People love to enjoy things and many of them believe they “deserve” this pleasure. You can build value in your product in areas that your product will bring pleasure to the customer that their current vehicle does not. Additionally, it is very important to get the customer envisioning enjoying your product.
5. Solve a Problem – This is the single most important area that causes someone to buy something. In almost any case where a customer is looking for a product, they have a problem they need to solve. Everyone has probably heard my “sell the hole, not the drill” story and this is your customers, hole. Sell the customer your solution and not the vehicle and very quickly your product becomes less about price and more about the value of owning it! You must be prepared with the skills to determine the customers problem, selecting a vehicle that solves it, and most importantly presenting and demonstrating how your product solves the customers problem.

The best way to sell is to combine all of these value building categories.

Saving the Customer Time

“Mr. Customer I understand that your time is valuable, so not only will we complete your transaction today in the shortest amount of time possible, we will save you time during the entire time you own your Model X by picking up and dropping your vehicle for every time your vehicle is due for maintenance. Over the lifetime of your vehicle that is going to be a huge times savings, wouldn’t you agree?”

Saving Money or Making Money

“Mr. Customer, your new Model X is going to get 10 miles more per gallon than your current vehicle. Given the fact that you drive approximately 15k miles per year this increased fuel economy will save you approximately $3k over a 5-year period, that is over $50 per month. That is a lot of savings, wouldn’t you agree?”

Fear of Missing Out

“Mr. Customer the Model X is sold out pretty much everywhere. In fact, this is the last one in the region. Don’t you want to take advantage of the fact that you can actually find one and start enjoying this vehicle before it is too late and you won’t be able to buy one?”r. Customer I understand that your time is valuable, so not only will we complete your transaction today in the shortest amount of time possible, we will save you time during the entire time you own your Model X by picking up and dropping your vehicle for every time your vehicle is due for maintenance. Over the lifetime of your vehicle that is going to be a huge times savings, wouldn’t you agree?”

Providing Pleasure

“Mr. Customer can’t you see how easy it is going to be to fit your entire family in this vehicle with all of your camping gear with room to spare. By the way, where is the first place you plan to take your family camping in your new car.”

Solve a Problem

“Mr. Customer, you told me you could not handle another day in this heat with out air conditioning. Can’t you just imagine how nice it is going to be to drive home in the cool air of your new car instead of the blistering heat inside your old one?”

This becomes even more effective when you combine these:

• Saving the customer time = more time the customer can spend camping with the family (Pleasure)
• Saving Money = limited time incentive offer (Fear of Missing Out)
• Solve a Problem = business can not delivery more products to their customers (Making Money)

This list can go on and on and on. Once you are prepared to build value with these categories your sales will not only become easy, they will become more profitable because they will no longer be all about price.