Recently we tested adding pricing to our website.

This is very different for me because when it comes to showing price on my website, I’ve always been against it.

My fear was that if I showed prices, a competitor would undercut my prices.

For years, when prospects visited my website, they were asked to fill out a form to get a free consultation.  We would then put together a custom proposal or send them our rate card depending on what type of service they were interested in.

I know I’m not alone.

Whether you should or shouldn’t put your pricing on your website is a common question–unless you are more of a commodity type site selling something like airplane tickets, clothing, hotel rooms, and so on.

But for service providers, coaches, consultants and high-end products, disclosing price on a website is often met with resistance.

The thing is, once we tried it, I discovered that my past fears were unfounded.

You see now that we disclose our pricing in advance, the leads that fill out the form for a free consultation are more qualified. Before, we had poor leads. They often were price-shoppers and tire-kickers. They weren’t qualified, had no clients yet, and so on. It was a HUGE waste of our sales people’s time.

Now, we are starting to sell more while streamlining our process and talking to more qualified prospects. We have fewer price shoppers and tire-kickers wasting our time.

It’s created great results for us and I believe it can for you too. There are other reasons you might want to consider listing your prices on your website too…

• Be considered an option. We now live in a time where price-shopping is part of what people do. If someone is searching for your product or service, more often than not, they want to know how much it will cost them. If they don’t find pricing on your website, they will keep searching until they find a site that has pricing. By not listing your prices, you might be eliminated yourself from consideration.
• It presents a huge SEO opportunity. Because listing pricing is so controversial, many companies aren’t doing it. This means when you do, you can create a pricing page and optimize for the highly searched terms related to cost and price with little competition. For example, Squarespace uses a strong headline, “Simple Pricing” and includes frequently asked questions about price on their pricing page such as “Is there a discount for yearly service?” “How long are your contracts?” “How do I cancel service?” and “What is meant by unlimited?”

That said, I can almost hear some of the reasons you might still be resistant to posting your prices, so let me address those.

Sticker Shock

If you are worried about whether there will be sticker shock, remember that people often don’t want to go with the cheapest as they don’t equate the cheapest with the best. Plus, wouldn’t it be great to get away from the type of customers who don’t value your worth?

Even so, here are things you can do to overcome price objections, creating buyers that are even more ready to buy. For example, you can:

• Add testimonials and case studies to your pricing page. Nothing is more powerful than hearing from a satisfied customer who shopped around and found your product or service to provide the best value for the money.
• Create a comparison chart. Some businesses create a chart showing what features they offer as compared to competitors. You don’t necessarily have to name the other businesses either – you can just use a generic term, for example, “Dental service provider 1”.

Variable Pricing

Some businesses have variable pricing. The fee is dependent on the deliverables and how much time or work is involved. For these types of businesses, simply publish a “starting price.” For example, “fees start at $1,200” or “minimum fee is $500”.

Educating the Competition

If you share what my biggest fear was: that you’d educate the competition, I’d like to offer you an additional piece of advice.  They say imitation is the best form of flattery, so if your competition is trying to copy you, that means you are the leader. Not a bad place to be, right? Plus, people buy on much more than price, so focus on how you can provide something unique and on giving the best value so that even if someone beats your price, you’ll still be the top choice.

Price is a key consideration for people. It helps them make decisions faster and helps qualify whether you are a good fit. And if you don’t show your price, someone else will. So, if the customer wants to see the price, why not give it to them?

Or at least test out listing prices on your website.

You might be as surprised as I was and find that you start attracting better-qualified prospects while repelling the price-shoppers and tire-kickers that are wasting your time. Plus, you’ll sell more.

And ultimately isn’t that what we all want?