Anyone working in a service-based sector will already be familiar with the ‘quality’ debate. In other words, if you want to set your business apart from, and above, the rest, you need to market yourself in a highly crafted way, and you will be looking to charge handsome prices for the fine detail. The current recession – and let’s face it, we haven’t plumbed the depths of it yet – mean that a lot of product-based companies are having to slash prices on products to win back custom, or clear out stock etc. Customer databases all over the country will be shifting like sand, as loyalties dwindle and economy comes to the fore. And as we well know, some will thrive as the others crash and burn around them.
But how quickly will we tire of email marketing that reads something along the lines of “To support our customers during this period, we’re making huge reductions …”? I’ve already reached my limit.
Clearly this kind of marketing is a thin cloak for a deeply embedded fear that if one doesn’t move with the tide, business will cease.
With service-based companies, there is more of a quandary. If what you offer is quality of service, what are you offering the customer at half-price?
Expert opinion seems split on this age-old debate: do you drop your prices, knowing it’ll take you some 3 to 4 years to recover, or do you drop half your clients who start looking elsewhere to appease the CEO?
It is Boost’s intention to fly against the trend. We will always offer strong solutions and excellent work. No price cuts here, though we do offer a “fewer frills” design and branding package for start-ups, just as we always have. This is because many start-ups simply require a presence / ‘toe in the water’ branding, until they have established themselves more fully and ’settled into’ their own company values.
And we would say “Remember: just because most people are doing it doesn’t mean it’s wise. Isn’t that how the economy went awry in the first place?”
Entry: Traci Rochester, MD, Boost
