Setting your prices

Jim Meisenheimer sent this story in a recent email that puts price into perspective:

How Pablo Picasso Dealt With The Price Objection

Whenever I'm doing an in-house corporate sales training program, I always ask the group this question. "What are the biggest challenges you face in growing your business?"

Within ten nanoseconds, someone raises his hand and says, "The price objection."

It never fails.

Is this how you feel? Do you find it difficult and aggravating to defend your price on a daily basis?

There is a better way. Why defend your price when you can explain your value?

But first let's see how Pablo Picasso dealt with the price objection when it was raised.

This is a story about Pablo Picasso. The source is unknown.

In Paris, there was a woman strolling along a street, when she spotted Picasso sketching near a sidewalk cafe.

"Not so thrilled that she could not be slightly presumptuous, the woman asked Picasso if he might sketch her, and charge accordingly. Picasso obliged. In just minutes, there she was: an original Picasso."

“And what do I owe you?” she asked. “Five thousand francs,” he answered.

“But it only took you three minutes,” she politely reminded him.

“No,” Picasso said, “It took me all my life.”

He established the value not the customer, though she wanted to.

What are you worth? Have you ever thought about that?

What's your time worth? What is your experience worth to a potential customer?

It seems to me that too often a price is put on a product. And this price is compared to a competitor's price. That's pure nonsense!

That's like Picasso being compared to Hooey Tooey a young painter in Paris.

Each painter has a sketch in pencil on paper. I'm sure a Un jeune peintre (a young painter) wouldn't consider charging five thousand francs for his sketch.

As an entrepreneur or professional sales representative you count.

Your ideas, creativity, and imagination count too.

Your experience counts even more.

If you don't share it with your prospects and customers they won't see your genuine value.

It's up to you to establish your value - the higher the better.

When you start thinking like Pablo Picasso, you'll start selling more and start selling more profitably.

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