A commodity is defined as something that is bought and sold. Commoditizing is defined as rendering (a good or service) widely available and interchangeable with one provided by another company. As a print customer, those are two different things – if Printers want them to be.
We all know how we got here. The economy tanked, marketing budgets crumbled, and money allocated was distributed through more channels. That left print buyers under a lot of pressure to get the most bang for their bucks when it came to print, exuded by the companies they work for, and/or the clients they serve. Printers saw this as “we only buy on price” …but in fact it is Printers who have made their services interchangeable by selling on price, and not value.
Setting aside this situation doesn’t apply to ALL printers or buyers, I still think we can agree that cost has become a prevalent topic in our conversations. This year I have seen and heard the “Price, Quality, Speed – choose two” scenario more times than I care to count. That useless hypothetical is exactly the reason VALUE is no longer discussed.
What is value? It’s what YOU bring to the table.
I started working in advertising in 1989 and to date only ONE printer has ever REFUSED to revisit a bid, standing on their VALUE to the project as the sole reason to take it, or leave it. The powers that be left it in that case, but as soon as I was able I started sending work to them and continued to do so for many years.
You have more to give than just a price – don’t you?
If you don’t know the answer to that, I hope you take some time to figure it out. As long as printers are trying to underbid vs. out-value each other, we will keep commoditizing print into a Vista sunset… and that isn’t good for ANY of us!
How do you define value? Do you communicate yours to your customers?
3 Responses
You have to be the one that believes in the value of your product. A potential buyer will recognize if you don’t and try barter with you to attain a lower price. Another great read, Deborah. Thanks!
msienicki Thanks!
What is Value is the question one needs to answer. After finding what it is -and what is not-then you can deliver it.
A simple “value” is ON TIME DELIVERY. We have asked new customers why they changed printers and you would be
surprised that a majority of them said their printers missed delivery dates so often that they could not use them anymore. Another value is PACKAGING. Do you deliver jobs in old boxes-no labels. Every order we deliver is in new boxes with our branded tape. Letterhead and business cards get delivered in white leatherette boxes with a gold seal. We want our customers to feel that they are special and that everything is done properly.
Value is correcting errors immediately. When I have new customer I tell them that you will never know how could your printer is until something goes wrong. I even tell them that if we have a long term relationship there will come a day when we will make an error. The first thing we do is come to their office and examine the problem-THAT DAY-.
We then take away the printing that is done improperly-don’t want it hanging around- We then put the customers job ahead of everything else and if feasible deliver the job back that day or as soon as possible. Over the last 25 years I have found that customers-when we did this-were amazed. They became our best customers because we built trust into the relationship-CUSTOMER TRUST IS THE BEST VAULE YOU CAN BUILD. And correcting errors go a long way to building that.
Phone calls. After we have done a project and delivered it. We wait a day or so and then call the customer to
make sure everything is ok and that they were satisfied. This builds value in the customers mind as he sees your
call as an INTEREST in what he is doing and they we as a printer are concerned about that.
We always tell our customers how glad we are to see them. If they have been with us for many years we call and
remind them of that. We have customers who have been with use for 25 years and when I remind them of that
it matters. What you want to build is a CONNECTION BETWEEN YOU AND THE CUSTOMER that goes beyond
price. We want our customers to work with use because they feel-and we are- their friends in business.
We want it to go beyond a business to business connection. Example-a customer is opening a new location
and needed banners- We did 2 big banners at no charge as our gift and we went to the opening. it wasn’t much
but it matter alot to them.
Want a customer to say-“you know I could get this job done for less but we trust you and we
want to do business with you-we feel SAFE working with you”.
There will always be customers where price is king. But after 25 years I have found that they are the short term-one shot customers-who add no value to your business. There is a difference between the person calling to find out what is the cheapest business card you sell and some who calls and needs help doing 1000 tri-fold flyers.
Extend that helping hand-VALUE- and you will see who is your best customer.
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