Value is Perception
This story is sourced from Robert B. Cialdini from his book Psychology of Persuasion
Got a phone call one day from a friend who had recently opened an Indian jewelry store in Arizona.
She was giddy with a curious piece of news. Something fascinating had just happened, and she thought that, as a psychologist, I might be able to explain it to her.
The story involved a certain allotment of turquoise jewelry she had been having trouble selling. It was the peak of the tourist season, the store was unusually full of customers, the turquoise pieces were of good quality for the prices she was asking; yet they had not sold.
My friend had attempted a couple of standard sales tricks to get them moving. She tried calling attention to them by shifting their location to a more central display area; no luck. She even told her sales staff to “push” the items hard, again without success.
Finally, the night before leaving on an out-of-town buying trip she scribbled an exasperated note to her head saleswoman, *”Every thing in this display case, price X 1/2*, hoping just to be rid of the offending pieces, even if at a loss.
When she returned a few days later, she was not surprised to find that every article has been sold..
She was shocked, though, to discover that, because the employee had read the *”1/2″* in her scribbled message as a *”2,”* the entire allotment had sold out at *TWICE the original price*!
Learning from the story
- If you want others to value your products and services, first you need to value them.
- You are not short of money, you are just short of ideas and creativity.
- It is not about the quality alone, it is also about the perception of Quality.
Questions to ask ourselves
- How do I deliver value through my products & services and at the same time create a perception of value around it?
- How do I build a Value Centric and Valuable business which can be sold if needed.
If you really want to build a VALUE CENTRIC BUSINESS; here’s my personal invitation to our seminar Business On Autopilot.
