The Value of Upsells and the Psychology of Buying

There are two doors.

One is a red door of value you presented to your new cleaning prospect. It's so much value that it includes the basic cleaning, an occasional deep clean, quasi-regular floor work, and maybe even some consumables. This packages is top shelf. You put a lot of time into the proposal. You did great on the sales. You know your numbers well and it's profitable for you.

The other is a yellow door of basic you could have presented to your new cleaning prospect. You're offering a terrific service, but without any extra like supplies, a deep clean, floor work, etc. and it's 20% less than your red door. But you know your numbers here too and it's profitable as much as the value door.

In your eyes, both have equal value because the profit is the same. But how does the prospect feel about these two doors when presented together?

Let's take a step backwards...the question shouldn't be how the prospect feels about these two offers...the question is: what does the prospect EXPECT before you present both offers?

When that prospect agreed to a walkthrough through a phone call, email, meeting, or however you connected in your sales process, they were EXPECTING either a VALUE OFFER with lots loaded into it -OR- they EXPECTED a BASIC OFFER with nothing added to it. Where do their ideas form? They formed on the expectation on their experience from your predecessor or from other past experience. 

If they expected value, you need to load into your proposal that value. If they expected a basic service, then you need to put that in your proposal instead. Picking the wrong one can lead to losing the bid entirely. 

So how do you tell if they want VALUE or BASIC? Here are some examples you can look out for in your next bid:

1) If they are scaling back their requested SOW during your walkthrough, then they're looking for a basic service. If in the walkthrough they are telling you they need floor work, supplies, etc. (and always ask for that), then they want more than a basic service.

2) If you do your walkthrough, and they already have a service in there already, and you see dust, fingerprints, etc., then they're expecting a basic service. If you walk through and they have daily service and it's spotless in there, then they expect more value and more bang for their buck.

3) If in the walkthrough they complain about a turnover of cleaning companies at their location, then it means they don't want to pay for value but they demand more, and chances are they're not a right fit for you (unless you want a few headaches).

4) If they drop phrases like "it's not clean enough" (while doing a walkthrough to a spotless location), then the other cleaning company failed to raise the perceived value of their company or the client based the cleaning quality on price alone (only the cheapest price will be the best-type-of-mentality).

Not everyone is meant to be your client. There's nothing wrong with wanting a basic service only. Remember, Ferrari offers a base model. It's ok. You can be very profitable with offering a basic service. 

But, WAIT! There's more! What's more? Well, you can be MORE profitable by offering upsells to a basic package. I'm against nickel and diming customers. But sometimes they want and expect that and offering add-ons at a high premium price can make you more profitable than just a whole package on it's own. 

Next time you bid, try experimenting with a basic clean, and then offer changes in the SOW and upsells to your new client. Even go as far as to bake these extras into your contract so if they ask for these things, you've already agreed to a price and process. 

Go kick butt!