Price-Only Stratagies Are Way Too Expensive

There is a scary belief running rampant through the inexperienced business community that, in the midst of a crisis, branding is too expensive and the only option is to push low price instead of value.

It’s also an odd cultural concept here, because most of the world has figured out that the truly expensive option is to completely forget about customer value while you drive low price. Especially when you come to realize that it isn’t any more expensive to continue branding while offering price.

Let me explain by example.

Not too long ago, I had a conversation with a young marketing manager for one of Bucharest’s foreign-invested, Romanian-managed malls. We were deep in mid-crisis, and the young manager proudly held out his agency’s latest marketing effort - a full color A5 catalog.

It was shiny. It was chock full of ads for nearly every store. It had pretty pictures. It had bright colors. It screamed Low prices! Low prices! Low Prices! Which, in fact, were probably at a par with prices at all the other Malls in Bucharest that had opted for short-term survival at all costs. The catalog also talked hours and undistinguished shop names. (You know them. They are duplicated in nearly every mall from Dubrovnik to Dubai.)

Did I mention that to print and publish it cost Three Hundred Thousand Euros!? Yikes!

And nowhere in the entire catalog of star burst discounts did it ever bother to mention why, besides price, you should come to this mall!

Or come back to this mall. It didn’t say fabulous shopping experience, or more fun, or convenient parking, or great food, or a thousand screen movie-plex, or envious friends or an upstairs zoo (I exaggerate for emphasis. They don’t have a thousand screen movie-plex or an upstairs zoo.)

Did it drive traffic? Possibly. Did it bring anyone back to the mall to shop again when the prices were back to normal? Highly unlikely unless you live in the neighborhood. Did this catalog do a single thing to position the mall as something extraordinary and welcoming any time? Not a bit.

The point is that in a 24 page catalog, there is a lot of room on the edges, in the introductions, in the flags on the corners, to proclaim the reason you will continue to be relevant and important to your customers. This is true of any communication you send to your customers via broadcast, print, sms, or carrier pigeons. If your message comes from the point of view of your brand, it costs no more to send the message.

Whether you are retail, B2B or product, selling only on price destroys loyalty. Your price-only customers will be gone when the bargains are. Off to the next better offer.

Your brand, however, stands for who you are and what you mean to your customers. It explains your essence, and your philosophy. It reassures your customers that you stand for something besides just taking their money. Important things like integrity, honesty, product quality, value, customer service. It’s why they do come back even when the discounts are over.

In tough times like these, survival is key. So you do what you have to in order to keep customers coming in the door. But if your marketing department or any of your agencies is bringing you any piece of communication that doesn’t speak from the essence of your brand, it's too expensive. Send it back for a do-over.

It doesn’t cost you any more to let your brand speak your price advantage in the short-term. And the price of not doing it could close your doors in the longer-term.