The Price Slasher

The Price Slasher comes onboard and starts selling for you. Initially, things go well as they settle into the role and go over the pricing for your products and services. In fact, they often will over scrutinize the pricing and pepper you and the team as to “why do we price things this way”? The advanced slasher will also ask why there are no tiered prices, discounts, rebates etc.

Of course, if they negotiated a compensation package with you that does not penalize discounting, do you blame them? Once they do start selling, they have a tough time displacing the competition because they are very weak at articulating value and struggle to create a perception of significance on how the product or service can resolve problems.

The real difficulty surfaces when the slasher starts saying, “Everyone is happy with the competition boss.” and “I am not sure what to do next because we’re not competitive in this situation?” Essentially they start selling you on price concessions rather than selling buyers on value. If they are unsuccessful in getting price concessions approved outright, they proceed to pitching “temporary” concessions. This typically sounds like, “I think if we lowered the prices to get our foot in the door, we could do big things with this account.”

The Price Slasher might make some sales but they’ll rarely be profitable. This will fill your business with questionable clients who never really bought into the value that you offer. Start on price, die on price. Beware of The Slasher.