By Ilise Benun, www.marketingmentor.com
I [recently] spoke to lots of clients who complained about wasting their time on prospects who can’t afford their services. The problem is: they didn’t know it until they’d already put in a lot of time, either talking on the phone or creating a proposal. Some even met in person.
That’s why we highly recommend that you bring up the topic of money right away, on the first phone call, just to make sure you’re on the same page.
How? You should always ask first what their budget is. But if they don’t have one or don’t want to give it to you, for whatever reason, then it’s up to you to provide a price range for what you would charge to do what they need done. You could say something like: “A simple Web site usually runs $X,XXX, while a more complex one could be as high as $XX,XXX. How does that fit into your budget?”
It’s actually very simple.
