At Blue Jay Exterior Renovations, we believe that homeowners should never be manipulated or pressured into signing a contract. Unfortunately, not every home renovation contractor agrees with us. Here are some of the sales tricks that we’ve heard of other contractors using, and strategies you can use to fight back when they try them on you. You’ll also learn how we make sure that we never use any of these tricks with our customers during our own meetings.
1. Price Padding
The trick: The quoted price drops and drops until you agree to sign the contract
Because no two projects are ever exactly alike, home renovation contractors won’t usually show a sticker price like home builders or consumer goods companies will. Some contractors take advantage of this by manipulating their prices, and customers
Some salespeople like to show a super high “retail price” hoping that the customer agrees to the ridiculous price without asking questions. When the customer says no, the salesperson might give you a discount if you buy today. If you still aren’t sure, you might be offered a discount for putting a contractor sign in your front yard. If that doesn’t work, the salesperson might tell you that they can offer an additional discount, for who knows what reason, as a last-ditch effort. All this really means is that the contractor is trying to trick people into accepting a higher price than they actually need to complete the job.
How to fight back: People are naturally inclined to pounce when they think they are getting a deal, especially when it appears to be a limited- time offer. Ignore the size of the so-called discount, and focus instead on the final total. If you think the contractor might be playing games with your price, the best way to confirm is to check a comparable quote from another contractor.
How we do it instead: We don’t play pricing games of any kind! Our quote is a promise to complete the scope of work at the specified price.
2. Good, Better, Best Pricing
The trick: The quote comes back with three options or packages, but you only asked for one.
This trick is one of the oldest in the book. Good, Better, Best pricing is designed to reset the customer’s price expectations and influence them into selecting the middle or “better” option. Often when a customer sees a high or “best” price on their proposal, even if they didn’t ask to see it in the first place, they will subconsciously begin to see the price for the middle or “better” tier as more reasonable. Sometimes, the “best” package will be inflated even more than it should be in order to maximize this effect.
How to fight back: If your contractor is showing you prices for options that you didn’t previously discuss with them, ignore those options altogether. This will help to minimize the effect.
How we do it instead: At our first meeting, we listen when you tell us what you are interested in. When you review our quote, you’ll find that we’ve only priced out packages that you’ve asked to see.
3. Creating a Sense of Urgency
The trick: The salesperson tries to convince you this is your LAST CHANCE to get an AMAZING DEAL
We’ve all seen this sales strategy on TV commercials, often for that big local furniture store. Hurry in for this weekend’s SPRING BLOWOUT, Saturday and Sunday only! But really, it’s not that big of a deal if you miss the spring blowout because next month, they’ll have a MASSIVE LIQUIDATION SALE.
In the world of home renovation there are very few legitimate reasons to sign a contract quickly, but that doesn’t stop salespeople from trying to create a sense of urgency. They might reference a seasonal discount, to make you think a deal is going to expire. They might use scare tactics, such as telling you what a painful experience it would be if your hot water tank quit working altogether while you waited to make up your mind.
How to fight back: Except for in cases of true urgency (like a broken furnace in the middle of December), resist the urge to sign a contract until you are good and ready. If a salesperson is willing to give you a 15% discount if you sign a contract today, the odds are good that they’ll still be willing to give you a discount tomorrow.
How we do it instead: Our standard quotes are valid for 6 months. This gives our customers lots of time to make the best decision for their budget and project. If you need more time than that, no problem! Just let us know how long you need and we will plan accordingly.
4. Up-Selling
The trick: The salesperson presents you with premium options that you didn’t ask for
Up-selling is everywhere. In fact, if you bought anything at a coffeeshop of convenience story today, you probably got the up-sell treatment from the barista or cashier. Up-selling is the act of trying to convince a customer to purchase more than they originally intended at the time of purchase. Sometimes, up-selling can be as simple as asking a question, like “Would you like fries with that?” Other times, salespeople aggressively up-sell their customers into purchases that cost hundreds of dollars for something that they didn’t need or even want in the first place.
How to fight back: As with many sales tactics, the best defence against up-selling is knowing what the salesperson is trying to accomplish. Before you agree to that higher efficiency furnace or the upgrade to triple pane windows, take a moment to ask yourself: is this upgrade really worth it?
How we do it instead: We don’t believe there is anything wrong with pricing out options for customers. In fact, we will price and re-price your project as many times as you ask, until you feel you have enough information to make a decision. The key difference is that we only price out options that you have asked us for: we don’t just throw 6 unsolicited upgrade options at you and hope you pick one or two.
5. Bait and Switch
The trick: A contractor advertises an exciting discount, almost too good to be true! Then it turns out that the offer is in fact too good to be true.
This technique is nothing more than a ploy to get you talking to one of the company’s salespeople. Once you are stuck in the sales meeting, they’ll tell you that you missed something in the fine print, or that the offer is only applicable to specific products or for certain people. At this point, it’s up to the salesperson to convince you to make a purchase anyway, probably by using some of the other tricks on this list.
Here’s a famous example, from a major flooring installation company in the United States. We won’t name names, but we will tell you that if you ever watch American network TV, you’ve definitely heard their jingle before. This company offers a “$99 per room” promotion, which advertises that customers pay full price for the first room in the home, and all other rooms are just $99. Of course, this “promotion” is just bait to trick people into setting an appointment. Here’s a summary of the fine print:
· One room is full price, additional rooms of equal or lesser value (read: smaller) are $99.
· The promotion applies only to select styles of product.
· $99 covers flooring product only, and doesn’t include installation, underlayment, or accessories.
· Material may not be purchased separate from installation.
· There are a number of surcharges, including stairs, and other so-called “miscellaneous charges”.
I’m sure you can see how this promotion isn’t much of a bargain after all. Imagine calling to schedule an appointment expecting to get flooring at $99 per room, only to have an estimator show up and present a contract for thousands more than you were expecting to pay?
How to fight back: Remember that home improvement contractors put together promotional offers in order to attract work for their business, not to be charitable. Always read the fine print on a promotion before you book an appointment.
How we do it instead: We choose to be up front and honest with our pricing, and we don’t run price-based promotional offers.
6. Closing the sale
The trick: Force the customer to make a snap judgement on a major investment decision.
Any sales coach will give the same advice: always ask the prospective customer for their business. This is known in sales circles as “closing the sale”. There some old school folks out there that self-identify as “high-pressure” salespeople, but most sales coaches these days claim to teach “low-pressure” sales techniques. Well, we’ve been through a few of these training programs and we’re here to tell you that there’s really no difference: pressure is pressure.
Here’s how a pressure close might play out:
The salesperson shows up to take some measurements and do an estimate. Once they finish their assessment, out comes an estimate template with your name and address already filled in. Before you know it, the salesperson has filled in the template, passes it over to you, and hands you a pen. The salesperson says: “We have an installation opening for next Thursday. Would that fit with your schedule, or is there another day that works better?”
At this point, you probably wouldn’t be ready to accept the salesperson’s proposal and schedule the project. Unfortunately, no matter how you answer, an experienced pressure seller will have a well practiced response that keeps the pressure firmly on your shoulders.
How to fight back: There’s really only one foolproof way to completely neutralize the pressure salesperson: when they try to close the sale, let them know that you’ll need to consult with someone in your family before you select a contractor. It might be your spouse, an uncle that used to work for a homebuilder, or really anyone that you like. Of all the sales seminars I’ve attended, I’ve yet to find a sales coach who has an answer for this objection.
How we do it instead: In order to make sure that our customers never feel any sales pressure, we choose to commit the cardinal sin of sales: we never “close” our meetings. If a customer finishes asking questions and doesn’t tell us directly that they would like to proceed with the project, we will thank them for their time and offer to schedule a date for a follow up phone call. After that we will politely leave.
Summary
As you can probably guess, we aren’t big fans of home improvement salespeople who use sales tricks and pressure to close deals. We believe that if a customer needs to be tricked into signing a contract, then they probably weren’t quite ready to move forward with a project just yet. When customers start projects before they are ready, they are more likely to feel anxious or stressed throughout the job. This is nobody’s idea of a good experience.
That’s why we developed our Stress-Free Renovation Process. It’s a 9-stage process that is designed to remove stress from every phase of a home improvement project, from research all the way through to the final inspection. You can read more about it by clicking the button below.