Reddit reviews Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value (and How to Take Advantage of It)

>We were planning on sending that to selected businesses, along with a personal letter and an iphone stand we designed ourselves. Good / bad? Businesses would be small to medium size for now. Do you have any tips on that, personal anecdotes? Anything would help.

It is good to go after the exact companies you want. Not just to put up a website and take anyone who contacts you.

Small to medium sized businesses is not narrow enough. ===> dentists, accountants, landscapers, whatever, but make it narrower. You can get lists of these people.

Don't ever use the word "we." Ever. Except in your "About us." Everything else should only be "you."

So on your front page, don't say, "We do SEO, design, blah-blah-blah." I see this mistake all. the. time. Instead, "YOU will get more customers", "YOU will get all the hot women into your bed," whatever.

It takes 3 contacts minimum to make an impression, so instead of going to 6000 prospects one time, go to 2000 prospect 3 times.

Trust is the major issue, and trust only builds with repeated contacts. Just like making a friend - you really can't (shouldn't) trust someone after one meeting. It usually takes getting together over beers or sports many times.

Always have new content interesting to give to the target audience each time you contact them. Who would buy a magazine or newspaper if it didn't have new content every single issue? No one. Many businesses do this.

Headlines are the most important. 80% of the attention of the prospect is the headline, therefore you should spend 80% of your time developing the headline. Maybe use a Johnson Box. For a good idea of good headlines, go to the grocery store and look at the magazines and see what their headlines are on the cover. There are multiple ones. Copy them, but just tweak it for your company. Magazines are an impulse buy, they only have a few seconds at the counter to make someone buy. They spend big bucks on the titles.

For example, here is the May 2012 cover of Cosmopolitan Magazine. Cosmo has been around forever, so they have to be doing something right. So let's take some of the headlines: 99 Sex Questions ==> 99 Sexy Website Designs; Feel Great Naked ===> Feel Great Naked (work it into the copy somehow); 8 Ways to Get Over a Bad Day ===> 8 Ways to Make Sure You Don't Have a Bad Website. Then let's hit the arrow and go to the prior month, and here are some headlines: You on Top: The Hardcore New Success Secret ===> You on Top: The Hardcore New Success Secret; 25 Fun, Free Dates ===> 25 Fun, Free Designs; "My Gyno Talked to My Vagina"........hmmm, ok, I got nothin'.

My point is that a headline is crucial, and you can make it easy by looking at what works at the check out magazine covers. I really like "You on Top: The Hardcore New Success Secret" It is awesome. "New" and "Secret" are Proven* to draw attention. Classic.

Each of the 3+ letter should have a different headline.

Text sells. Have lots of text. It's one thing to grab attention, but with a serious and informed buyer, let's say of a car, the buyer will read all kinds of words in magazines to determine which car they will buy. Not pictures.

Have dual reading to help the reader.

You say you have a good graphic design and IT, that is great. But you need a quality copywriter. Everyone thinks they know how to do this.

Store-to-store is so-so. You target, your clients. Much better to target the exact client you want. The letter should still be the same. You must follow up 3 times with them, too. More is better. There are statistics on this that you can google. Maybe you already know.

Target target target. If you don't know, go with who is kicking off the largest profits. They have the money. For example, check this out: most profitable. Accountants have a 16% pre-tax profit. On the other hand, restaurants have a 2-6%. Fuck working for restaurants. Who will it be easiest to collect money from once you've done the work. Someone in a 16% margin industry, or 2-6%. Maybe none of these choices fit you, but I hope you understand the idea of targeting specifically. I mean, fuck it, why not just focus on the top 5?

>leave one of our posters behind

Make sure you leave a letter with all the reasons why they should choose you - what do you do that others don't.

>I absolutely don't have a problem to just walk up to people and talk to them, but maybe it annoys them more than anything? What do you guys think? Any advice on that one?

I have done this a lot. There is no problem. But then again, I'm in the USA, and don't know the culture of Swiss.

>Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

There is only one type of business. Marketing. If you have the skills to do the website, and can execute well, then just forget about it. You can do it. The marketing is the only thing that matters.

Pricing: Crucial. The more you can niche, the less pricing matters. You make it so that the client cannot compare your company with others. Niche = more money. Example: Website for any business = $200; Website for dentist = $1000; Website for dental surgeon = $2500; website for dental surgeon who specializes in diabetics = $5500. Please understand that this is for advertising directed at them, not just getting a call out of the blue. So if you advertise worldwide for doing only websites for dental surgeon who specializes in diabetics

You should have a different website property for each specialty. Webdesignforlawyers.com. Bestwebsite4accountants.com. Because each industry will feel like you're talking to them, specifically, and you can target the message to them.

Oh. When contacting prospects, make sure you have TWO letters. Keep track of which pulls better. One will become the standard, and everything new will test against it. This is critical, because some copy could pull 1%, and other would pull 10%. Huge difference. If you have a successful copy, never change, even if you get bored of it, as long as it works. Many people want change for the sake of change on their copy. Bad idea. This is not to say that one shouldn't test new copy - just make it controlled.

Pricing: Remember, pricing is totally disconnected from the "thing." People are not price conscious, unless they are poor. And you don't want poor businesses.

Read Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value (and How to Take Advantage of It)

It is based off this. Print this out and memorize it.

Google Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman and read everything by them.

Target, target, target. Chose specific industries so you can go to them specific solutions, and charge more.

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Not sure if this helps.

oh, this is good http://www.amazon.com/Being-Direct-Making-Advertising-Pay/dp/0394540638

also read this http://www.scientificadvertising.com/ScientificAdvertising.pdf and this: http://ebookee.org/Claude-Hopkins-My-Life-In-Advertising_904762.html

I'm not too much of the "put a website up and wait for a call" or "go into random businesses." I'm more of a "target your ideal customer, customize to their specific needs, go after them, and therefore price very high amount" kind of guy.

TLDR: target your ideal customer (ones with money if you don't know), and pricing is disconnected from the buying decision.

Stealing a quote from here

>To understand why people have this psychological bearing on the '9's and why it matters, you should turn to a book called Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value (and How to Take Advantage of It) by Poundstone.

>It might be interesting to note that despite being cognizant of this psychological effect, we're still subconsciously driven towards a $99 product when there are two more similar products with price tags of $94 and $100.

tl;dr: Psychological effect.

Check out the book "Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value" for a slew of good ideas and insights.

read Priceless" if you are really really serious about it. Don't listen to anyone here.

This is culture dependent and is based on an inculcated (taught) sense of fairness. It can be probed with a specific instrument -- the Ultimatum Game, which yields population dependent results that vary widely between different cultures.

If this kind of thing is intriguing to you, you should read William Poundstone's "Priceless", which is fabulous. Note that it is available as a Kindle e-book for less than the paper book price.