Ease Frustrations About Your Pricing

It's not only your customers who are frustrated by store pricing. Chances are, it's also your sales staff and you. Are your staff repeatedly dealing with shoppers' complaints and efforts to negotiate? Are you frustrated because you'd like to keep prices lower, but realize your business's balance sheet won't allow it? What about those abandoned half-filled carts, clothing left in dressing rooms, and items returned because there's a lower price elsewhere?
     Frustration eats up needed energy from you and your staff, and frustrated customers are less likely to buy from you. It's in everyone's interest, then, to ease the frustration. Consumer psychology researchers at UCLA and University of Southern California suggest a three-pronged approach:

• Describe pricing as subject to change. When your customers and staff know you're regularly reviewing your pricing, looking for opportunities to pass on savings, they are less likely to stay frustrated. Give your staff examples of how you're not keeping all prices high and higher. Then coach your staff to approach customers who are in the area of competitively priced items to say, "Here's an item that might be of interest to you. Notice what we've done to the pricing."
• Explain why prices are what they are. If customers complain about price increases, staff might say, "When our suppliers increase their prices to us, we need to pass those increases on to the customer so that we can stay in business and continue to both serve shoppers like you and employee the people like me."
• Give staff and shoppers influence in pricing. Consider staff suggestions on what items to discount for specials and where to increase margins to balance it out. Point out product alternatives to shoppers so they feel a sense of control, since a sense of control helps wipe away frustration.