Price Integrity & the Awkwardness of Discounting

Why do so many salespeople reach for a discount the moment things get uncomfortable?

In this episode of The Reality is Sales Training, Bob and Jeremy look at price integrity – why it matters, and what happens when you don’t believe in your price.

They explore why arbitrary discounting creeps in, how your own mindset affects how you present cost, and why confidence in value is what really drives sales. There’s also a simple takeaway: say the price… and stop.

If you’ve ever felt awkward talking about price, or found yourself discounting too quickly, this one will hit home.

Explore resources, insights, and tools tailored to support your team's success and strategic growth at realitytraining.com.

Transcript

Welcome And Two Sharp Quotes

Jeremy Blake 0:14

Hello and welcome. Thank you for tuning in to another episode of the Reality is Sales Training. I'm one of your hosts, Jeremy Blake, and I'm joined by Bobby Morrell. And we have a big one for you today. I mean, they're all big, aren't they? But they all add up. Today we're going to look at the topic of price integrity. And I'm going to chuck a quote at you, Bob, from a bloke who's quite old. You ready? Go on then. Consider at what price you sell your integrity, but please, for God's sake, don't sell it cheap.

Bob Morrell 0:52

Well, that's interesting, isn't it? That infers that everyone has a price.

Jeremy Blake 0:56

Yeah, but you would never guess. So it's it's a Greek. He's incredibly old. First letter E. E. P I C T E T U S. Epicurus. Oh, Epictasus. Epictus. Epictetus. Yeah, that's him. Who I've actually quoted before in a blog about he did some other quite sort of translatably salesy stuff.

Bob Morrell 1:17

Well, I'm sure our listeners will be running towards Wikipedia to look up that one.

Jeremy Blake 1:22

Do you actually think that go on, your pronunciation's better than mine. How'd you say it? Epictetus. Yeah, Epictus. Epictetus? Yeah, I think it is. Do you actually think he said uh that sounds like a disease? Do you think it he actually said for God's sake, or do you think someone's added that over the years?

Bob Morrell 1:38

Probably been added. He would have said something like, or for the love of heaven, or something. Yeah. Yeah. Something like that. He probably would have said for God's sake.

Jeremy Blake 1:45

Yeah. Quick digression. Um, I heard that the very first opening lines of The Lion King, all of that stuff in um in Zulu, is oh my gosh, look, there's a lion. Oh God. That long bit that opens that has been mysterious. It's been translated as just someone saying, Oh my god, there's a lion. Right, price integrity. I'm gonna give you one more quote. Um if the truth won't sell it, don't sell it.

Why Arbitrary Discounts Happen

Bob Morrell 2:14

That's very good. Isn't that brilliant? We should use that for um, and also when we talk about people who do dislaw bonding. Yes. You know, it's eventually it's essentially a form of lying.

Jeremy Blake 2:23

Yeah, if the truth is, if you can't sell honestly, yeah, don't sell it. So I I don't have too much to say on price integrity. I've got a couple of rules you might want to add to them. My biggest problem with salespeople not believing in their rates, the prices, is arbitrary discounts that come out of nowhere and the fear and belief that you require one to sell. Yes.

Bob Morrell 2:49

It's the only way to do it, yeah.

Jeremy Blake 2:51

Yeah, because this goes this is the biggest tip, really. Because this goes against everything. When you wake up in the morning, if you don't believe in the in the price tag against your thing and you're focused on the price all the time, you're gonna just be thinking about numbers. You have to go, why is it valuable and why is it worth that? And there's so many salespeople we we've worked with over the years and continue who seem to need the support of some kind of a discount once the negotiation starts.

Bob Morrell 3:20

So let's imagine um that you are applying for uh an early sales job, Joe. You haven't sold much before, and you want to get a job with my car showroom selling high-end prestige cars. New ones. Okay, new or used, you know, nice, we've got a nice selection here.

Jeremy Blake 3:39

I'm having the interview with you, am I?

Bob Morrell 3:40

You're having the interview with me, and I'm gonna say to you, so Jeremy, you're a young, keen person, I can see that.

Jeremy Blake 3:45

Oh, yes.

Bob Morrell 3:46

Um, but clearly you're a few years off being able to afford any of the cars that we have here in the in the showroom. We start at we start at 50,000 and we go up. So my question is, how are you gonna feel talking to a customer who is seriously looking at a car that's £125,000? How do you feel about selling a prestige car at that sort of price?

Jeremy Blake 4:12

Well, I'm gonna not kid you. It's daunting. I mean, the the most expensive car my dad ever owned was a Ford Sierra, so um it's gonna be in a new realm. But I'm also my my optimism and my knowledge of your cars, as you know, I've been reading car magazine since I was about seven years old. I know my knowledge is off the charts. So I know that luckily there are people out in the world who can afford them. So I'm just looking forward to meeting the right people.

Bob Morrell 4:36

Now that's a great answer, and I think this kid's got a head screwed on, let's give him the job. So a week into the job, you're chatting with someone next to a beautiful, gorgeous Ferrari, okay? And you're chatting about the car and all the features, and you're very excited about the colour and the trim. And because it's a very prestige uh shop, there's no price on the front, like in a normal second-hand car dealer's. And I say, uh, how much is this one again?

Say The Price Then Stop

Jeremy Blake 5:10

This car is £57,500.

Bob Morrell 5:14

Oh. Okay, I thought it was double that. Um, okay, well, that's pretty good. Now, you've just demonstrated a really good way of delivering price. Have I? Now let's imagine that you weren't any good at this, Jay. And let's have that exact same scenario.

Jeremy Blake 5:28

No problem. How much is this car? This car. Um yeah, well, what what you've got to remember is that um this is the only one of its kind that we have here, and it's coming in.

Bob Morrell 5:41

I get all that. How much is it?

Jeremy Blake 5:42

Yeah. Yeah. Um, well, we we we take a deposit. Um, you wouldn't have to pay all of it up front.

Bob Morrell 5:48

Um how much is it in total?

Jeremy Blake 5:49

Yeah, it's um well, it's uh it's fifty fifty-five thousand seven hundred pounds.

Bob Morrell 5:58

Oh, that's gone down from what I asked you before, it was fifty-seven thousand five hundred. So there's obviously been a slight discount added already at that point.

Jeremy Blake 6:05

Yeah, yeah, I think we talked about that the weekend. That's that's right, yes.

Who Buys It And Why Finance Exists

Bob Morrell 6:08

Right. Okay, now what we have there is a demonstration of someone who just cannot say the price. Now, the first example is exactly what you need to do. You say the price confidently and shut up. And so many people get jobs where they think, oh, I can sell this, no problem. But actually, when they look at the money, it's such a lot of money, it absolutely terrifies them. Now, this is one of the biggest things that we work on with people because so many people sell things that they personally don't need or are not able to buy. And what we should immediately do is think, okay, where's the price integrity here? How can people afford these things that I'm selling? How can I square it in my own brain so that when it comes to the price, I have that confidence to be really clear about it and to believe that it's worth that amount of money?

Jeremy Blake 7:00

I mean, years ago when we were in marketing, we had a French beauty salon client and we interviewed some of her clients to help people know. And they learned that the disposable income of clients was so high, it boosted their confidence that people could afford it. If you are not surrounded by the same set of people who could buy these cars, it's going to continue to seem daunting for you. But there are plenty of people whose salaries, income, inheritance, whatever reason, how they've got their money, this is in their range. They can afford it. And as Bob says, we spend so much time telling salespeople this isn't your money. Yes, you haven't owned one. Your father, your mother haven't either. Doesn't matter. There is a set for them. Otherwise, this showroom, this business wouldn't exist.

Price Versus Value In Sales

Bob Morrell 7:44

Well, the other point is that what do we think that finance exists for? Okay. It exists for people who would love to be able to earn something like this. They haven't quite got the money at the moment, so they're perfectly happy to borrow the money and pay it back over a defined period and pay a little bit of interest on it. Now, that is what finance is for. And it's it makes the unaffordable affordable. That is what finance does. Now, that doesn't mean that what you're selling is expensive, and I think that's a really important point that you cannot sell anything. And this is another quote from Zig Ziggler: you cannot sell anything unless you believe it's worth more to the customer than the money they're paying you for it. Really good rule.

One-Minute Value List And Close

Jeremy Blake 8:27

Yeah, and connected to that, Warren Buffett said years ago, he said, price is what you pay, value is what you get. So you're buying this thing and you're using currency because that's the transactional, you know, frame for this thing, and then I give you the money, then I get to keep the thing. But the thing is always, as Bob said, going to be worth more to me, otherwise I wouldn't release the funds. So I'm happy to own this car, this this clothing, this watch, whatever it is. And the only thing I'd say if we go straight into B2B for a second is it's in a way even easier because it's less personal, the company is paying for it. And yes, it might be hard-earned, it might be founder-led, whatever, but still the money's in the bank, it's probably plus VAT. There's it's you know, it's still benefiting the company in such a way that their investment in it improves their business. And the only other thing I'd say is a really good exercise. You give yourself a single minute on a clock and you write down all of the reasons why somebody might buy your service or product, and you give yourself only a minute and you get them down, and those will be the main ones. That it does this for you, it returns this, it lasts in this way, it fixes this problem, it prevents this difficulty, whatever it might be. And you look down at that list, and that is a confidence boost, going, Wow, we do all of that through our product and service. So we don't need to go on about this too long. It's really a short, sharp shock of an episode. But price integrity is not arbitrary, arbitrarily discounting, it is believing in the worth of the product that you sell.

Bob Morrell 10:01

Now, if you are a salesperson, when you speak about price, if you sound as though you think it's too expensive, the customer's not going to buy. It is simple as that. So you need to practice how you deliver cost. That is a really, really simple thing to take away from this. Practice the delivery of cost in a confident fashion, and you will sell more.

Jeremy Blake 10:26

Thank you for tuning in. Look out and subscribe so you never miss an episode. We'll have more for you very soon. Bye.

Bob Morrell 10:34

This podcast comes from Reality Training. For the last 25 years, we've transformed the customer interactions of many leading UK businesses and developed thousands of managers to be better at what they do. To find out more about our work and to see what we could do to help your organization, go to realitytraining.com.