Geared For Profit

OK – one of the most brilliant marketing strategies is bundling …. or ‘meal deals’.

Think about what they did for Macca’s. Instead of selling burgers for say $3, chips for $2, and drinks for $2 – they sell a ‘meal deal’ for $5.50. You essentially get chips OR the drink for nearly free.

Instead of sometimes only selling a burger($3), or sometimes a burger + drink ($5), they more often sell a ‘meal deal’ for $5.50. Macca’s ends up with a higher average sale price. On average they sell more to each customer.

So what if you have ‘bundled services’ or ‘bundled products’ in your company? Perhaps you’ll increase the average sale. GREAT – we are getting more profit.

WRONG. What if the customer say doesn’t want or doesn’t respect part of your bundle.
– at best you will have increased your cost to deliver that sale (lowering your profit).
– at worst, they wont buy from you, as there is part of the offer they are not interested in
– overtime, you have increased your costs, and will disincent customers to buy from you …. not good

‘Blue Ocean Strategy’  clearly says you can attack a market by ripping out unloved features, and reducing costs. (I’ll write up a full review of Blue Ocean Strategy at some stage).

A simple solution would be to offer the components of your service seperately. And be proud of each component, talk highly of each of them. And ask the customer what components THEY want.

Its easy for sales people to think ‘if I put MORE value into the deal’ the customer might be more likely to buy.

Don’t sell them anything they dont want, or dont value. It will just end up a cost to you, and disincenting your customers.

Eventually bad deals, with too much cost, will destroy your company.

If you were smart, and to push the envelope, you have a bundle on offer, that is MORE than the some of the parts.