“Selling Down” Sales Process

bbbThere is a store that only sells one thing: billiard tables. It carries all kinds of billiard tables. You might be surprised to know the different kinds of billiard tables that are made.  The price of each table varies too. One can buy a billiard table for as low as $200 to as high as $3,000!

All the salesmen in this store are very knowledgeable. They know everything about the game and even more about the tables. They are trained in a sales system. They would show the customer the $329 table first. They would reveal the features and benefits of that table one by one.

Then they would point to another table and say: “This table here is a bit pricey and costs more than $329 but it also has more benefits.”  They would then compare the 2 tables and people would get interested in the more expensive table.  After all, people buy the billiards table just once and might as well select the better one!  The salesmen would then show a few more expensive tables and see if the customer gets interested in them or not.  This process generated a handsome average sale of $550!

One day, the owner of the store asks the salesmen to change their entire selling system.

He asks the salesmen to show the most expensive table costing $3,000 to the customer first, regardless of what he wants or can afford, then to show the cheaper tables after that.

This “selling down sales process” now generates a whooping $1,000 average sale for the store!

Action summary:

°    Show the most expensive product first and you’ll earn more per average sale.

°    The airplanes know that this process works really well. That is why, every passenger has to pass through the business class to go to the economy class. By seeing how spacey and comfortable the business class seats are, people are enticed to fly business class themselves next time. The airlines don’t have to work on selling their higher priced business class seats anymore. They sell themselves!