

When a Prospect Asks for Customization it Means He/She is Not a Real Buyer - jonsteinberg
http://jonsteinberg.com/?p=820 

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CapitalistCartr
When I was in construction, we made most of our profit off changes. Every
change has a price tag. Part of the price is how much you want to do the
change. Ugly changes don't come cheap. Changes we suggested do come cheap. Any
salesman who can't attach a price tag to a change request isn't doing his job.

~~~
larrik
Certainly, with ongoing jobs, this is definitely true. For enterprise
software, this customization is basically the bulk of the business.

However, the article is about a product with a single codebase, dealing with
_potential_ customers, rather than actual customers. (The auther doesn't
specifically spell this out in the article, but that's how I interpreted it)
That situation is completely different, as he isn't talking about building
customizations into the contract, he's talking about customers who say "add
this feature AND THEN I'll buy it (for the original price)."

So you're right, but you aren't talking about the same thing at all, even
though it may seem like it at first.

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wccrawford
I disagree that those aren't real buyers. Many rich people are so used to
getting their way that if you won't bend a little and include those windows
treatments, they'll just go find someone who will.

Look at it from the other perspective: If the seller will walk away over 1%,
they aren't a real seller.

Seems just as likely, doesn't it?

~~~
skunkworks
This reminded me of awful Craigslist buyers that always seem to be short 20
bucks when they arrive. A slightly different situation since CL scumbags are
usually looking for a spontaneous discount of > 10% vs. 1%, but funny
nonetheless. I'd stay firm just out of principle, but you don't always have
that luxury as a seller.

~~~
sireat
Why would you call them scumbags?

Granted, the buyers are disingenuous, if they truly have the cash and it would
be better to phrase discount request differently, but in what world, CL prices
are always fixed?

This short 20 bucks technique is a very basic,naive, yet effective negotiating
tactic 101, which was taught in all the 70s,80s books on trading (and probably
also goes back to Babylon).

If your ad specifically said $75firm then then it is their loss for not
reading and trying to negotiate.

If however you didn't specify a firm price, then in person to person dealings
a little haggling is expected. Not fair to call a person a scumbag then.

Most of the time you should be the one with the power since the buyers have to
come to you and your loss of time is less than theirs, if the deal does not
close.

~~~
retroafroman
I'd call them a scumbag if they said on the phone, "yeah, I'll pay $100," then
show up with $80 saying they were short. They hope you take the deal to just
be done with them. Yes, it's a sometimes effective strategy, but still scummy
in my opinion to say one thing and then make another lower offer at the last
minute.

~~~
skunkworks
Bingo -- this is exactly what they do. I consider this a serious angleshoot
because we agreed upon a price and this is to me a verbal contract. To have
someone fudge the terms of the contract by taking advantage of a 11th hour
switch is unethical IMO. I would much rather send them on their way out of
spite, and I'll have a grin knowing that they wasted $4.00 of gas to walk away
empty handed.

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akronim
If your product integrates with existing systems in any way, or even is still
just a fairly minimal product, this doesn't really apply. You can have clients
who are willing to pay for example for reports your product generates, but
it's useless to them unless your product accepts data from one of their
systems. You still need to prioritize requests, but to say they're not real
buyers is extreme. If you don't believe they'll really become clients, that's
what contracts (and maybe letters of intent) are for.

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jackfoxy
There are certain customers and prospects, and certain industries, where this
is endemic, where you just have to stop listening to customers. Sometimes they
actually do not know what they want/need. If you faithfully log feature
requests, you might find there is very little commonality. If you still have a
customer base, it just might mean you actually serve your target
audience/industry something useful.

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bmccormack
Working in a customer-facing position, I have a hard time not wanting to
champion every legitimate feature requests that comes in. However, I've
learned that if I want to get engineering to work on something when it really
counts, I have to be very judicious about what I send their way.

Thankfully, having a product with multiple customization options (API,
plugins, javascript and CSS), I can always give the customer the opportunity
to write their own feature, and if it's simple enough, I'll just write some
code and do it for them.

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jdp23
Our experience with the software engineering tool PREfix in the 1990s was very
different. our $4 million site licencse with Cisco depended on customization
and so did several other $100k-plus deals. When the customer's needs are
slightly different than your offering, you can either say "no" and walk away,
or work with them to come up with something that works for both of you --
which may not be possible or worth doing, but it's at least worth exploring.

Agreed though with Earl's point about "don't do business with dicks"

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zdw
The author seems to think that people who are nitpicky before sale use their
feature requests as a way to avoid making a purchase.

The solution, from my perspective, is to have individual feature requests be
bankrolled by the requestors. Tie features directly to dollar amounts, and
ignore the totally oddball. Or you could price them to the point that the
customer wouldn't buy them (or you're laughing yourself silly all the way to
the bank when they do).

~~~
wccrawford
People frequently do this and it can lead to feature creep. You can easily end
up with a product so complicated that the general user is turned off by the
interface.

I think it's important to decide whether you want to be a powerhouse that can
do everything, or a very simple tool that does 1 job really well... Or exactly
where you want to be between those 2 extremes.

I don't have a problem with turning down small customers that want custom
changes, but when that customer comes along that is as big as all your other
customers combined, you almost have to agree to what they want.

~~~
stylejam
Customization can actually be an important part of a business model. The
problem is how to behave when it's not part of it, and here I agree with the
author, the customer is asking for "something else".

I've been in a startup that used to say yes to every stupid request possible
to get a customer and yes, it destroyed the product, because we had some
general and generic features available to everyone and a lot of stuff that was
very specific and not reusable. This means that even if you get the client,
you're raising maintenance and development costs (and probably performance -
if it's very specific if/else are your friends) without investing in your
product and in future clients, and this is _very_ bad for a business, because
the customer _owns_ the product and you don't.

Actually, I believe it's the single worst thing that can happen to a startup -
case is, it always happen when who is in charge is not a tech guy but a
seller, and the reason is that while costs are hidden to his eyes (developers
do weird things in dark rooms) the benefits are high.

Unfortunately, you're gonna pay such decisions sooner or later :)

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CRASCH
I don't think it is as black and white. It could be a signal that they aren't
a real buyer, or it could be a signal that they do want to buy.

This is what I say when a potential customer of significant value asks for a
feature. "That is an interesting feature. That is the first time someone has
requested that feature. I think it might have some value in our core code base
and other customers might find it useful. I can build the requirements for the
feature into your PO. I'll find out when we can deliver that functionality and
we can start working on it as soon as the PO is signed."

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speby
This is open to interpretation. I would say a customer who comes along asking
for something you don't already have may present itself as an opportunity. If,
in fact, you're already planning to do X and X is the thing the potential
customer is asking for and you charge him double what it would have cost you
to build it anyways (and it was in your list of "features" all along), then
why wouldn't you? It ends being "free" money and you land a new satisfied
customer.

While I agree with the article, there are, as always seems to be the case,
many exceptions.

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earl
From the article: "My father has had prospective buyers of multi-million
dollar apartments threaten to walk away from a deal because of an additional
$10,000 in closing or alteration costs at the 11th hour." And you have a
problem with that? Seriously?

I have a hard rule that after many painful lessons is now inviolable. Every
single time I've broken this rule it's hurt. Don't do business with dicks. If
we negotiate a contract and you toss in another $10k at the last second? Hell,
I don't care if you try, but the answer is absolutely not. We had an
agreement, you changed it, the answer is no.

If that answer doesn't satisfy them, well, they already lied to me once.
They're dicks. I don't know what else they're going to try to screw me on, but
they already tried once and are going to try again. The only answer to someone
tossing an extra $10K in and daring you to walk away by saying you're not a
buyer is tell them they're assholes and you'll never do business with them
again.

Life is too short to have dicks in your life trying to screw you at every
turn. If someone isn't honest, drop them and count yourself lucky.

~~~
j_baker
_We had an agreement, you changed it, the answer is no._

No, you don't have an agreement (morally or legally) because you haven't
signed the contract yet. There's a reason courts place such high emphasis on
having a written agreement: they leave little room for assholes to alter the
deal after the fact.

Does adding in extra costs at the last minute make you a shrewd negotiator?
Perhaps. Unprepared? Probably. But does it make you a dick? Not by itself. If
you have a deal in writing and someone throws in extra expenses after the
fact, then they're an asshole. And you have recourse.

~~~
zzleeper
No, if you have a written deal and someone throws extra expenses, they are
breaking the law and they are IDIOTS, not assholes.

If you have a verbal agreement and someone tries to push a last minute scam
like this, they are dicks and they CANNOT be trusted. Thus, you should
walk/run away.

(I remember pg mentioned this in a post about VCs..)

____

Edit: It wasn't pg but jacquesm:

<http://jacquesmattheij.com/How+To+Sell+Your+Company>

"...Lo and behold, they actually tried to change one of the material terms of
the deal AT CLOSING. These folks were not to be trusted at all. We immediately
said "GOOD BYE!" and hung up the phone..."

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lwat
This is really not a problem. All you need to do is get this client to sign a
contract before you make any changes and everyone can get along just fine.

~~~
tptacek
The other word for "signing a contract" is "buying". Have you had a lot of
luck getting customers to casually sign contracts before making a purchasing
decision?

Lots of companies play games with contingent contracts (especially with first
lighthouse customers). But the phenomenon this post is talking about seems
pretty clear: the people who say "Can you implement X, and then we can talk
more?".

Just the fact that you brought contracts into this seems to me to confirm his
point.

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jpitz
That's funny. If they're not a real buyer, does that mean I don't have to
declare it as a real income?

