This is part 15 of a free online tutorial in writing sales pages.

There are 2 ways I do the ‘big food shop’ (grocery shopping in the states 🙂 ) depending on my mood.

One is with a set plan and budget. I plan meals methodically and scrutinise the cost of everything in the trolley (cart), adding it up as I go along to make sure I stay within the price I’d set myself.

The other way is to put product first and price last. In other words, I’m driven by what I want and what I think it will do for me, than by how much it costs.

Now financial experts might tell me that the first option is the best and most sensible. I get that.

But let’s be honest, when it comes to buying, we’re mostly driven by emotions first and logic second.

This is worth bearing in mind when introducing the price on your sales page.

You want your reader to wander through the sales page like they’re wandering through a supermarket gathering the items most attractive to them, imagining what they’re going to be like when they get them home. In other words, you want your prospect to be attached to the outcome before they’ve even got to the till.

That way, when it becomes time to pay, they feel like it’s a matter of course, rather than a hurdle to overcome.

So here are a few specific techniques you can use in your sale page to make the price less intimidating and easier for your prospect to get their head around.

Make it bite size

What would you rather do, pay a $360 gym membership bill up front, or just $30 a month?

Breaking down the cost of your product makes it more affordable in your customer’s eyes. You might decide to offer a payment plan, so your $297 product might be split into 3 payments of $99 over 3 months.

Another common technique is to equate the cost to a daily rate to make it seem a lot less than the total price:

“Would you pay the equivalent of just $2 a day this year to double your business income?”

Remove the distraction of price

A relatively new method I’ve seen in the past few years with online sales pages is the removal of the price until you click through to the purchase page. This is to encourage readers to judge the product on the sales copy rather than price alone. If you land on a sales page, there is a temptation to scroll down to the cost first to see whether or not you would pay that price for the product. For the copywriter this can mean the customer misses out on all the juicy details of the offer.

Price is important but you don’t want your customer shopping by price alone as that only tells a small part of the story. If you think the price of your product might distract buyers who look at it first, consider popping it on the next buy page without listing it on your main sales page.

Compare with due care

Another techniques for introducing the price is to compare the cost to another product.

Sometimes this is done in a similar vein to point 1, by breaking down the cost into a smaller daily expenditure, for example:

“Would you like to double your income for the cost of your daily coffee?”

The reason copywriters do this is to make the reader aware of the little purchases that we build up and to think about how easily the product could fit into their life. For example, If I can manage to buy a coffee every day, maybe I can find the resources and budget to buy this…

The other way to compare the pricing of your product is to align it against something that gets similar results, but is more expensive.

Here are some common comparisons you might have seen your self in sales pages:

So for example, with your eBook you might explain that it is based on a live workshop that currently costs $450 dollars. For a lot less they can work their way through the materials and get the same results.

I’ve explained that you do need to compare with due care because you want to pick something that makes your product attractive. You want to avoid the sales pitch of a musician my husband saw who said:

So, my CDs are on sale, they’re £7 each… so, that’s like the price of 2 pints of beer.

In short, the audience did the comparison and chose the beer…

Show them the investment

One way to make the price easier to swallow is to show them how your product will save or make your customer money over time.

This is particularly relevant if the purchase relates to a business. Business owners are used to spending money in their business if it means:

• They can work more efficiently and serve more customers faster
• If they can scale their operation to accept more clients
• If they can do more with fewer overheads
• If they can attract more sales

If your product relates to the above, and you can show the correlation between the cost of the product and the return they will make on their investment, do it!

Stack the value

Just before you list the price, it’s a good idea to provide a final reminder of all the great things they’re going to receive when they buy from you.

This is the time to list any bonuses (including the cost) to show that the sum total value of the offer, is more than the cost they’re paying. You want your customer to feel like they’re getting a good deal. For example:

For just $19.99, you receive:

• 4 print issues of Fisherman’s Bi-Weekly (worth $27)
• Access to the online back catalogue of articles
• A coupon to to fish for FREE for a day at the ABC Marina (value $47)
• A FREE Medium System Tackle Box (currently selling at $9.99)

That’s a total bundle worth $83.99 that you receive for just $19.99!

Just make sure, that when you do include bonuses, that they’re relevant to the offer (and make the offer more valuable) rather than just something you can give away for free. Just because it’s free, doesn’t make it valuable, it still has to be worth something to the customer.

Want some ideas about introducing the price of your product? Let me know your questions in the comments below or check out the Laser Copywriting sessions and we can hash it out 1:1!