The Effects of "Call for Pricing" Pricing Structures
-
I have a wholesaler who sells great products but they have an internet pricing policy that states we cannot show prices online and that we must have a "call for pricing" or "request a quote/price" button instead because retailers are losing sales due to lower prices online from other retailers.
I know, I know.. They are out of their mind. I have already told them that they should have online MAP pricing requirements to protect their retailers but they refuse to even set an MSRP! I've been looking for some articles to show the statistics of customers lost from not having a price on your site.
Does anyone have any information or suggested links on this topic? and the final question is if I was to remove the prices from my website, would that in turn affect my rankings?
-
Personally, if I can't find a price I hit the back button. This applies both to things I'm ready to buy right away and to things where a consultation is needed. For example, when searching for a company to do an animated explainer video for my site I only requested official quotes from companies that listed rough pricing estimates. And I only submitted my contact information to companies that didn't request a phone number. I have a fear of getting endless high-pressure sales calls.
Does my mentality apply to other people as well? I don't have stats on it, but probably, at least to people around my age (24). I want to do things when I want to do them. Usually that's at 3am. I don't want to call and leave a message and have somebody call me back at 8am when I'm sleeping. If I've made up my mind to buy something and I'm not allowed to buy it (reminds me of Apple forcing you to wait in line even if you already know what you want) I'll move on to the next vendor. If I need to get a quote, I want to do so by filling out a form. I'm also fairly introverted, and would rather not talk on the phone unless I'm in the mood to do so.
Additionally, when I have to call for a price I feel like it's going to be like buying a car. I don't feel like wasting my energy and emotions in a bartering process. I don't feel like being judged for how much I can probably afford and being charged accordingly.
Sorry I don't have any numbers, but that's my gut feeling.
-
I would imagine it would affect sales. There's probably no way around that. If they do this make sure call tracking is implemented so they can see what it does to their conversion rates.
As for rankings, Nakul Goyal gave the best answer so far with a first-hand account. He said they didn't change. But I would also imagine that you'd lose some sales from other channels that you can no longer participate in without pricing, such as Google Shopping, Amazon, and price-based comparison shopping engines.
There are other ways to block people from scraping your site for pricing besides requiring customers to call, so I wouldn't say that issue justifies this strategy on its own.
Good luck!
Everett
-
I am sure they did, but we were never able to have a read on it because price data was never added to the site. We just started measuring the Call to Action / Conversion as a successful RFQ or a visit to the contact page from these product level pages.
-
That's good to know but did it affect sales? It seems that less people are likely to call than are to just go ahead and check out.
-
Yes, but in our industry we have a set MAP Pricing policy with all other product suppliers which sets a legal limit on online pricing, normally about 20% below MSRP.
I personally will not call for pricing on most products. I assume it means that the price is too high. I can't imagine how many other people feel the same way and how many customers they're/we're losing from it.
-
Big companies hire computer savvy guys to run scripts and to take pricing from thousands of products from hundreds of competitors so they can undercut them or at least be competitive with them and use their strong brand name. This might be one of the reasons for this practice.
-
I worked on a B2B with a similar problem sometime back. The business decided to implement a Request for Quote system. And there was no impact on the rankings.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
How I can exclude "Events" & "Traffic" from a specific IP?
I would like to know how I can exclude the events triggered from a specific IP for example my office' IP address. I've already added a filter to exclude my office's IP address, but the "events" are still showing in the new view. TIA!
Conversion Rate Optimization | | zpm20140 -
Use "Brand Name" or things like "Free Shipping" in Ecommerce Product Title Tags?
Given the current industry best practices and changes to Google algorithms, should I be using "Product name...Brand Name" or something like "Product Name...Free Shipping (or similar)" in my ecommerce title tags? Thanks!
Conversion Rate Optimization | | jeffbstratton0 -
Is "http://whereisthefold.com/" a good tool?
I came across this tool: http://whereisthefold.com/ I would like to add this to my bag of tricks but want to see if anyone has actually taken the time to verify that this tool presents an accurate representation of where things are placed on different screen sizes? I would appreciate any input. Ron
Conversion Rate Optimization | | Ron_McCabe0 -
Review Functionality Plugins for eCommerce. Which are the best and most cost effective?
Hi Mozzers! Let me give you a bit of background for my question. I currently look after two eCommerce sites and naturally I want to get them using reviews for products for customer interaction / content and rich snippets. I am basically looking for a cost effective plugin that can plugin to our CMS system that can give us review functionality and will be compatible with rich snippets. At the moment we use Disqus for the blog commenting system and i've heard this can be used for product reviews. Any ideas would be great. At the moment our client is holding back due to 'lack of funds' so the most cost effective measures would be appreciated. Cheers,
Conversion Rate Optimization | | SEOAndy0 -
Call-to-action is literally a call/dialing a number...
The call-to-action for this site is not some sort of webform, nor adding an item to a cart; it is a call, that is the action this business wants to elicit. Would there possibly be any advantage to making the number clickable and having a landing page for that, any suggestions on how to make this call-to-action more pronounced/clear? Thanks! =]
Conversion Rate Optimization | | Mozzin0 -
Mile long pages with calls to action
Do these mile-long pages with a call to action at the bottom really produce more conversions? For example, see http://www.keywordelite.com/. Has anyone A/B tested this format vs. breaking up the content into tabs or some other format with multiple pages? Personally, these turn me off as they seem disorganized, they take forever to read, and they always sound like scams.
Conversion Rate Optimization | | john4math0 -
"How did you find out about us" accuracy research?
This is more of a conversion and usability question than an SEO question. Does anyone know if there's any comprehensive research about the accuracy of the well-known "How did you find out about us" question in web forms? I need to convince a customer that they shouldn't put the question in their form, at least not the way they do now. I hope someone can refer me to a credible online source / article about this subject?
Conversion Rate Optimization | | Melonmedia0 -
Lookiing for examples of local "small biz" sites with phone or contact form conversion points
Hi Guys, I'm looking for any good examples of small business sites that you've come across that do a good job at converting potential visitors to clients. I'm primarily thinking about service oriented business such as Doctors, Dentists, Salons, Clothing stores, small restuarants, car detailing services, local photographers, etc. I'm just trying to digest other examples and look for new inspirations.
Conversion Rate Optimization | | DotCar0