Jump Out of the Price Box - 50 Grand Mattress Anyone

May 18, 2008

Jump Out of the Price Box

How much is too much for a mattress? $500? $5,000? What about $50,000? And, the bigger question is… are you buying a mattress or the good night’s sleep the mattress provides?

If you market your service or product by talking all about your end product - the tax return, the CD, the program, the great model, then you are what is called a features-driven marketer. This means that your prospects have to take what you are talking about and tie it to what they will get from what you are selling (unless you directly tie features to benefits).

Some of your prospects will do this. Most won’t.

If you are like Hästens, the makers of the Vividus bed that costs $49,500 US (if it hasn’t increased since I first saw this story last year about this time), then you don’t even start talking about your mattress. You begin focusing on the benefit of your product - the thing that people who want it will crawl over pea gravel to get. In this case, it is a good night’s sleep. If you are one of the millions of people who do not sleep well, then $49,500 might be a drop in the bucket compared to how much creativity and productivity you lose from lack of sleep (at least that’s what Hästens is marketing).

So what does all of this have to do with you? Well, first, let me ask you. Would you have ever thought anyone could sell a mattress for 50 grand? I think in most cases your answer would be, uh… NO! But, Hästens has a few lessons for you.

Competitor price does not matter if there are other people out there that believe YOU have something they need. Case in point… Hästens has sold many of these mattresses and late last year began increasing production. There are many, many more competitors that sell for much less than the Hästens asking price.
Focus on YOUR prospects needs, wants and desires. Hästens is not selling to the group of people who go from mattress store to mattress store looking for a ‘deal.’ They are looking for the affluent insomniac (or spouse) that has tried EVERYTHING to get a good night’s rest. They KNOW what these people care about, and they know how to speak their language. See below to hear ‘hot buttons’ that appeal to their best client.
Benefits rule. The Vividus (made by Hastens), Latin for “full of life”, is the most expensive bed in the world. From the focus on what happens when you sleep and why you need a good night’s sleep to the name that promises you will be “full of life” when you wake, benefits are king.

Go to the Hästens website for a great marketing lesson that shows a woman (research shows most of these buying decisions are made by women) who is smart (message: if you are smart then you buy this mattress), and who is doing all kinds of work in her sleep (message: if you get this mattress, you can increase your productivity and get a good night’s sleep). Not once do they talk about the mattress. Or how it is made, or what it is made of. Sure, that information is available, but remember this… People make buying decisions for emotional reasons and then look for facts to back up the decision they’ve already made.

This mattress is a great example of how having the courage to price yourself high can attract in a whole new level of consumer. I have no doubt that the gingham (checkered) fabric will become a ’status’ symbol for the wealthiest people on the planet much like YSL did for luggage and handbags, Mont Blanc did for fountain pens, and Rolex did for watches.

When it comes to your offering here are the most important questions to ask:

Do you know who your BEST client is?
Do you know if your marketing is attracting that type of client? Hint: Look at who is coming to you and are they a fit? If not, do you know what part of your marketing is not working?
Are you priced in alignment with your BEST client? It may be hard to believe, but for some people if your fees are not high enough, people will be suspicious of your fees.

There are more wealthy people than you may think in the world. If you are hampered by thinking that people don’t have the money, they don’t want to spend it on your service, they just can’t afford it, think again.

Hästens announced they would be raising the cost of the world’s most expensive mattress to $59,750 in April 2008. I don’t know if they did… you must order a catalog to find out. With a typical mattress cost running somewhere around $750 bucks, and this company charging nearly 80 times that for a mattress (although I’m sure it must have some better qualities), then you might just ask yourself if there’s room for you to charge more for your services too - provided that your ideal client would still buy.

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