A: It's my belief that the price should be set and salespeople should sell the job for that price. Only the sales manager or the company owner should be allowed to give a discount.
I personally don't believe in discounting. Most salespeople will give the discount away at the first opportunity. I worked with a company once that authorized a 12% discount -- if necessary. Well it was sure necessary, because every salesperson I went out with presented the price with that 12% off. We immediately did away with that. Guess what? Volume went up, along with sales commissions.
I give salespeople a lot of credit. Tell them what they have to get for the product and they will get it. Give them any leeway, however, and they will take it.
The moral of the story is, tell a salesperson what you want them to sell, give them a reason to sell it today, tell them what you're going to pay them when they do sell it, and then pay them when they do. If you let them price your products for you, you're asking for trouble. --Phil Rea has conducted more than 13,200 in-home sales calls and trained more than 1,750 salespeople. For more information, please call (800) 613-4150.