What to do when people constantly tell you “I can’t afford it” – without lowering your price

Being told “I can’t afford it” can make you really question your pricing and the value inside your products. But this doesn't mean that you need to lower your price or offer discounts. Today I'm dissecting what this REALLY means and how crafting your content is crucial to dealing with this feedback in your business.

In this episode we talk about:
– How showing your customer the value of your offer can help to shuffle their priorities
– The four ingredients you need before someone will buy
– How to tweak your offer without changing the core product to identify what appeals to your audience
– Strategies to understanding and knowing when you are promoting to the right people
– How important positioning your messaging can be to reaching your ideal customer
– The benefit of tailoring your marketing to show your buyer why it is essential they buy now

 

Today, I am talking about a challenge that I know many business owners come up against especially when you are selling a digital product, like a course, a group program, or a membership, but also when you're selling your services. 

The challenge? When somebody tells you they can't afford it. I do want to differentiate the difference between one person saying they can't afford it and multiple people saying they can't afford it. Like if the majority of people are saying I can't afford it. 

If you're starting to get a lot of people saying, Hey, I actually can't afford it. Because if you're hearing this a lot, the first temptation might be to think, oh, this is too expensive. I should drop my price. I should offer discounts. I should put it on sale. And when you do this, chances are they still won't buy. When somebody tells you that they can't afford it most of the time, it doesn't mean that they actually can't afford it. 

But often when somebody tells you they can't afford it, it's a cop-out. It's easier than them saying, I can't see enough value in this to justify paying that amount. I can't see enough value in this to justify paying that amount. 

 

How showing your customer the value of your offer can help to shuffle their priorities

We are here to show them the value in our offer and hopefully, by showing them that value, we encourage them to shuffle their priority ladder a little so that they prioritise spending money on whatever it is that you are selling them. Sales happen at the intersection of the right offer, the right people, the right messaging, and the right time. 

So you have to be making that right offer to the right people with the right messaging and at the right time for somebody to buy. And if they are telling you that they can't afford it, chances are that one or more of these things isn't aligned. 

So let's break that down a little bit more. 

 

How to tweak your offer without changing the core product to identify what appeals to your audience

There is going to be some overlap between the right offer and the right messaging, the offer being the product or the service you are selling and how it's packaged up. That includes the price, any bonuses. Any additional support, any refund, policy guarantee, payment plan options. All of those things make up the offer. 

And sometimes we can tweak the author without changing that core product. If there is one particular reason why people aren't buying, you might be able to add a bonus that addresses their needs. You might be able to add additional support. Or if they are really tight on cash and they really genuinely cannot afford it right now. Maybe you can add an extended payment option. These things all change that offer without changing the core product. 

And they can, those simple changes might take something that is not the right fit for them and turn it into something that is right. 

 

Strategies to understanding and knowing when you are promoting to the right people

You might have the right offer, but the people you are selling it to could be the wrong people. And that brings me to part two of the formula –  the right people. 

If the people you are selling to actually can't afford, that's a sign that you are selling to the wrong people. You can help people who can't afford to work with you in your free content, but you need to make money to stay in business. Otherwise you can't help anyone. And that's where selling your services, selling your products, that's where that comes into play. 

On the other hand, it might be that you are selling an online course to an audience of people who value paying somebody to do it for them. They have the budget or somebody to just do it. They don't want to deal with it. They don't have the time. But these people might not tell you, I can't afford it. They might tell you that they want something different or that it's not the offer for them. 

Just because they don't want it. That doesn't mean that nobody wants your online course. It simply means that the people you are selling it to those who don't want that particular offer. They want something else. But there might be somebody else out there who does no matter how awesome your offer is, the wrong people will not engage with it. 

And it can be really hard to differentiate whether you have the wrong offer or the wrong people. And that's why I always recommend doing non-buyer surveys. 

 

How important positioning your messaging can be the key to reaching your ideal customer

Sometimes it might be that you have the right offer and you have the right people. But they're still telling you they can't afford. And in that case, maybe you have the wrong messaging. Without the right messaging, the right people won't see the value of your offers. They won't understand why they should prioritise spending money on it. 

Different audiences will resonate with different messaging or it might be that nobody resonates with a particular messaging. 

 

The benefit of tailoring your marketing to show your buyer why it is essential they buy now

You can have the perfect combination of everything else. You can have the right offer the right people, and the right messaging. But if it's the wrong time again, they won't buy. And you might hear something like, oh, I can't afford it.

Which doesn't always mean they can't afford it right now. It means I don't prioritise spending money on it right now. So then it's up to you to show why should they buy it now rather than next week or next month.

Limited-time launch campaigns, where you've got doors open and doors closed, or you're adding a bonus for a limited period of time, or your price is going up. These things can all help. That's not about pressuring somebody into making a decision. It's about saying, Hey look. I'm going to stop you from procrastinating. 

Now with most of these things, the offer, the people, the messaging, and the right time, how you market your product, your offer, that can help you to bridge the chasm. 

 

In summary,

If you have noticed that you get quite a few people saying I can't afford it. I really want you to pause and assess which one of these things that's holding your customer back. Because that will give you a lot more insight than you can get from just sitting there behind your computer screen, trying to guess what is going through their minds. 

 

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