How to Present Pricing to a Client in Better Proposals and Win More Sales

Presenting a price list to a potential client is a leap of fate. Set the price too high and the potential client may bail. Price things too low, and you leave money on the table. Formulating the right price is the tricky part, but the good news is that the success of your proposal doesn’t always depend on what you charge, but also on how to present pricing to a client. 

Let’s explore the safest way to present prices to a client and close more deals.

Reel them in with a juicy title

The effort you put into the proposal title doesn’t begin and end with the cover page – which you should definitely use, by the way, as proposals with cover pages have a 4.6% more chance to seal the deal. 

The thing is that each section of your proposal should have an engaging title, and this includes the pricing page. 

If you want your prospects to move through the entire proposal, the pricing page is a big hurdle to jump. 

You can do what PandaDoc does and make it look like this:

Which is ok, but not the least enticing for clients to move to the sign and payment sections. 

No one really reads this type of title. At the best, they skim over it and focus on the ca$h part. 

But we don’t want your clients to think that way. So what can you do?

You should remind them of all the benefits they’re going to reap when they choose your solution. 
This is what the pricing page for our Estate Agent Proposal looks like:

It almost seems as if it has a mini-cover of its own, followed by a simple calculation where your client immediately sees their ROI:

This way you’re reminding the client while they’ve contacted you in the first place – to make an investment. 

They are getting something out of this deal and that’s the only thing that matters. 

It zooms out the focus from the total price to include the bigger picture. 
You also don’t want to use terms and jargon that the client is not going to understand. Keep it short and simple, highlight the client’s benefits and you’ve got your foot through the door.

Bundle them up

Use the bundle technique to limit price objections and second thoughts. The more numbers and list items you have, the harder it is for the client to process them. 

It makes more sense to present them as one clear figure.
Again, this is something you want to steer away from:

Faced with a load of numbers, the prospects are more likely to bounce and start looking for cheaper options.

The key is not to invite the client to pick apart your costs. Once they reach for the calculator – it’s hard for them to think about anything but price. And you can pack your bags. 

The second problem here is the psychological dilemma called loss aversion. It basically says that the fear of loss is twice as powerful as the hope of gain. This means people are more willing to take risks to prevent loss 

When you itemize every cost point, the client may perceive a loss at every line with a price tag to it. 

This is why you need to use the power of a bundle. 

You present your value, your expertise, and what you are providing, with one bundled-up price. 
Now let’s take a look at the pricing section of our Marketing Plan Template that won $144 million in sales to companies worldwide in 2021 alone:

Instead of the entire ledger, we have a benefit-reminding title and a clear price that leaves little room for second thoughts.

Using this approach, Better Proposal has helped thousands of companies speed up their proposals and sales documents. 

What is more, our research has shown that If you have just one choice without upsells or multiple packages, you'll sell for a 16.30% higher fee for offers with initial costs. 

And that’s not all – you’ll also sell for a fee that is 28.50% higher with monthly fees. 

The conclusion is that proposals with a bundled offer fare better.

How to present pricing to a client and offer discounts?

This is the part where most people get it wrong. They try to retain clients only to come across as salesy and desperate. 

You need to keep respect when giving discounts instead of just saying “I’m going to eat half the cost so you still like me.”

The discount should go along the lines of “I’m ready to reduce the price because I value our potential partnership.” In this case, the discount is perceived not as a desperate act of a frantic account manager, but as a professional compromise. 

So how do you achieve this? 

There are two components of diving discounts like a gentleman –  the context and the presentation. 

Context

Make sure you’re sending the right signal about what you’re worth and the type of behavior you’re encouraging. If you offer a big discount to a new client, you’re saying that your services are not worth that much, You’re also setting a precedent for future business with them.

Source 

As this ingenious infographic by Toggl puts it: Like sharks, they’ll be coming back for more.

The thing is you can’t reel them in with low prices and then raise the prices in the future. It’s hard to change pricing with a particular client, once you establish it. 
A much better way is to offer a discount if they pay everything upfront. That way you look more professional and also avoid the risk of them not paying later down the line.

Presentation

The way you present the discount is also important to consider. Take a look at these examples:

Example 1:

Increasing Leads With a Landing Page - $12,000

• Includes 5% off Project for Early Payment

Example 2:

Increasing Leads With a Landing Page - $12,000

• Includes 25% off Social Media Marketing for Early Payment

Say that the discount for both of these options is $600. Example 2 is clearly a more attractive one because of the bigger percentage. 

It looks like a better deal and there’s an added bonus to accepting the add-on service of social media. 

Always present a solution

The problem with many business proposals is that they communicate the price but not the value. 

You need to get around this and highlight benefits and solutions in your proposal. 
Let’s take a look at an example. You’re offering IT support services. Instead of throwing a list of prices for your proposal, you focus on the benefits of each item. This is how we do it at Better Proposals:

Organized like this, the pricing section clearly communicates your value, expertise, and competency, which is more persuasive than a spreadsheet of items and figures. 

Wrapping up

Writing proposals is a tedious process, but also essential for landing new business. 

When you have the experience and skills, it’s not hard to come up with a price for your services. 

Now you need to nail the other part – how to present pricing to a client. This guide should help you avoid the common mistakes and allow your prospects to see your price as an investment in their future. 

However, if you don’t want to write every proposal from scratch, check out our collection of pre-written digital proposals. You won’t have to worry about presenting the price ever again

Sign up for a free 14-day trial and see for yourself why 8,000+ successful businesses keep using our templates.