Marketing Approach

[Clyde Hollinger]

Terry,

It just occurred to me that you could maybe use something like this:

        "Mrs. Client, even piano technicians can't agree on the exact meanings of terms like rebuilt, restored, etc.  Some will interpret it to mean spending many thousands of dollars to make the piano look and play like new and often better than new, while others may have standards that are much lower.  It may surprise you to know that even brand new pianos can often be improved considerably, although most buyers would have trouble understanding that.
        "My observations about your piano indicate that considerably more could be done to improve it.  Now if you like your piano just the way it is, fine; we'll just pick up on normal maintenance from here on.  But would you be interested if I explain to you ways that the piano can sound and play even better than it does now?"

Then take it from there.  Find a bass string that sounds the best and compare it with one of the bad ones.  Invite her to your shop, if you wish, and show her what you do.  Maybe you can show her a rebuild you just finished and let her see and play it.  Even though she is a piano teacher, she may never have played a piano that really looks and sounds good.  Or show her whatever else you think she should know.

The risk, of course, is spending a lot of time explaining/showing all this stuff and in the end not having one red cent more income to show for it.  Just be sure that if she okays more work, she will be able to notice the improvements when you are finished.  Otherwise, she'll think you're a quack out to get her money.

Over the years I have unfortunately developed cynicism about some piano teachers.  They are like piano technicians in that some of them are truly excellent world-class teachers, while others shouldn't be trying to teach at all.  I service pianos for a number of teachers, and the pianos go anywhere from nice grands to truly poor spinets (a certain Kincaid spinet comes to mind).  I once talked to a teacher whose piano (a Kimball console or something similar) was *very* out of tune and she said, "Oh, something's wrong with it."  Well, duh!  Why not get it fixed?!  But if they keep their price for lessons low enough, the trusting public will beat a path to the door.  I better stop there before I get too carried away.


Regards,
Clyde Hollinger, RPT

Kdivad@AOL.COM wrote:

> In a message dated Mon, 20 May 2002  8:05:23 PM Eastern Daylight Time, "Farrell" <mfarrel2@tampabay.rr.com> writes:
>
> >I tuned a small Baldwin grand for a lady today. I would guess it is at least 50 years old. It is not one of their top-teir pianos - it is one of the cheaper ones. The thing has realy tubby bass strings and the action is way out of regulation, etc. - your basic worn out older piano.
> >
> >She informed me that she just moved here and wants to start teaching piano again. She also plays violin. So of course, I was thinking that I should mention to her some ways to improve the performance of her piano - if not a total rebuild/replacement at least new bass strings and a serious action refurbish/rebuild.
> >
> >So I asked her how long she has had the piano. She said five years. She bought it because it has just been totally rebuilt: Hammers may have been filed, case was crumily (word?) refinished, and plate and tuning pins and agraffes and strings had been painted gold.
> >
> >I clammed up at that point and left. Is there any constructive way to sell her work in light of the recent "rebuild"? Anyone with a clever sales approach that would cut through the BS that she apparently purchased in the past?
> >
> >I've run into similar situations before and really don't know what to say that might sound constructive and appropriate.
> >
> >Terry Farrell
> >
> Terry, tough situation, the way I find successful for me is find out the complaints if any and let them guide me. I then go over the piano side by side with the customer discovering any problems together.  I use an evaluation list to explore the condition of the piano in an unbiased and methodical manner.  I would typically say things like "I use my tuning hammer to see how tight the tuning pins are telling me if the piano will hold a tune," It seems elementary but with most customers this eliminates hurt feelings or embaressments that can happen when you all of a sudden tell them that their piano needs major work.  A diplomatic explanation of the vast differences between piano mens interpretation of the definition of restored and rebuilt helps.  A intuitive understanding of what the customer is really looking is most important, maybe she is happy the way it is.  These things work really work well for me and maybe there is something here you can use.
> David Koelzer
> DFW