Marshall This is great news. Not only are you building a customer base, but you're keeping busy and more importantly, making money. Maybe not as much as you had hoped for, but just the fact that you'e out there working I am sure is a great boost to your confidence and self immage. When you start contacting these people a year from now, a lot of them will decided that their piano doesn't need to be tuned again. especially when they find out that your tuning fee is now twice what it was the previous time. Therefore, what you might want to consider doing what I've been doing for the past two years with great success. I have two different prices. One is what I call my "basic" tuning fee. This is for my regular once or twice a year customers and for pianos where there are no problem. All I do is tune the piano. Then for new customers I have my "full service" tuning fee, which is about 25% higher than my basic fee. For this fee I do minor repairs and regulations, or if there are none of those needed, a pitch raise. But I tell the customer that if in my opinion, the the repairs or adjustment are more than what I consider "minor", they will be notified and told what the price will be. It's interesting that some customers are almost proud to say that their piano needs at least a full service, if not more. I never tell my customers about a pitch raise. Most of them don't understand. So I just do it, and charge them the full service fee. And when there are repairs or adjustments needed and a pitch raise, just say that the repairs are more than minor. Customers won't know the difference, and and more than happy to pay the extra just to get their piano tuned and working. So next year, when you call your customers, tell them that they now qualify for your "basic fee", which, instead of being twice what they paid, it will only be 50% more. That will sound much better to them, and they will more likely to say yes. Good luck with your business. Willem -----Original Message----- From: Marshall Gisondi <pianotune05 at hotmail.com> To: pianotech <pianotech at ptg.org> Sent: Thu, Jul 5, 2012 8:23 pm Subject: [pianotech] half off sale Hi Rick, When it comes to groupon a half price sale, put the negative feedback aside. It's all about volume and building a business. It is not about being desperate. Even if you feel desperate at the moment. That might be your feeling and perhaps you are. Eve if you are it doesn't matter. The reason is still the same, building a client base. I'm sure there are folks on here who have all the customers they might need or can handle. Sure why would they try Groupon. They're all set. I can attest that it works. I've only had a problem with one couple who didn't want to pay for a pitch correction. The piano was about 30 cents sharp. That's not bad considering I sold 328 groupons so far. If you do it, be specific and make sure you put on the groupon deal that pitch corrections and/or repairs if needed are extra. I've made a little extra by charging for pitch raises and fixing a stuck key or two. Of course there are those I know who may never come back, but those are probably the ones you wouln't want to keep anyway. My wife was told by one of her customers who read in a business magazine that groupon is a great way for small business to build their business. The downside is all the calls and call backs you'll have to do. I received about 53 calls in a little over two days lol. The good thing for me is, I have the contact information of everyone I tune for who purchased a groupon and they will hear from me either in 6 months or a year depending on what they want. I haven't come across any dead pianos that couldn't be tuned. I have run into a couple that sure could use other work which in some cases I've put a bug in their ear. So Rick try the groupon, unless of course you're in my area of the country lol. I wish you succes. I was unsure at first as well. My thinking is, if I do this a couple of times then I'll build a substantial customer base and data base of definite piano owners whom I can contact throughout the year. I do ask them if they are working with a piano tech. I 'm looking for new customers not pre owned ones.:-) If they are working with a tech. and the majorit are not, I encourage them to stay with them if they are happy. The great thing is, there is no out of pocket cost, just time. Also I know on my groupon deal they limit to a 25 mile radius, so no 40 mile trips for you. People call me and ask , "Is my town within the 25 miles?" My joke to my wife is, "what am I a map?" lol I had one person write me from Jersey and ask if I travel to a specific zip code which I've never heard of lol Just try to get back with people as soon as you can and call all of them. It's tough and I'm still playing catch up from last week and some from the previous week. I hope this was helpful. Sorry it was long, just trying to keep you from reading any negative ideas about doing a groupon. I know these folks mean well and I sure understand what they're saying, but we're living in a new age now. Music stores as far as I've seen don't give ou their piano tuning customers any longer, yellow pages rarely work. It's a computer age, so get on board and start a groupon compaign. I've also heard of one called amazon local. Let me know how it goes. Marshall 215-510-9400 http://www.phillytuner.com -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <https://www.moypiano.com/ptg/pianotech.php/attachments/20120706/4d2186ff/attachment.htm>
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