When I sit down with potential clients and companies, I almost never go in with a set agenda. It’s impossible to have a “one size fits all” style proposal or product. And I make a point, in that first meeting, to do more listening than talking. Let them tell you what they’re looking for so you can make the appropriate pitch afterwards. This is hardly a new-fangled idea, but it continually seems to allude folks. Instead, they go into meetings and say “this is what we do, so this is what we’ll do for you.” Not a great model, because the people on the other side of the table always know their needs better than you. Listen first. Always.
A great example of this comes from JetBlue. Air travel has been getting put through the wringer lately. Escalating fuel prices coupled with a country in recession has resulted in less travel, and worse, less perks for those who are flying. Again, nothing new here. But JetBlue, through some shrewd marketing and number-crunching, is trying a one month “all you can fly” concept. Essentially, it’s $600 and you can fly as many times as you’d like on JetBlue -to any of their serviced destinations.
The buffet-style pricing is becoming the norm in most industries now. When I got my first cell phone in the early-90s, pricing was $0.44 per minute. There were no nights and weekends, peak/off peak, or in network calling. One rate, billed as you used it. Not surprisingly, this didn’t work too well for most people. Flat rates allowed people to maximize their minutes as they saw fit, and it doesn’t look like the cell providers are going out of business any time soon. The growing trend, as JetBlue realizes, is for set pricing with unlimited usage.
By evolving their price model, JetBlue stands to do extremely well. For businesses trying to solidify costs, this type of promotion would be welcomed. It used to be college kids wandering Europe on EurRail passes, now they can fly across the US and back and forth and back again. And the challenge becomes not seeing how little you can spend, but how far you can go.
Brilliant stuff. But the question remains, how does your company evolve to suit today’s market?
Check out the official JetBlue press release here.
