two cents

Meet the new 99 cents alternative.

In the early days of the Internet, I earned money by selling e-books on eBay. At the time, there were thousands of e-book sellers and we were competing for the same customer base. I was successful in my own right sharing enough e-books to pay for my 4 year college degree and provide for my daughter on that income.

The tactics that I used are still applicable today while selling products online. One of my products was a tell all book about affiliate marketing. I studied the competitors first before putting my product online. Two e-book sellers were listed in the category that I wanted placement. One seller sold his e-book product for $19.99 and the other item sold for $20. Only one penny separated the two. For the most part, the sales pitch and the e-book cover were similar. Certainly, there could have been improvements made on their sales copy, the layout and other attention grabbers. It is important to put together a product where people feel like they are getting a good deal on a product that appears to look more valuable.

So the penny enticed me to automatically desire to select the $19.99 product.  I wasn’t alone. Other customers purchased more of the $19.99 product than the $20 product. And the feedback was that many felt they were getting it for a “steal.”

In this case, the illusion was not the last number on the price tag.  But it was the first number. When a product could retail for $20, by simply making it $19.99 makes it seem more affordable.

So now I am ready to enter. But my product is similar in sales pitch and quality of graphics on the cover. What can I do differently to sell my e-book?

I decided to sell my e-book for $19.97. And what a great decision that was. By selling it for 2 pennies lower than the top seller, I reaped plenty of profits! It made me realize that after people look at the left side of the price, they will then look at the the right side and select the one that is smaller.

I also ran tests and discovered that people will buy if the size of the amount is written smaller. For example, it is better to write $40 than it is to write $40.00. The extra digits appeared to make the client feel that they were paying more although it was the same amount!

So the moral to this story is that if you are planning on selling products online, please research your competitors. And then lower your price by a couple of pennies. The number “.97″ seems to work better than “.98.” It’s not used very often, whereas “.99″ us overly used. So imagine how your product will stand out if you change the price by just a few pennies?

If you are an indie writer desiring to sell books on Amazon, you should purchase an e-book for 99 cents to walk through the entire shopping process. Make notes of what is working and what is not. And then try out the 97 cent alternative and let me know what happens.

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