Be interested to get CPs collective thoughts on this though as it is somewhat related to the thread. This was awhile ago now and I don't remember all the particulars and it will probably sound extremely weird/manipulative but at the time it worked.
We found that for our prospective asian clients we got more of their business if we estimated a higher price. This obviously makes no sense. Why? because typically we offered everyone the exact same bottem price straight away and there was no wiggle room, most people accepted that and evaluated our offer vs our competition. Now for Asian people and obviously this doesn't include all Asian people but the majority for sure, the stereotype, and for this we found true, is that people from the Asian communities love to haggle on price. With our old pricing there was no wiggle room so it seemed like they weren't getting a good deal when we said we couldn't move on price and they were more aggressive on trying to find cheaper competitors.
We didn't seem to be getting much of their business. So when we were meeting with pespective Asian clients we added a nominal amount <5% to the initial offer. Then they would start haggling and we would drop our price back to the initial amount just for them so it seemed like they were getting a better deal when infact everyone was hitting the exact same price point. When we started doing that, our business within the Asian community went up significantly and we started getting more referals as well.
Raises interesting ethical discussions doesn't it.
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