Chamber Executive Ongoing Education Weekly New Idea - Worth Every Penny: Build a Business That Thrills Your Customers and Still Charge What You're Worth - By Erin Verbeck, Sarah Petty

A revelation for small business owners: creating a profitable business is possible without getting into a slash-and-burn price war with your competitors.

Many small business owners feel pressure to discount their products and services, especially when times are tough. After all, how else will they keep up with the low prices offered by their discounting competitors? What they don't realize is that discounting is the last thing they should be doing if they want to win big. Sarah Petty and Erin Verbeck are here to show you that there's a radically different way to run a small business-- one in which the owners focus on creating specialized offerings and an over-the-top customer experience, not on matching the prices of their competition. Worth Every Penny encourages you to explore and use this model, which is designed to maximize your advantages over the big-box stores and other discounting competitors.

You'll learn how to:

--Build a brand that lays the foundation for you to charge what your offerings are worth.

--Create products, services and high-touch customer experiences to achieve healthy margins and an outspokenly happy and loyal client base.

--Understand how to use a pricing strategy that allows you to create demand and attract the right customers instead of discounting.

--Throw traditional advertising to the wind and implement a boutique way of marketing to excel in this competitive business environment.

--Learn the relationship-based sales skills needed to close every sale and have your clients clamoring for more.

The authors' strategies are enhanced by real-life business experiences and vivid anecdotes from all types of business owners--restaurateurs to contractors to professional service providers and photographers. With the advice in Worth Every Penny, you will be inspired to live your passion and pass your enthusiasm on to your customers. The result: a profitable business that avoids succumbing to the pressure to discount.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

Sources: Multiple, including Amazon and Arlington Heights Memorial Library