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The flipside to this is, you, the seller, sees zero money from people who were tasked to "do a quick search for quotes and providers and let us know at the meet

The flipside to this is, you, the seller, sees zero money from people who were tasked to "do a quick search for quotes and providers and let us know at the meeting tomorrow", and went away from your website simply thinking "ok this company doesn't even list a pricerange; move along". I've lost count of the number of times this happened to me for moderate-to-large / organization-wide purchases. Unless you somehow expect that a director never assigns a lackey at short notice, and always does this kind of research themselves, giving themselves oodles of time for a decision, because they enjoy the exhilirating experience of spending hours upon hours on the phone with salespeople. There's probably a good chance of a non-trivial amount of survivorship bias going on before you even reach the tip of the iceberg that is the "I only end up talking to directors and managers" observation.

notahacker 4y ago
In most cases, they expect to see zero money from people who were tasked to "do a quick search for quotes" anyway, because they don't compete on price and someone who gets their junior to shortlist self service providers on the basis of the lowest cost and least effort to get a quote isn't remotely likely to be making a purchase strategic enough to consider their large up front setup fee for a custom trained model and months long integration process.
satvikpendem 4y ago
> The flipside to this is, you, the seller, sees zero money from people who were tasked to "do a quick search for quotes and providers and let us know at the meeting tomorrow", and went away from your website simply thinking "ok this company doesn't even list a pricerange; move along". The people who look for quotes in organizations that are likely to want to be targeted by the company are themselves salespeople and business development employees, not developers, who know how "contact sales" and the sales pipeline in general work. In other words, it is mutual self selection that benefits both parties. All others outside of that range need not apply.
- JohnFen 4y ago
  > The people who look for quotes in organizations that are likely to want to be targeted by the company are themselves salespeople and business development employees, not developers As a developer, I've been tasked with doing this probably two dozen times in my career at various companies. It's not that rare. And yes, having to talk to a salesperson to get an idea of the cost gets that offering crossed off my list immediately. Those companies have lost fairly large sales because of the practice.
  - satvikpendem 4y ago
    Not as many sales as devs would like to believe, and likely are net positive by not underselling with fixed prices.

notahacker 4y ago

In most cases, they expect to see zero money from people who were tasked to "do a quick search for quotes" anyway, because they don't compete on price and someone who gets their junior to shortlist self service providers on the basis of the lowest cost and least effort to get a quote isn't remotely likely to be making a purchase strategic enough to consider their large up front setup fee for a custom trained model and months long integration process.

satvikpendem 4y ago

> The flipside to this is, you, the seller, sees zero money from people who were tasked to "do a quick search for quotes and providers and let us know at the meeting tomorrow", and went away from your website simply thinking "ok this company doesn't even list a pricerange; move along". The people who look for quotes in organizations that are likely to want to be targeted by the company are themselves salespeople and business development employees, not developers, who know how "contact sales" and the sales pipeline in general work. In other words, it is mutual self selection that benefits both parties. All others outside of that range need not apply.

JohnFen 4y ago
> The people who look for quotes in organizations that are likely to want to be targeted by the company are themselves salespeople and business development employees, not developers As a developer, I've been tasked with doing this probably two dozen times in my career at various companies. It's not that rare. And yes, having to talk to a salesperson to get an idea of the cost gets that offering crossed off my list immediately. Those companies have lost fairly large sales because of the practice.
- satvikpendem 4y ago
  Not as many sales as devs would like to believe, and likely are net positive by not underselling with fixed prices.