DA, Right on. Bruce and List, my experience is that often technicians are hesitant to try and sell more work, thinking that they will be perceived as "nickel and diming the client to death." But if you approach the sale from an honest, educational perspective, showing the client the details, telling them what results they can expect, the information is almost universally well-received. I agree with DA that EVERY piano I see needs more than tuning and EVERY client knows what their piano needs to perform at its best. I also like to tell clients that I'm not offended or upset if they choose not to do the work right now. It's their piano. But I also tell them that I DO believe it is very important that they know honestly what they have and that they know what they can have and what it will cost. Again, almost universally my clients are happy to have that information presented to them in a non-confrontational, non-judgemental way. I'm here to help, Ma'am....... William R. Monroe On Wed, Nov 11, 2009 at 9:06 PM, David Andersen < david at davidandersenpianos.com> wrote: > > On Nov 11, 2009, at 6:30 PM, Bruce Dornfeld wrote: > > I agree completely! This is what’s good for the music and the technician. > I think most techs are afraid to sell it. How do you go about it? > > > 1) ask great questions: > ---"Has this piano ever been serviced? It's a machine, ya know. Have you > ever seen the action out? > ---"How long have you owned it?" How many hours---guesstimated---is it > played in a week/month?" > ---"Wow. So it's been ___hundred/thousand hours since any service > whatsoever besides tuning has been done. > That's like driving a car xxxxx miles and just putting gas in it. That's > kind of brutal...." > > 2) SHOW them what's wrong---letoff, springs, drop, key travel, string > cuts---and TELL them how that "wrongness" makes the piano sound and feel, > and the simple steps you'll take to correct it and make it right. If you're > accurate, and they're anywhere towards being a decent player, they'll > immediately sense you know what you're doing, and they'll agree to to the > work. > > 3) Be authentic. Be honest. Don't promise the moon unless you've delivered > it reliably many times before. Underpromise and overdeliver. > > 4) MOST IMPORTANT: the final question (if they haven't agreed to the work > already) > "So. Do you want to do this work?" > then > SILENCE. DO NOT SPEAK. > > The vast majority of times the client will say "yes." Then everybody gets > excited and happy. Bingo. > > Hope this helps. > > > DA > > > > > "I don't know where these guys that claim they do 5 pianos a day find their > clients -- all the ones I work on need pitch raises, repairs, regulation, > and who knows what ..." D. Nereson > > > “Right on. There's tremendous amounts of piano service money lying around > waiting to be picked up by the complete piano service business. I highly > recommend that every tuner-technician become a complete piano service; then > the days of 5 or 6 a day, 5 or 6 days a week, fade and become a horrific and > cautionary memory.” David Andersen > > > Bruce Dornfeld, RPT > bdornfeld at earthlink.net > North Shore Chapter > > > > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/pianotech.php/attachments/20091111/27fcfccf/attachment.htm>
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