First, I have no buyers. I am not a reseller, nor do I have products of
my own to sell. I therefore cannot give my buyers any credit, or even
enough credit for that matter.
That being said, what I wrote is typical in the marketing industry.
Average buyers, although not morons as you seem to think this makes
them, aren't going to think extremely logically when they are out buying
things unless they are on a tight budget. They will typically go with
their impressions on how much something is as opposed to how expensive
it truly is. Hearing $49.95, to most people, puts the item in a
significantly lower price range than hearing $50, even considering the
truly small difference in price.
It has nothing to do with the intellect of the person involved (or at
least it doesn't generally) but rather how much time the buyer is
willing to put into price evaluation. Impulse buying is heavily swayed
by this tactic and impulse buying is precisely what department stores
and the like want you to do. They even set their store up specifically
so that you hit the impulse items right when you are most vulnerable to
the idea. These tactics have been proven to work and they play with a
person's perception of the product and not their intellect. They are
all geared towards influencing the buyer's decision to buy products and
have been working on the average consumer for years.
If you don't believe me, that is your choice, but ask yourself this: If
this isn't the reason for big businesses to lower a price by 1 penny
then why do they do it at all? Why don't they keep the penny for the
increased profit?
Sam
Steve Mann wrote:
>
> >The reason many people feel this practice is unscrupulous is because it
> >is a manner of manipulation of the buyer. Let's take, for example, an
> >item that is $49.99. The average buyer will think this is a better deal
> >than $50 even though there is such a minimal difference that you could
> >say that the prices are pretty much the same.
>
> You're assuming that the average buyer is a moron that doesn't notice
> that $49.99 is the same as $50. Seems like you don't give your buyers
> much credit.
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