Page 77 - 100 Great Marketing Ideas (100 Great Ideas)

At first sight, the cost of sending a courier door to door with
documents is prohibitively expensive, especially when compared
with the postal service, which would deliver documents for less
than one-hundredth of the price the fledgling DHL company
charged. However, the service being supplied far outweighed the
cost, especially once the courier was in the position of carrying
documents for 20 or 30 clients. The cost of having documents arrive
late, or documents being lost altogether, would be colossal: the 100
percent reliability of the service was worth paying for.
Nowadays we have become used to the idea of courier services. They
are extremely common (especially in major cities where same-day
delivery can be achieved) and often compete on price. However, DHL
would not exist at all if its founders had tried to compete against the
postal services on price!

In practice

• Think about what you are providing, not what competitors

are charging.

• Think about what your service is worth to the customer, not what

it is costing you to provide.

• Ensure that what you provide will meet customer expectations.
• Don’t be afraid to look expensive (and high quality) rather than

cheap (and low quality).

68 • 100 GREAT MARKETING IDEAS