Haha yes. I was juggling my kids and didn't expect you to see my comment so quickly. I shared it expecting to come back.
Ok, so:
Pros for me:
I can validate people and save time on my calendar. It lets me immediately dismiss low-ball offers or potential clients who aren't the best fit.
I'm putting my "starts at" rate for one article on my site for transparency. If they say their monthly budget is $X and it comes out to 5 articles a month worth but they're asking for 6-8 articles per month, I have a really great starting point for the sales conversation.
Regardless, it just lets me know where their mindset is around content writers. Do they value the work or not? Are they respectful? How realistic are they? Are they looking for a one-off project or something more long term? Is there room for negotiation where we can both benefit?
Cons for me:
People do get intimidated sometimes when they see the budget question, especially startups that haven't set a firm marketing budget. (Or people who have a range in mind but want to get away with undercharging. It happens.) They might skip over the form entirely instead of entering negotiations.
People might feel uncomfortable saying their actual budget because they want to just know the price upfront. (Except I do have my "starts at" price on my site, so this wouldn't necessarily be a problem for them.) This is part of the undercharging problem too. While I understand they want to "get a good deal," it's also good to be fair with service providers.
Some people would really rather just get on a phone call and talk it out. I'm not the best fit for those people, though, because I physically can't get on a call with everyone who wants to talk. I wouldn't have enough time to do my actual work. (So this is a con for them but a pro for me.)
Overall, for me, the pros VASTLY outweigh the cons because it helps me weed out people who just are not the best fit so I can spend my time with people who are ideal clients.
Oh also, for your second con example, it'd just be wasting their time if they do that. I've never had anyone pull that, though. It looks like you're also working in a B2B capacity (correct me if I'm wrong, though), so that's just less likely to happen anyway. People running/managing companies are too busy to play around.
Plus, the way I operate on a sales call is I just dive right in with "okay, you want this amount of work and your budget is this" and let them confirm or change it. Then go from there with negotiations, if any.
My job is to streamline the entire process as much as possible for them to save them time and effort, and asking that budget question upfront is a part of that process so we can skip right to the sale on the sales call instead of them going back and forth with "oh I'm not sure" while we're on Zoom (or in person).
@cat could you elaborate a bit?
With my limited knowledge, the pros and cons are:
Cons:
1. People who don't know their budget might not engage
2. People who lack a budget can bypass it anyway by typing something down.
Pros
3. It filters out indecisive people.
4. Even if some might bypass it, not everyone will and at least that saves some time.
Haha yes. I was juggling my kids and didn't expect you to see my comment so quickly. I shared it expecting to come back.
Ok, so:
Pros for me:
I can validate people and save time on my calendar. It lets me immediately dismiss low-ball offers or potential clients who aren't the best fit.
I'm putting my "starts at" rate for one article on my site for transparency. If they say their monthly budget is $X and it comes out to 5 articles a month worth but they're asking for 6-8 articles per month, I have a really great starting point for the sales conversation.
Regardless, it just lets me know where their mindset is around content writers. Do they value the work or not? Are they respectful? How realistic are they? Are they looking for a one-off project or something more long term? Is there room for negotiation where we can both benefit?
Cons for me:
People do get intimidated sometimes when they see the budget question, especially startups that haven't set a firm marketing budget. (Or people who have a range in mind but want to get away with undercharging. It happens.) They might skip over the form entirely instead of entering negotiations.
People might feel uncomfortable saying their actual budget because they want to just know the price upfront. (Except I do have my "starts at" price on my site, so this wouldn't necessarily be a problem for them.) This is part of the undercharging problem too. While I understand they want to "get a good deal," it's also good to be fair with service providers.
Some people would really rather just get on a phone call and talk it out. I'm not the best fit for those people, though, because I physically can't get on a call with everyone who wants to talk. I wouldn't have enough time to do my actual work. (So this is a con for them but a pro for me.)
Overall, for me, the pros VASTLY outweigh the cons because it helps me weed out people who just are not the best fit so I can spend my time with people who are ideal clients.
Oh also, for your second con example, it'd just be wasting their time if they do that. I've never had anyone pull that, though. It looks like you're also working in a B2B capacity (correct me if I'm wrong, though), so that's just less likely to happen anyway. People running/managing companies are too busy to play around.
Plus, the way I operate on a sales call is I just dive right in with "okay, you want this amount of work and your budget is this" and let them confirm or change it. Then go from there with negotiations, if any.
My job is to streamline the entire process as much as possible for them to save them time and effort, and asking that budget question upfront is a part of that process so we can skip right to the sale on the sales call instead of them going back and forth with "oh I'm not sure" while we're on Zoom (or in person).