How to get quality customers and rid the cheap ones?

[Mr. Ingram's Computer Repair & Shoppe]

Bullet point story:
>21 years old.
>been a business owner for 8 months.
>opened my second store 2 months ago.

I started with lower prices to try to attract people...
and now I have a problem where I am getting a lot of cheap customers that don't want to pay my retail price for labor, everyone wants a "deal" so I usually just take $20 off and send them away happy...

What do you do to combat this problem?

Bonus question:
My prices are around the same (some better, some worse) than other small stores in my area, and way better than the big box like UbreakIfix and GeekSquad. So I'm not charging ridiculous prices.

The big problem is there are a lot of craigslist people willing to install a new hard drive + win7 + office2016 for $60. I talked to a couple and they were willing to meet me anywhere at my convenience... I blew them off and never met as nothing good would come from it, but the fact that they are at least advertising that is killing me...

Any advice?

 

[River Valley Computer]

You really need to notify the Microsoft verification people to determine if they are legit. We all know the answer to that question.

Also - would you please contact them and find out where they are buying HDDs, Windows and Office for $60 - we will place an order for 100.

 

[Slaters Kustum Machines]

Make sure your rates are in the top 75+% range for your area and stop giving deals. That should help with the cheap clients. Also let your clients know that you run a legitimate business and will support your customers when an issue arises. I read a quote one time, I believe on here that said something to the effect of "if you think I am expensive, wait til you see what an amateur costs you" Meaning they will only have problems with the crappy service and will in the end have to have you fix everything and charge them appropriately to fix it correctly.

 

[gadgetfixup]

Hunt down business clients. Join business owner FB groups and advertise anywhere you can to get business customers. Once you get a handful of good business clients, your stress of competing with CL sellers will wain.

 

[Mr. Ingram's Computer Repair & Shoppe]

You really need to notify the Microsoft verification people to determine if they are legit. We all know the answer to that question.

Also - would you please contact them and find out where they are buying HDDs, Windows and Office for $60 - we will place an order for 100.

You can buy cheapo desktop HDDs on amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/Generic-750GB...&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o06_s00
Run Hard Disk Sentinal on it. I've gotten several that are new with like 3 start/stops and %100 life and health. but most are used crap that are next to dead.

I didn't know there was anything I could do, simply because they could disappear so easy...

 

[nlinecomputers]

Hunt down business clients. Join business owner FB groups and advertise anywhere you can to get business customers. Once you get a handful of good business clients, your stress of competing with CL sellers will wain.

This. Residential customers are a dying breed. I know plenty of people that have ditched their PCs for iPads. Many people only have a phone. The PC market started in business and only expanded into homes because of AOL and later the direct internet. Now I can get on the internet with my watch. So PC use is retreating back to being a work only device for the most part. There is still plenty of money there AND you have BYODs to deal with as well.

 

[Slaters Kustum Machines]

You can buy cheapo desktop HDDs on amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/Generic-750GB...&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o06_s00
Run Hard Disk Sentinal on it. I've gotten several that are new with like 3 start/stops and %100 life and health. but most are used crap that are next to dead.

I hope you don't do this for customer machines. Only buy name brand, new HDD's for your customers. We use WD Black with 5 year warranties.

 

[Cambridge PC Support]

I'd bump your prices up.

 

[Mr. Ingram's Computer Repair & Shoppe]

I hope you don't do this for customer machines. Only buy name brand, new HDD's for your customers. We use WD Black with 5 year warranties.

What they deliver are a mix of brands I always get Hitachi, Seagate, or WD.
is running hard disk sentinel on them not good enough to verify the drive?

I'd bump your prices up.

Why?

 

[Slaters Kustum Machines]

What they deliver are a mix of brands I always get Hitachi, Seagate, or WD.
is running hard disk sentinel on them not good enough to verify the drive?

I wouldn't trust them. I know with the drives I get if a customer has an issue it will be covered for 5 years, no questions asked. I send them straight to WD for RMA and get a replacement drive sent.

 

[jfm]

You can buy cheapo desktop HDDs on amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/Generic-750GB...&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o06_s00
Run Hard Disk Sentinal on it. I've gotten several that are new with like 3 start/stops and %100 life and health. but most are used crap that are next to dead.

I didn't know there was anything I could do, simply because they could disappear so easy...

No offense but your practices are cheap (similar to Craigslist's pizza techs), that's why you get cheap customers.
Step your game up in terms of what you offer and sell to your clients, and they will follow.
Start by not seeling junk to honest customers.

 

[altrenda]

Do you advertise on Craigslist? If so, then you will attract customers that want to pay Craigslist prices.
If not, then don't worry about the people that do advertise there. They can have all the customers that are cheap. You don't want them anyway.

 

[Cambridge PC Support]

"I am getting a lot of cheap customers that don't want to pay my retail price for labor" - that's why

 

[Mr. Ingram's Computer Repair & Shoppe]

No offense but your practices are cheap (similar to Craigslist's pizza techs), that's why you get cheap customers.
Step your game up in terms of what you offer and sell to your clients, and they will follow.
Start by not seeling junk to honest customers.

no offense taken, just curious on why my business side prices make my services cheap?
and

I wouldn't trust them. I know with the drives I get if a customer has an issue it will be covered for 5 years, no questions asked. I send them straight to WD for RMA and get a replacement drive sent.

cheap does not equal junk.
What is the difference between the $36.90 for a seagate 750GB drive from: http://www.amazon.com/Generic-750GB...&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o06_s00

and the seagate $48 1tb drive: http://www.amazon.com/Seagate-Deskt...d=1462812803&sr=1-1&keywords=seagate+desktop\

aside from the obvious size difference and the warranty.
seems like if hard disk sentinel can't tell the two apart, they should be the same?

 

[Slaters Kustum Machines]

It would seem to me the generic drives are generic for a reason. Where did they come from? Ultimately you can use what you want. I just stated what we do and why. If a customer asks what brand we use we tell them. And it's WD Black, RED or RE for platter drives. It's nice to have a standard. Rather than if a customer asks what drive you use and you say well we get a box of random drives and pick whichever works or tests ok.

 

[Markverhyden]

Number one rule with pricing in the business world - it's far easier to have customers accept you lowering prices rather than raising prices.

 

[jfm]

Only reffering to the hard drives from Amazon, you're showing that you are yourself going for the cheap stuff, you reflect it on your clients somehow I think.

 

[Mr. Ingram's Computer Repair & Shoppe]

It would seem to me the generic drives are generic for a reason. Where did they come from? Ultimately you can use what you want. I just stated what we do and why. If a customer asks what brand we use we tell them. And it's WD Black, RED or RE for platter drives. It's nice to have a standard. Rather than if a customer asks what drive you use and you say well we get a box of random drives and pick whichever works or tests ok.

I tell them I have Hatachi, Western Digital, and Seagate, if they ask for brands.
Usually they ask why so many, I respond with an analogy usually like "It's like coke and pepsi, different people had different opinions on brands and I try to support as many people as I can.

as long as HDS comes back 100% 100% and a start/stop count under 20. I consider it new, if it is anything below that and I can't return in, I try to sell as used at a lower price. anything that dips under 80% or over 2k start/stop I put in a pile to sit. forever....

 

[gadgetfixup]

You can buy cheapo desktop HDDs on amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/Generic-750GB...&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o06_s00
Run Hard Disk Sentinal on it. I've gotten several that are new with like 3 start/stops and %100 life and health. but most are used crap that are next to dead.

Those drives are very old and what the company is doing is they're wiping the SMART data to make them appear new or low use.

 

[nlinecomputers]

Those drives are very old and what the company is doing is they're wiping the SMART data to make them appear new or low use.

In other words: Fraud. It is the computer equivalent of rolling back the odometer and pouring engine honey into the cam box.