Every now and then you’ll get a comment from a customer, or even another Etsy seller, who says that your listings are overpriced, not worth the cost, too expensive, whatever.
If you’ve set your prices the way that you need to, based on your own expenses and cost to make your products, there’s no reason to take comments like that seriously.
Depending on where the comment comes from, you might not even need to respond at all!
Table of Contents
- Do you need to respond to a rude pricing message on Etsy?
- What if someone leaves a rude comment in a review?
- Steps to take if someone wants to order but asks for a discount.
- What to say to people if they’re pushing you to discount.
Some of the links in this article are affiliate links that will pay me a small commission if they’re used to purchase something. To see the entire affiliate policy click here.
Do you need to respond to a rude pricing message on Etsy?
Every now and then someone will send you a direct message asking why you’ve set your prices the way that they are set because they think you’re overcharging. This might make you feel like you need to respond because it’s a direct message, or just because it makes you feel defensive.
First of all, there’s no reason why you need to respond to this kind of unsolicited comment. On Etsy, you can mark the message as spam and send it to that folder, and it won’t count against you for the Star Seller responses.
Make sure that the message shows up in the spam folder and isn’t still sitting in your inbox.
Marking a message as spam won’t send future messages from that person to spam, but you can just keep marking the messages as spam if they keep writing to you.
Another option would be to write back and say “thanks for the feedback, I’ll consider it.” Then consider it, decide that they’re wrong, and ignore their opinion.
What if someone leaves a rude comment in a review?
If someone leaves a comment in a review that says that your merchandise is overpriced, that’s more irritating because that’s there for every other potential customer to see. Etsy won’t remove most reviews for legal reasons, but there are still a couple of ways to handle it.
I’ve had this happen before and it’s annoying, and it can also make you mad because you know that you’re providing a good product. (For an article about responding to bad reviews, click here.)
One thing that you can do is write to the customer and offer to give them a refund if they send the item back to you in new condition. They probably won’t do that, or they’ll ignore your message, and you’ll be able to respond honestly that you offered a refund but they decided to keep the item instead.
If you don’t want to offer a refund, you can respond that you’re sorry that the customer’s experience wasn’t positive, and that you encourage people to contact you to ask questions before purchasing if they’re looking for something specific.
As long as most of your reviews are positive, comments about pricing shouldn’t be a problem for future customers.
Steps to take if someone wants to order but asks for a discount.
If someone contacts you and asks for a discount because they think your product is overpriced, take a deep breath and remember that when people talk about prices, they’re speaking from a position of their own budgets.
When people say “your prices are too expensive” they’re leaving off the last part of that thought, which is “for what I can spend.”
If you want to see if you can work with them, you could tell them that they can sign up for your email list to get a discount code, if that’s something that you offer. (For an article about setting up abandoned cart or favorite coupons, click here)
If it isn’t, but you have a returning customer coupon set up with Etsy, you could give them that code.
If neither of those is an option, and you don’t want to discount your merchandise, just say that you’re not offering any sales or discounts at the moment. There’s no reason to feel bad about it, and don’t beat around the bush trying to dodge the question.
If you NEVER offer discounts, tell them that, too. It’s better to just say no than it is to string someone along, because they’ll just write to you again later.
You should also remember that people who are difficult from the start don’t get less difficult if they buy from you. Trust your instincts as far as this goes, because if you feel like someone is difficult, it will probably be easier to turn the work down and give yourself a break.
What to say to people if they’re pushing you to discount.
If someone is really, really pushy and won’t leave you alone, it’s going to be best to just stop communicating with them and start marking their messages as spam. If you’ve told them that you’re not going to discount for them there’s no reason to argue about it.
If they say something about another shop that sells “the same thing” for less, you could tell them that that looks like a really good price and they should get it while they have a chance! This usually gets rid of them.
Don’t be insulted that they’re comparing your products with someone else’s…I’ve seen a lot of Etsy sellers get all worked up about that part of it, but it’s trivial and not worth worrying about.
Just tell them to go get that lower price, and they’ll either leave you alone or tell you that they like yours better, which just goes to show that they don’t really think that the products are the same.
I’ve also had customers write and tell me that one of my products is cheaper than the one that they want, and that they want the lower price for the more expensive item.
This is irrational, but don’t bother arguing. Just tell them that you must have missed raising the price on the cheaper one when you did your last pricing increase, thank them for bringing it to your attention, and tell them that you’ll be raising the price later that day when you get a chance.
99% of the time they’ll go buy the cheaper one before you raise the price. If they don’t, you can raise it later.
The key to responding to this kind of unsolicited comment is to remember that some people just go by the “if you don’t ask, you don’t get” philosophy, and that it isn’t meant personally for you specifically.
If your prices are set the way that you need them to be in order to make the profit that you want, don’t feel like you need to accept every random comment from customers, friends, or family as far as how to run your business
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