"We are getting three quotes"
The customer says they are getting three quotes and the standard reaction is to try to shorten the process: emphasise a deadline, offer something that expires, or explain why comparison is difficult. All of it reads as a company that does not want to be compared, which is exactly the wrong signal at exactly the wrong moment. Comparison is going to happen and it is entirely reasonable. The useful realisation is that homeowners are genuinely bad at comparing quotes, not through any failing of theirs but because three quotes for the same job routinely describe different work, and nobody hands them a way to see that. Being the company that helps them compare properly is a much stronger position than being the company that would rather they did not.
Why three quotes are almost never comparable
Put three roofing quotes for the same house side by side and the usual finding is that they are for three different jobs. One includes the disposal and one does not. One assumes the deck is sound and one has priced replacing it. One is a fifteen-year workmanship guarantee and one is two. One has scaffolding as a line item and one has it buried in the total.
The customer sees three numbers. They have no way of knowing that the cheapest excludes two things that will reappear later as extras, which is the single most common way people end up unhappy with home-services work: they did not choose the cheapest quote, they chose the least complete one.
So the differentiating act is not defending your price. It is giving them the means to see what each quote actually contains. That is genuinely useful, it is not a sales tactic, and it disproportionately favours whoever is most complete, which should be you.
What to do with a comparison you cannot prevent
- Say it is sensible, and mean it
- "Good, you should. It is a lot of money." One sentence, and it removes the adversarial frame entirely. A rep who is visibly relaxed about being compared is making a claim about their own quote that no argument could make.
- Give them the questions to ask everyone
- Four or five specific things to check on every quote: what happens if the deck is worse than expected, is disposal included, what exactly is guaranteed and for how long, who does the work, is scaffolding in the price. Written down. This is the artefact, and it will be in their hand when your competitor is standing there.
- Name your own weak spots first
- "We will not be the cheapest of the three." Saying it before they discover it changes it from a finding into a known parameter, and it makes everything else you said more credible.
- Make your quote easy to compare
- Itemised, with the assumptions and exclusions stated plainly. A quote that is a single number is impossible to compare and gets compared on the number, which is the only axis you do not want.
- Invite the follow-up question
- "When the other two have been, if something in theirs does not match mine, call me and I will tell you why." You have volunteered to help them evaluate your competitors, which is a position of confidence and is also very often the call that closes the job.
What it sounds like
The customer has just said they have two other companies coming this week.
What to notice. Rep A introduced artificial urgency, which the customer ignored and which quietly signalled that the price is soft. Rep B gave away a comparison framework that helps competitors get evaluated fairly, and in doing so became the reference point against which the other two get measured. The pre-emptive admission about price is doing real work: it is now a known fact rather than a discovery.
The mistake: manufacturing urgency
The expiring discount, the diary that is filling up, the price that holds until Friday. Customers have seen all of it, most of them recognise it, and it does two things simultaneously that you do not want. It signals that the number was arbitrary, since a price that can drop on Friday was never a real price. And it applies pressure at the exact moment the customer is trying to think, which produces resentment even when it works.
It is worth separating genuine constraints from manufactured ones, because genuine ones exist and are fine to state. Material prices really do change. Crews really are booked. A roof really is better replaced before winter. The test is whether it would still be true if you did not want the sale: if the reason survives that, say it plainly, with the actual reason attached.
The related error is disparaging the competition. "Be careful with those guys" invites the customer to wonder what those guys say about you, and it usually reads as insecurity. Describing what to check is the same information delivered as help rather than as an attack.
The third mistake is going quiet. A rep who says "fine, let me know" and then waits has handed the outcome to whoever follows up. The comparison is not a period to survive, it is a period to be useful in.
When they are getting other quotes
- Did I say out loud that comparing is sensible?
- Have I given them specific questions to ask all three, in writing?
- Have I named my own weak spot before they found it?
- Is my quote itemised enough to be compared on something other than the total?
- Are my assumptions and exclusions stated, or implied?
- Have I invited them to call me about the other quotes?
- Am I about to invent a deadline?
Does giving them comparison questions not help my competitors?
It helps the most complete quote, which should be yours. If a competitor wins because they answered those four questions better, they deserved it. The scenario the questions actually prevent is losing to a quote that looked cheaper because it silently excluded two things, which is the most common way this goes wrong.
What if I genuinely am much more expensive?
Then say so early and be specific about what the difference buys, in things the customer can check: who does the work, what is guaranteed and for how long, what is included that others exclude. If you cannot articulate the difference concretely, that is worth knowing about your own pricing rather than something to talk around.
Is a time-limited discount always wrong?
Not always, but the honest version is narrow. If a genuine constraint exists, name the actual reason: a material price change on a date, a crew slot that is real, a season. What corrodes trust is a deadline invented to compress a decision, because customers who spot it revise their opinion of everything else you said.
How long should I wait before following up?
Do not wait for the comparison to finish. Send the quote and the photographs the same day, then check in once the other appointments have happened, which they will usually tell you the timing of if you ask. Module 8 covers the sequence.