Has anyone else seen this? This seems to be a common pattern lately. Companies will list all their products:
Product X1 Product X2 Product Y1 Product Y2 Product R42 Product F25
… but they don’t have a page explaining what the difference between the X line, Y Line, R Line, and F Line actually are. Let’s say they are gadgets. Would it hurt them in any way to simply say the X line prioritizes speed, the Y line is backwards compatible with legacy gadgets, the R line is meant for business use, and the F line is experimental form factors. How do you not think to put this info on your page?
Sounds like ThinkPads
If I see a comparison matrix, I’m a happy camper. OTOH, you have to be extraordinarily careful with words or lose sales. Because people are stupid.
Case in point; Employee needed a new laptop and we leaned mostly towards Lenovos. Found a sweet deal on one labelled as a gaming rig. Boss wouldn’t sign off because, “A dev doesn’t need a gaming rig with a high-end video card.” Of course not, but still showed him the specs, compared against what we were currently purchasing and paying, no go. We ended up paying more for a laptop with lower specs because it didn’t have a “gaming” label.
What if you call a product line “prosumer”? It may be perfectly acceptable for a small business, but the owner might feel he needs “enterprise”. He looks at the enterprise line, flinches at the price, goes to another brand selling the same damned thing with a label that makes him happy.
Another one I had just posted; Shooting the shit with a customer who was unhappy he couldn’t buy straight grass seed and the label only showed the filler content in small print. What a ripoff! Another customer chimed in that filler is necessary for the seed spreader to work as expected. Oh.
X line prioritizes speed - Nah, not paying extra for speed, don’t need it.
Y line is backwards compatible with legacy gadgets - Sounds like it’ll be outdated soon.
R line is meant for business use - They just slap that on there to sucker people into paying more. (Yes they do!)
F line is experimental form factors - I need a tried and true product, sounds like a clusterfuck.
Having worked in various fields for 40 years, and now at my first retail job, I see that a lot of the fuckery we blame on capitalism is actually sellers trying to navigate ignorant and fickle consumers. Also, sometimes the weird shit we see, or don’t see where we expect it, is due to laws and regulations, but that’s another story.
don’t explain the different product lines suck.
Why would they explain the product lines suck? That kind of honestly will not win sales!
This is entirely intentional. The point is to confuse the consumer and make them buy more expensive shit.
Bold of them to assume I can afford to buy things
And buy more things when you realize you need something that’s in product V but not product A.
Ubiquiti devices. What’s the difference between “UniFi Gateway Fiber” and “UniFi Cloud Gateway Fiber”? Last I checked they were even the same price.
Took me awhile to figure this out when I was first considering getting their stuff. Basically, you need some kinda server on the network running their programs to manage their devices. The “cloud” devices include this capability, otherwise you’ll need either their cloud key or to set up your own server running it. It’s definitely poorly explained and the weird pricing schemes don’t make any sense really.
AutoGlym does this, they have so many similar products and they’re really bad at explaining why I should use A instead of B. It’s annoying because their products are good and I like using them.
It’s the same with energy pricing, 15 different rates for the same gas and electricity just from one supplier. Half of them you aren’t eligible for for some reason but they won’t tell you outright you have to dig through the terms.
Then comparison sites appear to help, some suppliers aren’t on them “to keep pricing simple”, aaarrgghh.
It just means in most cases you end up paying too much for something and they make more money out of you.
This is Microsoft Licensing in a nutshell.
I have a tinfoil hat theory that they keep it complicated on purpose to add value to 365 certifications
That’s not tin-foil hat stuff when Microsoft has clear monopolistic tendencies.
Yes I recognise this and I hate it. I don’t wanna be a detective just to figure out which product I need.
My first guess is; they want me to give up and hope I just pick the most expensive option. My second guess is; they themselves think it’s all obvious and looks straight forward. They don’t think it’s necessary to test their sales pages on actual consumers.
It’s a frustrating experience and I think it drives consumers away.
I think that’s exactly what it is. They do these confusing pricing schemes hoping people will overbuy and “put up with” the extra features they didn’t actually want or need. They want you to have to sift through their product inventory before buying. The other factor is that product identity is sometimes not even centered around product features, but rather around an ad campaign with a sexy spokesperson, sports sponsorships, or some kind of performative group affinity. This is especially true for large corporations that have their hands in many cookie jars.
Glad to know I’m not just getting too old and out of touch for the internet. :P
Intel AMD Nvidia
