I admittedly stayed up pretty late last night binge-watching something I shouldn’t have at 2 in the morning: Bar Rescue! While watching, I saw Jon Taffer teaching one the owners of the bars about the essence of perceived quality. Now, while I can divulge into a drawn-out, descriptive explanation as to what makes perceived quality so important to brand equity and so forth, I won’t for the sake of time.
Perceived quality, simply put, is a measure of value that a consumer will equate to a product, regardless of its actual value. (Note: this my, probably skewed definition of perceived quality, not the business dictionary version)
So what I’m saying is, imagine taking a normal bottle of soda (or alcohol for those over 21 😉) and pouring it into a can whose logo is just absolutely dreadful and ask yourself “Would I want to pay $2 to drink that?”
Probably not.
Now put that same soda into a can with a well-known logo such as Coca-Cola or Pepsi and ask yourself the same question.
Lastly, pour that EXACT same soda in a glorified, heavenly, golden, background-chorus-singing-worthy can, and ask yourself “Would I pay an extra $39.99 to drink that?” I bet your answer would probably be yes.
But remember, it’s all the same soda regardless of its packing. Yes, it can be argued that your paying for the experience and whatnot, but it’s still the same bloody soda. You would think that these kinds of things are obvious but this isn’t always the case.
Not to tie all this to books but that is the exact mindset I had when designing the interior for my book The Abnormals. I know that regardless of how much people like my book or how much it costs to publish it, what really matters is what it’s perceived quality is. Would a customer want to spend their hard-warned money on a bunch of papers I cobbled together?
Maybe, if I made it look good enough, right?
www.devonrowebooks.com 