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Finding tech values: More bang for your buck - Part 1
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With the economy the way it is these days, everybody needs a deal to save money. While looking for the best price on food and gasoline is common, a lot of folks don’t realize that looking for the best price and value for electronics is also critical. Especially since a lot of electronic items don’t get researched by the shopper as thoroughly and the salespeople are looking to pad their own pockets.
Now, while I could just tell you directly what the best deals are, that would not help anybody to learn. Plus, honestly, there is no way I could cover the wide variety of items that folks need. This multipart article will be giving the general guidelines, teaching you, the consumer, how to get the most bang for your buck.
Cost Versus Value
Value is one of the most misunderstood terms these days. It has a lot of depth and a lot of intricacies, but at the very root of value is the idea of what it is worth -TO YOU-. Knowing the value of any given thing, especially a feature, is one of the most important starting points in saving money and still getting the best product possible for your needs.
Of course salespeople will be touting features and benefits to you in an attempt to part you with more money than you were originally intending to spend. Convenience is one feature, for example. The ability to go to a store, pick up the object you want, hand over some money, and walk out the door with that product… That’s convenient. The value of convenience varies from person to person. You need to set your own definitions on what that value is.
An excellent example of convenience cost comes in cables. The average margin for any kind of cable is between 85% and 97%. Yes, you read that right. 97% margin. That $24.99 cable may have only cost the store 75 cents in bulk. Of course, their bulk definition is thousands of units, so you can’t get the same, but at the same time, it’s possible to look for other options.
Online sources, for example, may not use the cables as a margin bump for their low margin items. The same kind of cable that could cost $49.99 at your local store (or worse, $89.99 for that special brand name) may end up being $5.22 after Shipping and Handling from an amazon.com seller. Same cable does the same thing with the same connectors and same specifications and performance, lacking the brand name and the margin buffer.
The trade off for this lower cost is the need to pre-plan and wait for shipping. So obviously, if you just bought a new LCD HDTV and need to have that HDMI cable immediately, you need to make a decision on your own whether three to five days’ wait is worth up to $85 for you.
Feature Creep
The next important part of cost versus value is best explained by Mr. I. M. Gunna.
“This printer model has built-in scanner, copier, and fax capabilities, so you don’t have to have a separate fax machine or copier. You can make reprints of your own photos.”
“You can take good-looking pictures in the dark with the image stabilization on this camera.”
“This GPS unit can acquire a signal lock within 15 seconds. That’s three seconds faster than the next best unit!”
Mr. I. M. Gunna hears these kinds of features and benefits, and says, “Yes, I’d love to have those! I am gonna copy my documents and fax them even though I’ve never done it before! I am gonna take pictures outdoors at night all the time! I am gonna need those extra three seconds all the time! The extra cost is worth it!” Mr. I. M. Gunna also has more credit card debt than he’d like and never has money for the little things that would improve his life. He spends far too much money on feature creep.
So how many of those nifty features are you REALLY going to use? Are they worth the extra cost they create? Unless you are getting a device with more features for less cost than the device with fewer features, these are important questions to ask yourself.
Create your feature list. What will you use it for? How often will you use it for that? What benefit does a given feature give you, and at what cost, both monetary and usability-wise? Find the right balance for yourself.
Sometimes the next price point may be a good value anyway. If $10 on a $200 object adds three new features that you know you will use regularly and will benefit you well, then that extra $10 may be worth it. There’s no good reason to spend $200 now and then spend another $210 in three months (grand total of $410) just because you want to save money now but need those features. Spend the $210 now and know that it will last you much longer without a need for replacement.
The most important thing: Try to avoid immediate needs. If you don’t have a little bit of time to research features, options, reviews, etc, you’re doing yourself a potentially costly disfavor. If a salesperson points out a feature that you didn’t think of or find before, consider that an opportunity to evaluate exactly what that feature means for you. Preferably without the salesperson hovering around and pressuring you to buy.
Once you know what you will need, you are well on your way to getting the best value for your money.
Check out part two, coming soon!
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