Ah pricing!!! For many of you, the whole topic of pricing and money is something that you never thought you’d have to deal with when you first started your business. After all you just wanted to help people.
However to be a successful coach/consultant you have to be seen as a visible expert! If you make mistakes in pricing your services, it diminishes your brand, your services and what you do!
Here are 5 rather common but also BIG pricing mistakes that I see in the coaching & consulting industry.. Are you making one or more of them? Is there one that resonates with you?
Mistake #1: Not raising your prices
Most entrepreneurs don’t raise their prices because they feel that people won’t pay. However, the truth is that there are always people out there who will pay for different price points. I think a bottle of water or cup of coffee are 2 great examples! Some people will pay $1 and others $5. This is called a money set point – people have different money set points for different things! You want to serve people who value the solution you are offering. Are you charging enough for the value of the transformation you are offering?
Mistake #2: Selling low-ticket programs/packages
While it’s true that you need to have offerings that are linked (or ascend), you don’t always have to offer a low ticket program to your prospect, especially if you are face to face! Whether it’s at a speaking or networking event, you have a great opportunity to share about your brand. If you offer a low ticket item, you may be perceived as cheap and you aren’t doing your brand justice.
Mistake #3: Too many choices
As entrepreneurs, we are a creative bunch! However too often, I see service based entrepreneurs who aren’t getting enough clients think that the answer to getting more clients is to create more programs/offerings. Wrong – too many low ticket offerings are diluting your brand! By creating workshop after workshop or program after program, you are spending your time CREATING rather than marketing/selling or delivering! A Signature Program is the solution – create it once; and deliver it over and over again!
Mistake #4: Sharing your prices too early
It’s a common question I get from my clients – should I put my prices on my website? My typical answer is NO. Because displaying prices upfront like that doesn’t allow you to explain the VALUE of your program so it’s doing you and your client a disservice! Ultimately, you want to know whether the client is a good fit to work with you; you want to explain the features and benefits; you want to be able to figure out if your offering will solve your prospects problem! If a coffee shop put up a sign and said coffee: $5 you might have lots of questions. How big? What kind of coffee? Perhaps it’s refillable during the day. Based on that price alone, you might not be interested even if it was a great value.
Mistake #5: Pricing by hour, session or month
There are several problems with this approach.
i. Harder to sell — Selling coaching is selling transformation or a solution to a problem (a result). However, if you are selling by hour, session or month that’s only a unit of time NOT the result. Results are by far easier to sell!
ii. Too expensive – Truthfully a service-based entrepreneur needs to charge a minimum of $100 – $500/hour in order to make a reasonable income. But to many clients, $100 – $500 seems like a lot of money for an hour. You don’t want to have to start justifying to your clients that you need to pay for admin time, your marketing time, your education, etc.! However if you offer your services in a Signature Program that allows people to see the value. When you have a great Signature Program, it elevates your brand and you become the go-to-expert for what you do.
iii. Puts a cap on your earnings – Let’s face it; there are only so many hours in a day; week or month. If you are charging by the hour or session, this means that you will maximize your income quickly! Then you’ll fall into the trap like my client who had a schedule full of clients but still wasn’t making the income she required to support herself and her daughter!
iv. Less committed clients – Last year my client Frances shifted from offering hourly consultations to offering a Signature Program. Not only did she earn much more money but she told me that clients who committed financially for the longer term solution were much more fun to work with than those who were only wiling to pay for the lower priced consultations. It’s like if you bought 2 books; one was $10 and the other $100 – which one would you read first? Most probably the one where you invested the most! It’s the same with coaching/consulting!
v. Always on the cash flow roller coaster
When you price your services by the hour, session or month, it seems that you are always looking for new clients and that never seems to be any consistency in the cash flow. However with a Signature Program, clients usually enroll for 3-6 months and pay over time thereby evening out the cash flow.
Well – did any of those pricing mistakes resonate with you and your business? Was there one that stood out? Are there any of these pricing mistakes that you’d like to learn more how to avoid?
If you answered yes ….. then you’re going to LOVE my upcoming event SHIFT-the money event! I’m going to dive deeper into these pricing mistakes to help explain why entrepreneurs who earn 10x more; don’t work 10x harder!
I promise you’ll leave the day with implementable strategies for your business; resources to help you; and perhaps a new business friend or two!
Because you’re part of my tribe – I want to ensure that you earn more and work less – I want to make it easy for you to attend! So here’s my gift …..
The regular investment for SHIFT is $197 which includes lunch, networking, learning and free parking. It’s worth every penny for the full day.
However, for you the investment will be only $20 …. Yup $20. When you register here and use the discount code DL20!
If you are ready to shift your business; to make more consistent income; to earn $5 -$10 k a month …… then I look forward to seeing you at SHIFT!!!
Sharing is caring …… I’m on a mission to help ONE million women entrepreneurs build profitable business. If you know of business buddy, or another entrepreneur who could use some help shifting her business, then please share this with them! Thank you!
BE UNSTOPPABLE!!!
Diana
