I work with a lot of service-based entrepreneurs…coaches, virtual assistants, body and energy workers, authors, graphic designers, image consultants, and more.
What I often find these passionate, service-based entrepreneurs have in common is that they really struggle to price and design their programs and services so that they attract ideal clients AND create the lifestyle they want.
Too often, they under value the transformation they create with their clients. And that does 3 things…
- It can make you feel resentful of what your clients “demand” because you simply aren’t charging what you know your time is worth
- You likely find yourself constantly fighting the battle of bringing in the revenue you need to cover your bills
- You may actually HURT your sales because your price doesn’t position you as an expert!
It may be because of “money stuff” (almost every one of us has this!), fear of selling at the higher price, or just plain not believing in the value you provide to your clients.
Here’s what I want you to know…
You are uniquely designed to create a specific transformation with the people you work with. No one else can do exactly what you do. And you get to see your innate value and design and price your programs and services so that you can confidently offer them to your ideal clients AND get paid well to create the lifestyle of your dreams.
Last week I talked about the 4 approaches to pricing that I work through with my clients (check it out here). And I promised that this week I’d reveal what I call Desire-Based Pricing.
Desire-based pricing is designed around deciding what lifestyle you are committed to creating first, and what income it’s going to take to support that lifestyle. This is often called your vision or your “why”.
Only when you are clear on your vision and have done the work to determine the reality of what revenue you get to generate in your business are you ready to move on to determining the best pricing for your core program or service.
Once you are clear on your revenue target, the next step is to determine how many clients you can comfortably work with at one time. This is critical because if you provide an extremely high-touch, labor-intensive service, you will only be able to have a few clients at a time. If you provide a mostly “do it yourself” program, you’ll be able to handle a much bigger group of clients. Ask yourself these questions:
- Do you like to work closely and deeply with just a few clients, or are you more interested in the “one to many” model for your business?
- How much time a week do you see yourself spending with each client in your core program?
- How many hours do you want to work each week overall?
- How much of that time will you want to work directly (or indirectly with things like email, reviewing stuff, admin, etc.) with clients? Remember, you are a business owner, and you get to run your business, market your business, and plan for your business in addition to servicing clients.
The answers to these questions will give you an estimate of how many clients you can effectively handle at one time!
Once you know your desired total business revenue per month and how many clients you can comfortably work with each month, pricing your programs is easy! It simply becomes a simple math equation….
Desired total revenue per month / # of clients per month = Price you charge each client per month
Sounds simple, right?
I also get it’s sometimes not this simple. I’m excited to announce that I’ve developed a new tool to support you in thinking through this process. I call it the Ideal Price Calculator, and I’d love for you to try it out here!
Simply answer a few questions and the calculator will tell you the optimal price for you to charge per client per month to meet your lifestyle and revenue goals! Voila!
Check out the calculator here and post your questions, comments, and ahas! I can’t wait to get your feedback!
To what’s possible!
