#178: Command Higher Fees by Putting Value on the Table

Welcome to the High Income Business Writing Podcast, helping you propel your writing business to a whole new level. And now, here's your host, Ed Gandia. Hey there. Welcome to the High Income Business Writing Podcast. I am your host, Ed Gandia, and this is the podcast for business writers and copywriters who want to earn more and less time doing work they love for better clients. You can find detailed show notes for this episode@b2b launcher.com Episode 178 and those notes include a summary of our discussion as well as any links or resources that we might mention during the show. So today I'd like to talk with you about the concept of value and more specifically, the value that you and I bring to our clients and how we need to frame or. Or position that value. When quoting client work, I find that most of us leave a ton of money on the table, and this is really an opportunity that just really hurts because when you realize what you could be earning that you're not even asking for, you start wondering, gosh, I wonder how that might change my business, my life. What kind of freedom would that have given me if I would have asked for and received, you know, 20, 30% more on my average project? This is really something to give some serious thought to. And I think after today's discussion, you'll see where I'm coming from. And if anything, if I can help you thinking, if I can help you start thinking about this a little bit differently, I think you're going to really make a huge impact on the fees you start commanding with clients. I think many of us fear when we're quoting client work that we're going to price ourselves out of the opportunity. Gosh, I think the market rate for this is between X and Y, or this is what I've been getting for the past few years. And I've had some price resistance in some cases. So I want to kind of play it safe and just keep it here. I really want this opportunity. But there are other key reasons. I think in many cases, we. We think clients are making these decisions in a certain manner, and in some cases, that's not the case. These are just assumptions that we make and we carry with us sometimes for years. I talk to writers that I've coached, and they're kind of deconstructing their thought process in terms of an opportunity that they quoted and they got, and then they regretted quoting so little. And as I listened to them, it's very obvious that so much of why they decided to quote that is based on some Assumptions that are not true. Listen, one of the difficult things about doing what we do is that we work in isolation. So we have no one, typically, to run these things by. And we're making these decisions, and we live in our own reality, in our own little world, and we feel that we're making the right decisions. Now, sometimes we are, but in many cases we're not. And we feel that we are because of certain assumptions. So that's one reason. The other big reason, this is what I'd like to talk more about today, is how we're framing or positioning our work in the value of choosing us versus somebody else. And somebody else might be doing it internally or not doing this at all. So here's how many of us are approaching this process. And I'm going to be oversimplifying this, but, you know, for the sake of our argument here, just bear with me. So the client needs something done and wants to know how much you would charge for that. And you kind of get to work. You maybe even give them a ballpark figure on the phone. But you kind of think through this, and you quote X amount based on a variety of factors, based on your own process, based on how you typically make these estimates. And then finally, the client decides yes or no, right? So they need something. They want to know how much you charge. You quote X, and then they say yes or no. Here's the thing. When you go about it this way, and this is the way I think 99% of writers I talk to are going about it, and myself included. I did this for a long time. When you go about it this way, your quote is essentially just a number. It's a dollar figure. It's just a. It's just a number. And there's no context next to it or behind it, underneath it. There's no great way for the client to understand if it's worth paying you X to get Y. All right, So I know that sounds abstract and theoretical, so let me explain with an illustration. Outside of our world, outside of writing, say you're planning a Florida beach vacation, and you start shopping for hotels. And let's say that Hotel a is. Is $100 a night. Hotel B is $300 a night. So which one would you go with? Think about that, right? Based on that information, which one would you go with? It's probably going to be very difficult for you to decide. I mean, what's missing here? What's missing is additional information. In other words, what's missing is context. You need to understand what you're getting for each. And you also need to understand how these two experiences are different. You know, going with Hotel A means that you miss out on the experience of Hotel B. Right? We're, we're. We know that if we make a choice, we say yes to that. We're saying no to everything else. So in this case, let's just say we're looking at two different opportunities. Hotel A sounds man 100 bucks. Great. But what am I giving up, you know, what am I missing out on with Hotel B? And, you know, if I go with Hotel A, what, do they just screw it all up? Let's just say that you've had bad experiences with some hotels where they give you the wrong room. You paid for one with an ocean view, and then they give you a city view, or you're not really sure. Like, every time you check in, there's a lot of variability, you know, in terms of the quality of the room. Or what if you had a history of, you know, checking in and, you know, you're checking in at the right time and your room's not ready? You know, in that when you're traveling with small children is a real drag because, you know, the kids want to get in the pool, they want to get in the water. You don't have, really a room ready. And it's just a real big hassle to, you know, calm down kids who are very excited and they want to get in the water, and you don't have a room, and it's, you know, it's just. It's just messy. So I don't know. I'm just making this up. But you see what I'm saying. So you've had these experiences. We all have had those experiences. And because of that, we know that you can't just look at a price and say, okay, I'm going to go with that one. Right? And because the price is not everything. These are apples and oranges. And sometimes you are really leaning toward Hotel A because of your budget, but you're also wondering, you know, I wonder how much better it could be at Hotel B. It's that FOMO fear of missing out. You know, there's an opportunity cost there. If I pick one, there's a cost of not going with B. And at the end of the day, what are we talking about here with this example? We're talking about we want the right experience, don't we, really? When it comes to a vacation, a trip like this, we are buying memories. We are paying to create memories that we will cherish hopefully for a long, long time. And I think intrinsically, deep down inside, we, most of us understand that if we choose wrong, it could really impact in a very negative way the kind of experience we end up with. So I think, again, bear with me. I know that's not a perfect example, but I think you are hopefully starting to see how it's important to. To think about these decisions. And you already do that in your own personal life. And I think it's a very healthy thing to start understanding that clients can also view their decision in the same way. So when you start thinking about presenting your fees to your clients, I want you to stop giving your clients a number. That's it. I want you to go beyond giving them a number and give them the right value context, if you will. So I'm going to give you another illustration because I don't know, for me, I find this really, really helpful. I like to think of a table, and I'm standing on one side of the table. There's nothing on the table right now. It's a clean table. The client is standing on the opposite side across from me, and we're looking at each other, and they come to me and they say, look, I need help with this project. So what do I do? I ask several good questions to understand why this project is important, what it means to get it right. What's at stake here? What are you looking to do with this? What's why? Where does this fit into your strategy? What's the goal? And by the way, what are you looking for beyond good writing? Because, I mean, there are a million writers out there, actually several million writers out there. What's the end result and what are you looking for? And in terms of not just the product, but the experience, you know, how quickly do you need to get this done? How, what, what kind of person do you want to work with? What kind of experience? How do you want that process to go? You know, how important is that to you? What about the risk of getting it wrong and having to start all over again with somebody else? Let's say you're on a tight timeline or having to scramble to fix it internally. Right. I need to understand all these things now, obviously, and we're going to get to this. You don't need to ask these questions directly, but you need to ask questions that can uncover, cover this information. I'm trying to understand all these things, not just how many pages, how many words, and when do you need it. Okay. Which is the way that many of us tend to approach These things, and these are typically the only questions we ask. I want you to go deeper and you'll see why. Because as the client starts answering these better, deeper questions, their answers are getting stacked up neatly on a pile on one side of the table. So that's how I like to think of it. I'm asking questions and they're reaching into the pocket and putting some stuff down on a pile. And then they. I ask them the question and they take some couple things out of their pocket and they put it on that pile again. Okay. So they're. They're kind of creating this pile because I'm asking them to give me some information, and they're just laying it down on the table. They're just stacking it up. Okay. When they're done, I then imagine that I'm creating my own pile on that table, which I'll stack up right next to theirs, so theirs is on the left side. I start then creating a stack on the right side. And essentially what I'm doing with my stack is. And this is obviously a thought exercise. Okay. But hopefully this illustration will help. I'm essentially saying, okay, look, you need X, Mr. Client, and you need it to turn out this way and get this result. You need. You need to the process to run smoothly, and you can't afford to take the risk of having to go south or missing the mark, missing the deadline. Here's why I'm your guy. And I then finish that whole spiel, which is again, every time I'm giving them a piece of information, I'm adding it to my stack on the right side of the table. The last thing I put on my stack, the last thing on the very top, a sheet of paper with a number. And that number is my fee. And it goes again on top of that pile. So here's what we have here. We have two piles on the table. Pile on the left is basically what they need, why it's important, the risk and the cost of getting it wrong, what they're looking for, what their objectives are, where this all fits into what they're trying to accomplish. Right. It's all that deeper information. The pile on the right is all about why I can meet that need, why I can give them the result they want and drastically reduce their risk. And on top of that is my number. By the way, quick, just side comment. When I say results, I know many of us aren't really dealing in situations where the work we produce generates direct results. Okay, I understand that. I don't want you to think about Results as necessarily tangible results as sales or leads. I want you to think about results like, you know, you delivering a quality piece of work, that's a result. Okay? A piece of work that they can now turn around and use immediately and get value from that, that's a result. A piece of work that makes them look good and enables them to do their jobs, that's a result. Okay, so just a quick side comment there. So that is, that is my stack on the right. I can meet that need. I can give them the result they want and drastically reduce the their risk of this going south. And on top of that is my fee. Then and only then can the client make a good decision because I've uncovered their true needs, even including their risk aversion, and then match my skills, my experience, my track record to that. So I've laid everything out on the table and you can probably now see that that's much better then just having them ask me for a price in putting down that sheet of paper and that having be the only thing on the table, it's just, well, two things, right? I need X and that's on the left side of the table. And on the right side of the table, it's just a sheet of paper with my number. So this is, I hope, is for you as you start thinking through this and give it some thought. Maybe this is kind of a foreign idea and you're thinking, I don't understand. Listen to this again and hopefully as you start giving this some thought, you'll realize, you know, okay, I understand we're trading, we're trading a fee for value here and this thought exercise will hopefully start, will start getting you thinking that way. But let's go ahead and make this more practical, okay? I have six specific tips for you as you start thinking through this and you know, start implementing this idea in your business. First, I want you to start asking better questions in your discovery calls. Discovery call is what I call that initial call with a potential client where you discuss everything from what they need to how they're going about it, timing, logistics, budget, etc. I want you to start asking questions that help you uncover both desired results, value and, and here's a big one, the risk to the client of getting this wrong. Okay? They are making not just an investment, but they are placing a bet on someone and they are hoping and praying that everything will go relatively well. Okay? Because if it doesn't, that creates a whole new set of problems. Okay? So that's the first one. The second tip is when you do this, you're going to help the client in more ways than you know. You're going to help them get clarity, better clarity. You're going to help them crystallize their needs and what they're really looking for. Plus, by asking good questions, guess what? You're going to automatically, by default, look good. You're going to look like the pro you really are. It's really kind of a magical thing. Think of yourself in this respect kind of as a business therapist, in a way, a project therapist, if you will. When you ask good questions, you force the client to really think about some of these things at a deeper level. Now, many times, you know, much of what you ask is going to be logistical, and, you know, all those things are necessary. But I want you to think about some deeper questions you can ask that will help you uncover some of the stuff and force them to really get clear and crystallize their need and what they're looking for, what's important to them. The third thing would be to highlight your relevant experience, your track record, and your results. And again, your results don't need to be, you know, tangible in terms of leads and sales. We talked about that already. And then you want to match that information to what they're looking for. So show them how everything you say maps out to what they need. Okay. So it's. Remember, like in. In school, there was that some tests were matching, you know, multiple choice and matching, and you have two columns. You have to match column A items in column A to column B. That's how I think of it. You know, just. You need to match these things, and that's going to help the prospect understand, okay, he's addressing all of these needs and concerns. Great. Next, push yourself to quote a little higher than you might be comfortable quoting. When you do this right, you're going to be able to command higher fees and land the work at those fees. So I encourage you, in fact, I implore you to start pushing yourself. This is one of the great ways that you can start breaking out of the kind of the. The income range that you might be getting stuck in. Okay? And this is a wonderful way. It's extremely rewarding, and it builds confidence like nothing else. So it's not just about the bucks, not just about the dollars. It's really about confidence in what that can help create in your business. Next, when the opportunity involves a ton of work and you can tell that there is some, the client is hesitant because there's so much they need to get done, or you feel that Based on who they are and what I know about them. When I give them that number, even if I map value to the fee, they're going to freak out. Okay? So when you are in those situations, consider reducing the risk further by proposing that you start with a pilot project. Something simple, something that's maybe the highest priority on that list that you can get started with to get to know each other a little better. Now, this is a technique that I've been using for years very effectively. It's not always the right call in every situation. Sometimes it's better to go for the whole enchilada. Okay? So you have to use good judgment here. But when done right, this could be the ultimate, ultimate thing that will actually get them to commit. And then once they're in, once they're a client and you do things right, your chances of getting the rest of the work go up dramatically. I mean, you're the obvious choice at that point. So keep that in your back pocket and don't be afraid to take it out if and when it makes sense. Finally, I want you to recognize that clients don't have time to do massive, massive amounts of research and search for the right resource, for the right writer. They're under as much pressure as you are. In fact, many times even more. Their jobs are on the line. They got to get this stuff done. And keep in mind that writing is only part of their job. A typical marketing director or marketing manager wears so many different hats that, you know, this is something they're trying to just cross off their list. And the sooner they can find the right person, the better. They really. I know we tend to think as writers that they're going through the search in a very methodical way, and they're spending weeks on this, and they're searching and they're kind of calling their list and creating a short list and then interviewing everybody. And look, those days are over, okay? Clients are being asked to do so much more with fewer resources. They don't have time. They want to say yes. They are hoping and praying they can find someone they can say yes to. Give them a reason to do that. Okay? So keep that in mind that you're not in a position of weakness, you're in a position of strength. And if you do all this right, and you keep in mind that they need to get this done and they need to find somebody, in some cases, they're not looking for perfection. They're looking for someone they can feel relatively comfortable with and that really understands, you know, what they're trying to accomplish and where they feel that there's real value here because you've helped them uncover that and map it to your fee. Man, you have done something that nobody else that they're talking to is probably doing. So bottom line is you can start commanding much, much higher fees when you start recognizing that, you know, you just can't give out a number. Just like you wouldn't make a decision for a 10 day family vacation in Florida on just a number. You don't think that clients are doing the same thing. That clients will understand and we'll appreciate you helping them uncover all these factors in helping them match your fee to what they're looking for and what's important to them. This has been Ed Gandia. Hope you have an awesome rest of the day. Take care. The High Income Business Writing Podcast is a production of B2B business launcher. 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