Let’s Talk Pricing

[00:00:05.830] – Nicky Williams

Welcome, welcome, welcome to Nine to Thrive Lead Generation Uncovered. With me, Nicky Williams, business mentor and Laura Burnett, Tech Geek and marketing extraordinaire from The Thrive Business Academy. We’re here today because we’re telling you about the seven biggest lies that you’ve been told about business that leaders don’t want you to know about. And we’re here to tell you the truth because we want to support your online business, your lead generation growth and income.

[00:00:36.020] – Nicky Williams

So the ones we’ve covered so far is Why We Don’t Need an Ideal Client. It feels like a little game now, doesn’t it, Laura? Each time we’re like it’s, trying to remember it’s like the old fashioned, “I went to the market and I bought” when you were younger.

[00:00:49.710] – Laura Burnett

I fail this game every time.

[00:00:51.830] – Nicky Williams

Yeah! No Winning Formula was number two. Number three was Why We Don’t Need Flashy Tech. Number four was Visibility, Why You Don’t Need To Be Visible Everywhere. And today we are talking about Pricing, aren’t we, Laura?

[00:01:10.130] – Laura Burnett

We are indeed. We are talking about that lovely thing that stopped us all from advancing the price. How much do you charge?

[00:01:20.930] – Nicky Williams

Yeah. And do you start off your business high end with a high ticket offer, or do you go in with just a small offer or many of them is, are offering free?

[00:01:31.870] – Nicky Williams

So when I first entered the online world, it was all about offering free. Everything was free. Free, Free, free. Open a Facebook group, offer all of your knowledge for free. And then we sort of missed out on the part of selling, so that’s obviously not good. Then you’ve got the people that are telling you you’ve got to have a high ticket offer. Don’t waste your time with low ticket offers, you’ve got to go in high.

[00:01:57.080] – Nicky Williams

Now, honestly, I believe neither, none and all are right, because I feel like you have to grow your audience first, but at the same time, we need to let them know we’re a business and that we do sell something. But when we put our offers out, there’s so many people that say, oh, it’s worth this, but I’m going to discount it to that.

[00:02:24.800] – Nicky Williams

So, for example, I’m going to put out an offer, and my offer a couple of years ago was the business fast track programme and I was offering it for £3,000. Now, there’s some mentors that tell you that you need to discount it just to get the first few people in. I disagree. I think that you should start at a price and just gradually work up as you build your clients, as you build your testimonials and as you grow your audience, rather than going in, discounted straight away, because that’s false advertising. You’ve not sold it at £3000 before. We don’t know it’s worth £3000. We haven’t had the testimonial or the audience, the proof, the social proof that we need to sell it at £3000. So we have to grow from the beginning, grassroots up.

[00:03:13.910] – Laura Burnett

Yes. And it happens all the time. So obviously you’ve got to be comfortable with pricing or it holds you back without you knowing. It’s something I learned a long time ago. I’m not into anything like this, Nicky will tell you, of the mindset stuff, but I’ve learned that it’s quite important, actually. It’s quite important to business. So a lot of people will join these big programmes and you’ll get told, if you think you’re worth £5000, then go charge £5000. So then you’ll go charge £5000 and you’re brand new on the market, you’ve never sold anything before and you’re selling something £5000 , you’ve barely got an audience, and then you wonder why you didn’t get the sale. And it’s like Nicky said, you didn’t have the social proof, you haven’t got the proof that you are worth that. Yes, you do feel you’re worth that, and there’s no point saying you’re not going to be worth that, but you might not be able to start off at that price. And that’s probably where our thoughts probably differ from the big leaders, because, yes, you are worth thates, yes, we’re going to charge that, but you might not be able to do it straight away. Because it could be, yes, you could put out £5000, but something deep in you – oh, my God Laura’s talking about deep feelings. If anyone knows, this is like a really big moment – but, yeah, there’ll be something holding you back deep down and actually thinking you’re worth that.

[00:04:38.470] – Laura Burnett

So that’s why sometimes we do have to start lower, because we need to build ourselves up, not just everyone else up, but we need to build ourselves up to feel like we’re worth that money. And I think I was a prime example of this I think Nicky, wasn’t I?

[00:04:52.700] – Nicky Williams

Yeah, it really is about strategy and mindset combined. And I always talk about the woo and the do, but it really is about that. There’s a formula to pricing, how it should work and how it works. That we know logically, that’s how we should do. We should start low and gradually build up. Now, I don’t believe that in the olden days when you used to have to wait per year to put your prices up with inflation, et cetera, I don’t believe that’s the case. I believe the more you get testimonials, the more you get that confidence up, then you can grow your pricing. But, yeah, you started low and then I kept on telling you you’re worth it, but you weren’t quite there, were you?

[00:05:36.120] – Laura Burnett

No. So like when I started working with you as my business mentor, I was charging with £15 an hour.

[00:05:43.770] – Nicky Williams

It was.

[00:05:45.000] – Laura Burnett

It was £15 an hour. And if anyone looks now my price is at £147 an hour, and that didn’t just be an instant jump, that wasn’t an instant jump from £15 to £147. I think I was having heart palpitations at the feeling that someone could potentially pay me £147 for an hour of my time. And it took a lot of effort from Nicky to keep me on the right path I think but she did it! And it was, Nicky used to tell me I was worth more, and almost every time she told me that would help me feel a bit more worth. But I also needed to prove myself. So when we first started out working with Nicky and we developed my Power Hour, Automation Power Hour, it was £30, the first price, I believe it was, as a beta tester. So we did it as a beta tester just so I needed that confidence. I couldn’t have just gone out and started charging £97, £60, or anything for it, because I just wasn’t confident that I was worth that, even though maybe deep down I knew I was. Something was holding me back, so I needed to put it out at £30.

[00:06:47.350] – Laura Burnett

But also, I want to say it wasn’t just for me. I was brand new to LinkedIn. I operated a different business before that so I was known as something else on LinkedIn. I was known as a First Aid Trainer, not as actually as someone who does the tech. So I had to get my audience to have confidence in me, and me to have confidence in me. So I went out with £30 to start it all off.

[00:07:11.980] – Nicky Williams

And then people were getting really blown away by what you were doing and you were like, oh my God, it seems so easy to me. It always is when it’s in your zone of genius, in your area of expertise. And that gave you the base, didn’t it, to start gradually?

[00:07:26.270] – Laura Burnett

Yes. So I had an agreement I would do five at £30, and then the agreement was to go up to £60 from Nicky. No, it was actually £97. I think you told me it was £97.

[00:07:35.750] – Nicky Williams

I did say that.

[00:07:36.720] – Laura Burnett

But I wouldn’t allow it.

[00:07:38.280] – Nicky Williams

Yeah, that’s it. Yes. Happy medium.

[00:07:40.910] – Laura Burnett

Yes. So I didn’t go for the £97, so I did go for the £60 and I stuck at £60 for a while, a couple of months, I think, maybe something like that. And then I was seeing that, all right, so people are still booking up at £60 and I was still getting good social proof. People were shouting about me on social media and this were growing my knowledge and making me seen on the audience as a person who’s an expert at this. Which is obviously vital for when you are charging higher prices, you need to be seen higher up and that you know what you’re doing. And there’s no better testimonial than a referral from someone else. So when you’ve got people tagging you saying “this was an amazing time I’ve had with this person”, “this product were amazing”, “this hour I’ve had with them”, “this course I’ve done with them was amazing”, then that’s the best social proof you can potentially have. And that was happening and then when that happened, we upped it to £97 and then I think I got a bit of a block at 97. I’m really struggled to go up to £147. I think with some journaling involved. I actually have it next to my desk.

[00:08:43.160] – Nicky Williams

It was yeah. I actually got Laura, who was not at all into journaling, or anything, she did journal it. And it’s amazing how much stuff about money that we hold on from our past and we’re not even really realising it. And we know in our logical brain that, oh my God, of course I know that I’m making these changes, I’m transforming these people’s lives and I’m saving them hours and days and weeks and months by helping them. But you just have to look at all of your old messaging to realise that, actually, if I work through that, I can get it. Have you found it?

[00:09:15.030] – Laura Burnett

I have, I’m just laughing at it. Right. So some of the questions you had me asking is, why can’t I earn that money? And then, what does success look like? What does rich mean to me? And what am I really afraid of? And what’s my first memory of money? Look at this. Some lovely money mindset question you asked me there, Nicky.

[00:09:39.290] – Nicky Williams

Yeah, but it’s good because it digs deep. It gets to the point of we don’t have to go into the why’s and the wherefores, we just need to recognise that was old messaging and actually, it’s nothing to do with, unrelated to what’s going on in the here and now, isn’t it? And look at you. Then you moved it up, didn’t you?

[00:09:56.460] – Laura Burnett

And then I moved it up, yeah, we moved it up to one £147. Still gets booked up. It probably still could go higher, but I’m absolutely comfortable at my £147. People keep telling me I should charge a lot more than I charge, but I’m still not ready for that move and I’m totally happy at that. So that little story –

[00:10:14.090] – Nicky Williams

It’s about evolving with your prices, isn’t it?

[00:10:19.000] – Laura Burnett

Yeah. I could have dived in at £147, but I probably wouldn’t have sold much because, one, my audience didn’t have the confidence in me, they didn’t have the social proof, and I wasn’t confident. And if you aren’t confident, deep down, it’s just not going to happen. But you need both.

[00:10:36.410] – Nicky Williams

Oh I’m proud! I’m proud. So proud.

[00:10:39.770] – Laura Burnett

I would say you need both because the reason people are confident, I am worth that money, I am going to charge that money. But actually, if you haven’t got the other side of it and you haven’t got the audience who’s confident in you, it’s still not going to hit, it’s still not going to be nailed. You’ve got to start from somewhere. So I would always say, yes, you can do high ticket, but when you’re starting out, you have to start somewhere and you’re better when you grow it up.

[00:11:07.250] – Laura Burnett

There are some people out there who have been successful and just charged high tickets from the get go, but it’s probably one person out of 10 million. It’s a rarity. But we always hear about the rarities and not actually what’s actually happening. And that’s why we’re doing the Seven Biggest Lies, because we’re always hearing about it’s been successful for this one person, but we want it to be something that’s successful for all of you.

[00:11:31.390] – Nicky Williams

Yeah, and start low. And just like Laura said, she sold only five low and she moved her prices up very quickly at that point. So it’s not forever, it’s just for now. So start low, get those bookings. It’s better to have ten people paying £30, £60, than trying to sell something for £500 and not getting any sale whatsoever. Get your social proof, spend that time getting that audience, getting known, getting those testimonials. And also on these sessions that you’re having with your clients, you’re getting to know what their needs are even more so you can use that in your messaging and your marketing. Okay? Get known as that expert. And the more you get known as that expert, the more you get tagged in posts, the higher the price you can go.

[00:12:25.850] – Laura Burnett

And I think that would be it. That’s it of this episode, Let’s Talk About Pricing. The summary of it is, yes, you can do high ticket, but you may need to start lower to get it up. And, like as Nicky was saying earlier, don’t lie to people, don’t say “right, I’m selling this brand new course which is worth £3000 for £147” because it’s not been worth £3000, because you’ve not ran it before. So you need to work that up, don’t lie in your messaging, that will just affect you as well. And work with what works for you. What do you feel comfortable with? And you’ll just start higher-ing it up and you’ll be where you want to be then after.

[00:13:07.990] – Laura Burnett

So if you have liked the episode, make sure to like and follow and leave us a review, depending on what platform you’re watching on. And then, of course, tune in for the next episode, which is every Wednesday. And if you want to join us for our Masterclass on the Seven Biggest Lies on 9th September, go to thethrivebusinessacademy.com/masterclass. And even if that Masterclass has been done and dusted now, there will be another one there for you to sign up to.

[00:13:35.740] – Laura Burnett

And we can’t wait to see you all in the free Facebook group as well, where you can join in with the community, get to know people, and there’s opportunities to advertise your own products and help share your zone of genius as well. And I think that’s it from us, isn’t it, Nicky?

[00:13:52.530] – Nicky Williams

It is. It’s wonderful. Thank you. Good session. Nice to be open.

[00:13:57.530] – Laura Burnett

Nice to be open. Goodbye, everybody.