In this video I’m sharing my story with pricing my services as well as sharing some of the reasons why you may or may not choose to do so. First, I’ll give you some context and talk about my troubled history with pricing. Next, I’ll explain the key change that happened for me to feel confident to publish my pricing online. Then, you’ll hear about some of the reasons why publishing your pricing might NOT be a good idea.

Prefer to read? Here’s the video transcription:

Welcome to the story by Design Show with me your host, Becky Lloyd Pack. We have a solo episode all about pricing. So let’s get started!

So why am I talking about pricing? Well, for context, three days ago, I relaunched my new website and on there, I included for the first time ever, all of the prices for my packages.

Now this was super scary up until the point I hit Publish. And then I just felt a great wave of relief. But whether you should or should not publish your prices on your website is not a black and white issue. It’s not a straightforward answer, and that’s what I wanted to come on and talk about, because I mentioned this on my Instagram stories, and I got a really interesting response from people. So I thought it was worth having a slightly longer conversation with you guys.

Before I tell you why I decided to publish my pricing, I just want to give you a little bit of history about how I’ve always felt about pricing just so you understand where I was coming from. So I’ve been running my business for three years and up until about I want to say a month, but it was probably like two weeks to be honest, I did not feel confident in pricing. It’s something I had always struggled with always always been like, “I don’t know what to charge for what I do”, it was just just something that would always make me like (noise of angst) inside is the best way I can describe it. When it comes to thinking about how I used to price myself in part, I think this is just my own personal experience of I’m not particularly driven by money or numbers. So some of the exercises that tell you to like work out what you want to earn every year, and then how many hours and then divide by… I was like, (confused noises) I struggled to know where to start with those things. I get the logic. And I think for some people, they will work great. But for me, it just did not resonate at all. But that’s kind of like the hourly based approach, then there’s also like the value based approach. So it doesn’t matter how long you’re charging for the transformation. But then I was like, well, what’s the transformation worth? Surely it’s different to every individual. So, I just really struggled when trying to use these external formulas to come up with my pricing. And it was just something that like I said, up until about two weeks ago, I would have told you I didn’t know how to price myself.

What changed? What’s changed Becky? What was that moment where you realise you could? I know how this is gonna sound coming out my mouth. But I’m gonna say it because it’s true, that I’ve been on somewhat of a spiritual journey recently, really connecting with my own intuition. Trying to break a pattern that I recently became aware of, of outsourcing my power to other people. So essentially, I’ve been on a bit of a mission of stop trying to find the answers out there and start listening in here. I get that that sounds just a bit like what, but that’s kind of what I’ve been doing. So, I can’t really can’t really dress it up any other way. Other than I’ve just been really listening to myself. That’s involved a lot of time not on social media, not consuming other people’s content, saying no to people that I originally probably would have said yes to working with to helping me on these things. So yeah, what’s changed is I actually just stopped listening to everybody else and got really clear.

Now that probably is an oversimplified answer, what also changed and what has also led me to the point where I now feel confident putting my pricing out there and putting a number on what I do, is that I have worked with over 60 brands. Working with them on their business, their brand, their messaging, this is experience I now have, I’ve seen the power of it, I know what I deliver, I am pretty crystal clear on the offers that I now put out there. I’m not really a work in progress in that area anymore in the same way, like of course, my services are still going to develop as I continue to gain experience in this. But I really spent time connecting with like, what do I actually do? What am I fundamentally here on this planet to change? Why is that important to me? And then who are the people that are going to be able to help me realise that vision? That are going to help me on this mission. Okay, cool. What level are they playing at? What level do I want to play. And I’m really approached it from this fun place, to be honest, of not being afraid to dream as big and bold as I wanted to. But it’s been a journey to get here. I don’t think there’s, like although the actual shift happens quickly, the moment that leads up to that shift. That’s taken me three years to get here. Although it looks like an overnight thing. And although I said two weeks ago it changed. It’s been a long time coming.

Full disclaimer, don’t beat yourself up and do allow yourself the time because it does take time to get there and to sift through all your own rubbish. To be able to get that level of clarity. That’s what I believe anyway. And again, I’m sure there’s coaches out there, I’m able to help you get there quicker. But in this instance, I actually needed to not work with anyone else, because that was a habit, which almost became an excuse for me to not take ownership of it.

And then beyond just confidence, because I’m still gonna have all this confidence, no, well, I don’t need to publish my prices out online. But for me, one of my core values in business is really about transparency, I want to create a more transparent online space, so that we can empower consumers to make better decisions for themselves. Publishing my pricing is a fundamental part of this transparency, I wanted to hand the information over to those that might be interested in working with me, so that they can decide whether it’s a yes or no. And they don’t have to jump on a sales call with me to get that information. Now, I understand that’s not right for everybody. And I’m going to talk in a second about why you might choose not to publish your pricing. But for me with transparency, and this desire to create a better online world. Publishing my pricing was just such a strong part of that. And it feels so empowering to do. That I know, for me, it was absolutely the right step.

So let’s go to the flip side, Why hadn’t I published my pricing beforehand, and also maybe just a few reasons why you might choose not to.

The first reason I was ready to publish my pricing now is confidence. So the reason, one of the biggest reasons I hadn’t felt able to do so before was lack of confidence, surprise! Like I mentioned earlier on, I really just was not clear or confident in that number. And so putting out online was almost like putting something out, and then if I was questioned on it, I would have no response. And that just wouldn’t be good for me, and it wouldn’t be good for them. And so it felt like a better choice for me to work through that on my own. And then on conversations with people, I could actually use my own knowledge and my own experience on the call to be able to actually advise whether my services were right or wrong for them.

Another reason I hadn’t published my pricing is that I was still figuring out my services. I didn’t know what I was going to be offering. Well, I knew I wanted to offer but I felt until I’d road tested it multiple times. Again, this is just a personal thing, until I’d road tested it multiple times, and really understood what worked in reality, not just in theory, I felt unable to put a real price on it. Because I didn’t have the information, I didn’t have the evidence. And now I’ve worked with over 60 brands doing that, I have plenty of evidence to really draw the reality of what it is I offer and what that transformation actually looks like for people and from that can now go, cool, I can kind of marry this up to where I want to be then in terms of what that number is.

So if you’re still in those early stages, or testing out your offers, or putting something new out there, you might not want to publish the price, because you’ll be backing yourself into a corner. And from the perspective of a potential client, if you went on someone’s website, and prices were changing every month, what kind of perception would that create for you, you’d probably be a bit hesitant about working with them, because you didn’t really know why their prices were changing wouldn’t create a great impression for you. So if you’re in that stage, what perception might that give to other people? Maybe just consider that maybe it’s not the right time to publish your pricing just yet.

And then I think there’s also a personal preference thing with this as well with a previous coach or a previous business coach that I worked with and we talked about whether pricing should be publicly available or not. There was advice against doing so because people may have or potential clients or customers might have money objections, or money blocks. And they may talk themselves out of working with you based on a figure, because they haven’t had the opportunity to really explore it in a conversation.

So on Discovery calls or sales calls, part of the role is you hosting that sales call is to really guide the person through the conversation and help them come to a place where they’re able to make an empowered decision. So if somebody was to just see the pricing and immediately go, “Well, that’s not my range, I’m going to write that off”. They might actually be discounting something that they need, and you are not there as the “coach” or the “consultant” or whatever you want to call yourself to guide them through the process where they feel ready and empowered to step out of their comfort zone and invest more than they might have felt like previously they wouldn’t. I don’t know how well I’ve explained that. But I get it right. I get it. When there’s super high ticket things out there. Maybe there’s an element of actually, you need to help people work on that money confidence. And part of that part of the first step on that journey with you is having a sales call. And actually if someone’s not willing to reach out before knowing the price, maybe their not your kind of client, you know, there’s logic there that is so that’s tied up in this that is not black and white. And I guess that’s why I wanted to put this video out there so that you can make your own decision on whether publishing your pricing is right for you or not right for you.

One of my mottos is that there is no right or wrong way of doing things, there’s only the right way for you. And that applies to pricing as well.

And that’s my pricing story. That’s why I published my prices now and why I didn’t in the past.

If you found this interesting, I would love to know what you think. I’d love to know if you feel now inspired to publish your pricing and you hadn’t before because actually, you realise Yeah, I’m confident I want to empower my audience, do you really resonate with that side of what I’ve spoken about. Or I’d also love to know if you’ve listened to this and now feel relieved that you don’t have to publish your pricing because you’re still in those stages of trying to find your feet. You don’t want to back yourself into a corner, you know that actually it would be detrimental to the relationship with your audience if you did publish your pricing because it is subject to change quite drastically over a relatively short period of time. Let me know I’d love to hear from you guys. And that’s it for me today. hope that’s been helpful. I will see you guys soon on the next episode of the Story by Design Show.