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Where you might be quietly losing clients

Where you might be quietly losing clients

by | Mar 17, 2026 | Client Creation, Selling

Where you might be quietly losing clients

One of the first things I do when I land on a new client’s website isn’t read their About page or their story. I look for how I’m supposed to work with them.

I put myself in the shoes of a prospective client and go in search of a clear next step.

What I’m hoping for is a frictionless journey from curiosity to action. Something simple and obvious like making a payment, completing an application form, or booking a call. The smoother that journey, the less likely we are to lose people along the way.

It’s worth remembering what the average person who lands on your website is up against.

They’re likely already overwhelmed. Bombarded with information about their particular problem. Faced with endless options, conflicting advice, and a lot of noise. Most people aren’t looking for more inspiration or explanation. They’re looking for something that cuts through and tells them, clearly, what to do next.

When you’re newer in business, and you don’t yet have a lot of traffic or the budget for beautiful design or optimised copy, it’s often the small things that make the biggest difference.

Over the years, I’ve seen just about every possible way people lose potential clients in the short window between interest and action.

Sometimes there’s no clear “Work with me”, “Services”, or “Offerings” page at all. When I visit a service provider’s website, that’s where I’m heading first. I want to understand what’s available here that could help me with the problem I’m trying to solve. If I can’t find that quickly, I often won’t keep looking.

Other times there is a services menu, but it’s packed with confusing dropdowns. Even after clicking “Work with me”, I’m left unsure where to go next or which option is actually relevant to me.

I also see a lot of offers described in just a few vague lines, with no page that gives the full picture. No context, no detail, no clear way to understand whether this is right for me without having to reach out first. For many people, that step feels like too much.

And then there are the very practical issues.

Broken or outdated links. Pages that no longer exist. Buttons that promise one thing and deliver another. These might seem minor, but to someone already hesitating, they can quietly bring the whole journey to a stop.

The same principle applies beyond your website.

For many people, your social media bio is the first doorway into your work. If the link there leads to a dead page, a confusing set of options, or something that no longer reflects what you actually offer, you’re creating friction before the relationship has even begun.

I often use an analogy (I first heard from Tad Hargrave) of imagining your business as a house in the forest and it’s always stuck with me.

Given the nature of a forest, there are various potential pathways to your door. What I’ve noticed is that most people spend a lot of time working on the signposts and the paths themselves. The content, the posts, the links that help people find you in the first place.

But sometimes, once people arrive, the doorbell doesn’t work.

They press it once. Then again. They wait. Nothing happens. Eventually, they assume no one’s home and walk away, even though you’re inside, ready and willing to help.

When your website or bio doesn’t make it clear how to take the next step, or when links are broken or confusing, this is often what’s happening. People are finding you, but the signal isn’t getting through.

This isn’t about being perfect or polished.

It’s about recognising that when someone is interested, they’re often already doing a lot of internal work. Weighing up whether to ask for help. Whether to spend money. Whether now is the right time. The least we can do is make the external journey feel clear and supportive.

A gentle place to start is to take a few minutes to metaphorically walk the different paths someone might take to work with you.

Imagine they find you through social media, a referral, or a newsletter someone forwarded. Where do they land first? What do they see? What do they click next? At what point might the doorbell stop working?

You don’t need to redesign your entire website or rewrite everything from scratch.

Often, it’s about noticing and removing small points of friction. Clarifying a menu label. Simplifying a choice. Fixing a link. Adding a sentence that helps someone understand what happens after they click.

Making it easy to work with you isn’t about being pushy or salesy.

It’s an act of care.

It says: if you’re here, if you’re curious, if you’re considering this, I’ve made space for you to take the next step in a way that feels clear and contained.

And that, quietly, can make all the difference.

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Once a week, in the form of an e-letter, I share the best of what I know about building a business with integrity for conscious business owners.

The intention behind these letters is to be a voice for integrity within your (undoubtedly) cluttered inbox. To be the one email you can count on to contain strategic and soulful advice for building a business without selling your soul.

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Why I Don’t Recommend Tiered Pricing

Why I Don’t Recommend Tiered Pricing

by | Jul 23, 2025 | Selling, Uncategorized

Why I Don’t Recommend Tiered Pricing

Why I Don’t Recommend Tiered Pricing

Given that I work with business owners who want to operate with integrity and do right by their clients and customers, accessible pricing options such as Pay What You Can (PWYC) and tiered pricing often come up in my 1:1 and group program calls. More often than not, people are surprised when I share that I don’t recommend them.

In case you haven’t heard these terms before, Pay What You Can allows your customers to choose a price that feels affordable to them and tiered pricing offers several different prices for the same or similar offering, inviting the customer to choose the price they can best afford.

If you’ve ever considered PWYC or tiered pricing, I totally get it. Having a single price point that might exclude some people from accessing our offerings can feel uncomfortable for the conscious business owner who wants to help as many people as possible.

Couple that with how tricky pricing our offerings can feel, because we worry that we might pick a price people can’t afford or one that equates to undercharging, and it’s no wonder then that many people see these multi-price options as a potential win-win.

My perspective is a bit different, and here’s why

The hidden costs of PWYC

I first encountered PWYC pricing years ago when I was trying to access some business trainings from Mark Silver’s Heart of Business. I’ll be honest I found it stressful.

Whilst he goes to great lengths to describe how to make your decision and even gives a baseline amount, I remember not knowing which option to choose and feeling too guilty to choose the baseline but not really being able to afford more and so, on more than one occasion, I ended up not buying at all.

You can see how he presents it here. As you notice, there is a significant amount of information on making the payment decision that I feel makes the whole process more fraught for the buyer. Just to note I love Mark and his work so this isn’t me knocking him at all. In fact when clients are set on doing PWYC, I’ll often send them to the Heart of Business website as the best example of PWYC pricing I’ve seen.

Most people don’t give even half as much information as he does, so making the decision can feel even harder.

My feeling is that for the consumer PWYC pricing can create unnecessary stress around making a decision and can have you wondering throughout, should I have chosen the lower price? It may even mean losing sales if people can’t decide easily and plan to come back to your sales page but inevitably never do.

For the business owner, it can mean constantly navigating who pays what, making it hard to keep track or to predict income. It may mean more admin or questions from potential customers unsure about what price to choose.

And, when more people inevitably choose to pay less, there’s a chance of resentment and wondering if people should or could be paying more.

It’s for these reasons I’ve chosen not to use it myself.

The pitfalls of tiered pricing

Other ways I’ve seen pricing offered is with several tiers, sometimes based around affordability and other times based on what is offered.

Here’s a simple example of what tiered pricing could look like for a course/program.

Tier 1 — might be just the materials/videos for 199$
Tier 2 — might be the materials/video + live group calls for 399$
and — Tier 3 might be materials/videos + group calls + 1:1 sessions for 799$.

Here’s where we might see names like Basic package or VIP package thrown around.

For me the issues with this kind of pricing are as follows:

  • It’s unnecessarily complicated — too many options can lead to overwhelmed and indecisive customers.
  • It can lead to a fear of missing out (FOMO) if you simply can’t afford the higher tier. This creates an unintended hierarchy, in that people feel like they are getting a “lesser” version, which could impact engagement and outcomes.
  • It can undermine your work especially if your work is deeply transformational or relational — not something that fits neatly into silver/gold/platinum boxes.

When I tried using tiered pricing in the past, I noticed that people nearly always went for the cheapest option, even when I knew one of the other options would be more impactful.

That’s why these days you won’t see different tiers for my offers.

There is only ever one option (the one I think serves the customer and myself best) and one price (the price I need to charge to have my business be sustainable).

So what’s the alternative?

Now you might be thinking, but what if people can’t afford that price?

I get it, I think about this all the time.

One way I recommend to clients who really do want to offer a cheaper option for people who can’t afford it, is to include a line on the sales page underneath the price that says something like.

If the price of this <insert offer> is prohibitive, please note that I offer a number of discounted (or scholarship) spots for people with limited means. Please email me at <insert email address> for details.

That way, those people who really can’t afford it have an option available to them. You could give more detail here, but I am a “less is more” kind of girl when it comes to sales pages.

What I do

What I do to ensure accessible pricing is to choose the best price I can offer without sacrificing my own needs. There’s no doubt I could charge more than I do and could be earning more as a result.

Instead, I try to keep my prices as accessible as possible. That said there will always be people who can’t afford, for example, my 1:1 subscription, but rather than offer my most premium service for less money, I try to offer more affordable alternatives, options such as workshops or group programs.

That way there are always cheaper ways to work with me, without me devaluing my higher touch services, like 1:1 coaching. As someone who leans towards undercharging and overgiving, this is progress for me!

Interestingly, the people who come to me with a desire to offer cheaper options to their people are often the business owners who are themselves struggling to make their business work for them financially.

I’m curious, have you tried PWYC or tiered pricing? Is it working? Does it feel sustainable? If you feel called to share your experience, please do hit reply and let me know.

If you’ve been wrestling with how to make your pricing accessible without burning out, I hope this gives you some reassurance and direction. It’s okay to keep things simple. It’s okay to have one clear price. And it’s more than okay to create boundaries that support your sustainability and service. There are thoughtful ways to make your services accessible without compromising your needs.

 

SIGN UP FOR MY SOULFUL STRATEGIES WEEKLY

Once a week, in the form of an e-letter, I share the best of what I know about building a business with integrity for conscious business owners.

The intention behind these letters is to be a voice for integrity within your (undoubtedly) cluttered inbox. To be the one email you can count on to contain strategic and soulful advice for building a business without selling your soul.

If you want to receive the Soulful Strategies Weekly, simply share with me your name and email address below and you’ll start recieving emails right away.

Selling Without Selling: My Approach to Sales Calls

Selling Without Selling: My Approach to Sales Calls

by | Jun 3, 2025 | Selling

Selling Without Selling: My Approach to Sales Calls

Selling Without Selling: My Approach to Sales Calls

I want to share with you a behind-the-scenes look at how I run my “sales calls.”

A colleague of mine shared with a group of fellow business owners about her sales process and said, “I hate sales calls.” In the responses that followed, nobody seemed to question this and talked about everything else she had shared instead. But for me, that’s the only thing I heard.

You see, I love sales calls. Well, if you can call them that. I don’t actually think of the call I have with a prospective client as a sales call at all.

In fact, as I pondered her statement, my first thought was that perhaps she hates them precisely because she sees them as “sales” calls.

I have never described the call I have with someone who is interested in working with me as a sales call. Instead, I call it a Work Together Call, and selling is actually the furthest thing from my mind when I get on those calls.

I’m not sure what my colleague does on her “sales” calls, but my guess is that she’s doing some version of pitching her offer. I don’t pitch. Instead, what I seek to do is serve.

Step 1: The Application Form

Why I use one:

1. I get to collect important information that informs my decision as to whether this person is a good fit or not

2. It sends the message that working together is not a given. It speaks to the fact that I don’t just work with anyone who wants to work with me. I have clarity on who my ideal client is, and I choose only to work with those people.

I’ve learned over the years that working with less-than-ideal clients benefits no one. As the coach, you end up dreading the sessions and fail to perform at your best, and the client also suffers because you are not a fit for them. So what’s left is just a deeply unsatisfactory experience had by all. Not worth the money in my opinion.

Step 2: The Work Together Call

Early on in my coaching career, I realised how sales or “discovery” calls were set up in such a way that it felt like the onus was on the coach to convince the prospective client that working together was a good idea.

I rejected this outright.

For me, more important than getting the sale is determining whether or not we are a fit.

  • Is this someone I actually think I can help?

  • Is this someone I think will do what they need to do for the coaching relationship to work?

  • Is this someone I want to work with long term?

There’s no pitching in this scenario.

Entering Work Together Calls with ascertaining fit as my intention is so different from entering the call with the intention of making the sale.

So if I’m not pitching, what am I doing?

Usually, I’m mentoring. I start the call by saying something along these lines:

“We have around an hour together today and I’ve found that the best way to determine whether or not we’re a fit is to dive right into mentoring you. I’d love to know more about your business and your current struggles and in return, I’ll share my best advice and strategies so you can get a sense of whether or not my approach to business is one that will work for you. There’s also time for you to ask me any questions about how I work if you have them. How does that sound? If there’s anything else you want us to cover on this call, let me know now and we can make sure we save space.”

And that’s what we do. If someone were to listen in to one of my Work Together Calls, they would be hard-pressed to see the difference between that call and a session with a client.

Typically, around the 50–55 minute mark, if I have made the decision that this person is a fit (which thankfully most people who apply are), I’ll say something like:

“I’m just noticing the time and I want to share that I would love to work with you. How are you feeling?”

And usually follow up with:

“There’s no need to make a decision today but I’d just love to check in at this point to see where you are at.”

Most people are already a yes, and I actually have to encourage them to sleep on it. I’m a big believer in slowing down the sale because putting the person and their best interests before the sale is a key principle of what I call conscious business.

Why I Don’t Need to Sell on Calls: My Content Does the Heavy Lifting

Most people who get to the point of applying to work with me have already read a fair amount of my content. And because I write content with the goal of serving people rather than selling to people, they already have a really good sense of how I work. They know my approach and my point of view and, as such, have a good idea of what they will get if they work with me.

At the end of Work Together Calls, when I ask how they’re feeling about working with me, it’s not uncommon to hear:

“I was already a yes to working together before we got on the call.”

It’s not my sales page that sells my offers. It’s not the sales call that sells my offers. It’s more often than not, my content. Time and time again, I see this to be true.

A Final Note

I hope this insight into my process has been helpful and, if you have been dreading or avoiding sales calls, that this offers you a more aligned way.

It’s also worth noting that I use the application + Work Together Call process now, but when I was still building my business and had far fewer clients, I would offer a gift session + a Work Together Call, which you can read more about here.

In fact, if this is something you’re working on actively, you might also be interested in a class I taught called Designing Your People-First Sales Process, which you can watch below.

 

If you have any questions about what I’ve shared here, leave a comment below. I’d love to hear from you.

SIGN UP FOR MY SOULFUL STRATEGIES WEEKLY

Once a week, in the form of an e-letter, I share the best of what I know about building a business with integrity for conscious business owners.

The intention behind these letters is to be a voice for integrity within your (undoubtedly) cluttered inbox. To be the one email you can count on to contain strategic and soulful advice for building a business without selling your soul.

If you want to receive the Soulful Strategies Weekly, simply share with me your name and email address below and you’ll start recieving emails right away.

10 Website Mistakes That Might Be Impacting Sales

10 Website Mistakes That Might Be Impacting Sales

by | Nov 26, 2024 | Selling

“If you think math is hard, try web design.”
~ Trish Parr

You thought having a website would lead to sales but the truth is, it’s not. In this piece I share common website mistakes I see business owners making time and time again when it comes to selling their products and services online. Many of which are fairly easy to fix.

Normally, when meeting with new clients, I suggest that website won’t be one of our priorities. I think it’s all too easy to get bogged down by trying to get your website perfect, when it’s actually much more important to be out there having conversations with people and building relationships.

That said, there are instances where a website IS a problem that needs fixing and in today’s letter I want to share with you 10 mistakes I see many business owners making, that could be impacting your sales.

1. No clear problem that you solve (aka niche)

When we land on a service provider’s website, we’re usually looking for help with a specific problem or struggle we have. If we don’t see any copy that speaks to that problem, we’re unlikely to stick around or consider engaging in the services provided.

Let me put this into context for you. As a parent to a 4 year old who struggles with big emotions, I’ve researched parenting coaches and courses a ton. If upon landing on a website I don’t see anything that relates to my particular issue, I’ll probably leave pretty quickly.

On the other hand when I came across a parenting coach who talks a lot about “Deeply Feeling Kids” and offers specific resources and services for parents of children like that, I was all over it. I joined her list, I signed up to her membership and I bought her book. I just knew she was the parenting expert who could help me.

Many of the business owners I work with struggle to narrow down to just one problem and that’s fine. You can list out a number of problems you offer support with but you must be clear and specific about which problems your services best help with so that people know you can help them when they land on your website.

2. Broken links

I see this all the time. It’s not uncommon for me to be reviewing a new client’s website and find links that don’t work and important links to boot. Links to book a consult call or to connect, links that could and would potentially lead to a sale.

And I get it, I remember speaking to the largest audience of my business journey a few years ago and wondering why, after I got so many messages and great feedback, that my subscriber count didn’t seem to go up at all. Months later, I realised that my newsletter sign up link was broken!

So it happens AND it’s so important to check regularly that any links that people might click to buy from you, connect with you or stay in touch with you aren’t broken.

3. No clear CTA or sales page

I remember being surprised the first time I saw this and have since seen it several times. This is where people might have something like a services or coaching page that explains what they do but it doesn’t have any call to action (CTA) on it. So there is nothing to tell people what to do next if they are interested, nothing, for example that says, “buy now”, or “get in touch” or “book a call”. Leaving people to wonder or guess what they should do next.

Worse yet I’ve seen many people showcase their offerings with just a few lines of description. No sales page explaining who the service is for, what it might help with and what to expect. Just a brief description and on top of that no CTA.

Let me tell you now, most people won’t spend money on something that they don’t know enough about or that they have to go searching for a way to actually buy or pay. If you are selling a service to your customers, I would recommend you have a sales page with a clear call to action at the bottom of it.

4. Too many offerings

I typically work with multi-talented and highly trained individuals who work with a multitude of modalities and thus offer a wide range of services. The problem is people aren’t usually searching for a modality, what they want to know is whether or not you can help them to solve their specific problem.

If you have too many different services, each relating to a different modality, there’s a good chance that people will find and leave your website feeling confused. When we’re not sure which route to take, we typically don’t take any. So if you are offering people too many options to work with you, without clarity on why you would use one service over another, you will inevitably miss out on sales.

Usually when I’m working with a client in this situation, I’ll ask them 2 questions, which of your services do people rarely or never book? And which of your services do you NOT love delivering? If there are any services that fall into either category, I recommend they remove them from their website or at the very least from their top-level menu. This way when people land on your site they are presented with only your most popular services and those which you actually enjoy delivering.

Another recommendation I give is that when you have multiple services, do what you can to explain why a person would choose one over the other by making it clear who the service is for. Ethical Copywriter. Lauren Van Mullem does a great job of this on her services page.

5. No stepping stone — freebie or low cost offer

A good business model will offer buyers a journey from not knowing you to buying from you and from buying a low cost offer to purchasing a more premium offering. So, if for example, you are a coach who only offers high priced coaching packages, you are expecting customers to skip a necessary part of the journey — getting to know you better.

Giving people a free or low-cost way to get to know you better allows people to take steps along the journey to buying from you that don’t feel like a huge leap of faith.

My recommendation is that you have, prominently displayed, on your website a freebie (ideally a generous freebie) and/or a low cost (less than $50) product people can buy to better know how you operate. If you can wow people with your freebie or low cost offer, you’re much more likely to see those people come back for your higher priced products and services.

6. No way to “meet” you before they buy

If the services you offer include spending significant time with your clients, I believe it’s essential that you allow people the opportunity to “meet” you before they buy. I remember years ago wanting to hire a practitioner and the minimum spend was significant. What I really wanted to do was meet her so I could be sure she was the right practitioner for me but as this wasn’t an option, I decided against hiring her.

I can’t tell you how many times people have told me that they were 95% certain that they wanted to buy from me but the decision was made 100%, as soon as they spoke to me.

There are a few ways you can do this. You can offer a call (for me this is done on Zoom) on your sales page. You might have noticed that aside from low cost offers like my workshops, I rarely have a “buy now” button on my sales page. It’s much more likely to be an application form (which is followed by a call) or a link to book a call directly.

If you don’t want to offer calls to everyone who might be considering your individual offerings, then find another way for people to “meet” you before they buy. My colleague Lauren, offers craft and copy hour, where you can bring a craft to work on and any questions you have about copy to a group video call. Or another client who is an incredible book coach who offers free Q+A calls for people who are working on a book. Doing a group freebie like this allows you to meet several people at once.

7. No blog or an out of date one

This is, in my opinion, a biggie! Since getting serious about my blog circa 2019, I regularly have people finding me through Google searches, who then end up buying from me or enrolling on to one of my services. It’s important to note that this happens without me having spent a ton of time on SEO, rather just creating high value content that answers the questions that my ideal clients have and are searching for.

If you don’t yet post new and useful content on your website on a regular basis, I’d recommend starting there. People often think that the sales page is the most important copy on your website but people regularly tell me they are ready to sign up to 1:1 with me, because of all the content they’ve read on my blog and how sold they already are on my approach. Posting regular blogs allows me to share my most up to date thinking on business growth and share details about my approach, my best advice and my point of view.

8. No pictures of you

They say a picture tells a thousand words and never is this more true than on a website offering 1:1 or group services.

If people are going to spend money working with you (as opposed to just buying a product) then they will want to know what you look like. Having pictures of you on. at least. your homepage and about page works wonders for cultivating a sense of trust and safety for your website browsers and potential clients.

And for the record, it doesn’t have to be photos from a professional photoshoot, all the photos on my website were taken by friends or family and it shows!

9. An unclear message or lack of Point of View

This is probably one of the hardest to get right because it requires us to possess that clarity in the first place. If you do have clarity on your message or you do have a strong point of view about your work or industry, then do what you can to make sure your copy reflects that.

If you don’t yet possess that clarity, then my recommendation to clients is to explore your message and point of view through your content. People often think that in order to create meaningful content that they have to already be clear on their message or point of view but in my own personal experience, it wasn’t until I got consistent with content that my message became crystal clear.

10. Bad design

This is last on the list for a reason. I think many people get tripped up by this one, thinking that they’ll never be successful unless they spend 10K on fancy website design. That’s simply not true. These days with templates, it’s pretty easy to DIY a relatively good-looking website. Having said that, if your website is really out of date and badly organised or designed, it will inevitably have a detrimental impact on sales.

If in doubt go for minimalist, clean, with lots of white space. You’ll also want to avoid large chunks of text without paragraph breaks or subtitles to break it up. It’s human nature to give up when we see a large amount of text with no breaks in it so break down your copy into smaller chunks!

And that’s it, are you making any of the mistakes on this list? Can you fix them? I’d love to know, so if you feel called to share, hit reply and let me know.

SIGN UP FOR MY SOULFUL STRATEGIES WEEKLY

Once a week, in the form of an e-letter, I share the best of what I know about building a business with integrity for conscious business owners.

The intention behind these letters is to be a voice for integrity within your (undoubtedly) cluttered inbox. To be the one email you can count on to contain strategic and soulful advice for building a business without selling your soul.

If you want to receive the Soulful Strategies Weekly, simply share with me your name and email address below and you’ll start recieving emails right away.

Five Things To Include In Your Next Launch

Five Things To Include In Your Next Launch

by | Oct 9, 2024 | Selling, Uncategorized

“The future depends on what you do today.”
~ Mahatma Gandhi

I want to share with you my 5 of my favourite launch activities, just in case you are planning a Fall/Autumn launch.

With launch season (as I call it) coming up, now is the time to be thinking about our launch plans if we are thinking of launching something in September or October. It can be tempting to leave it until the other side of summer but getting into planning mode now will make for much better launch results.

I teach a whole course on launching, which includes several activities I recommend you take when launching a new product or service but in this piece, I’m simply going to share with you my top 5 activities you can include in any launch to make it more successful.

Let’s dive in.

1. Conduct audience research

This one sometimes gets a few groans. Many people resist doing the research before getting too deep into launch mode because they either see it as a waste of time (because they believe they already know what people think) or they worry that the people will tell them things that they don’t want to act on.

The reality is that audience research is foundational to the success of any new offering. Conducting audience research in the form of calls early on in the launch process (aka the pre-launch phase), is a great way to do the following:

  • Test your idea to see if it’s really what people need and want. They might need something and not necessarily want it and therefore won’t pay for it.
  • Get the exact language your audience is using to describe their struggle or challenge. This is great for copy and sales pages.
  • Let your audience know what you are creating before you even begin asking for the sale.
  • Let’s your audience know you care about what they think and value their input into your creative process. This is great for building stronger relationships.

Check out the bottom of this piece for an example of how to invite people into research calls.

2. Use takeover graphics

When we’re in launch mode, it’s easy to think that we should be posting about our new offering all the time and yet as conscious business owners we don’t want to do that, because we don’t want to bombard our people.

My solution to this is to use takeover graphics on social media. What that means is changing the cover photo for my Facebook Business Page and Facebook groups that promote my offer with a link in the description to my sales page.

This is also possible on LinkedIn and for platforms that don’t use a cover photo, like Instagram, I simply change my bio so that it let’s people know I am launching something and links to the sales page. What this means is anyone visiting your channel can immediately see that you are launching something, without you needing to post that fact EVERY day!

See below for an example of my last takeover graphic on my Business Facebook Page.

3. Launch partners

This is one of my favourite launch strategies and probably the one that gets most overlooked. Whenever I start planning a launch, I think of a few colleagues, clients or mentors who I think might be willing to share about my new offer with their audience.

I then reach out to them, as early in the process as possible, to ask if they would be willing to support my launch by sharing details with their people. I do this early to give them time to plan it in and so that I can approach other people if they say no. I’m fortunate to have created some great relationships both with colleagues and former clients and in part I think this is because of my generosity in sharing about their offerings.

Having a small group of people supporting your launch can be the difference in a handful of people hearing about it and several hundred or even several thousand people.

4. 1:1 invitations

When we’re launching something new, it’s easy to become focused on our one to many marketing. Social media posts, newsletters etc. What I’ve found to be especially effective is actually taking the time to send personal and thoughtful 1:1 invitations to people who you would personally love to be involved (if it’s a live program, for example) or who you think might really benefit from your new offer.

We tend to think this will come across as pushy or salesy but when done with an attitude of service, with zero attachment to outcome it can actually feel like a compliment by the recipient.

Before I even get into launch mode, I like to think of 10 people would love to have in my workshop/program or who I think would benefit greatly from my new offering and if they haven’t bought as we get near to the end of the launch period, I might drop them a brief note to let them know that I’m offering something I think they’d be a great fit for. No pressure of course! I also never send any links and prefer to say something along the lines of: if you’d like to know more, let me know and I’ll send over details.

5. Final Call communications

I’ve been launching stuff online for a decade now and one thing I’ve learned is that people like to leave their buying decision until the last minute. I can’t tell you how many times, I’ve had a launch, only to get a flurry of sales on the first announcement and then nothing for the rest of the launch period and then another flurry of sales when I make the final call.

It can be tempting to think that if people have stopped buying/signing up that we’ve made all the sales that we’re going to make but sending a reminder to people that the deadline for purchase is approaching (if there is a deadline!) is often all it takes to have people make a decision. I would say that in most of my launches, an equal number of people sign up at the end as they do at the beginning.

Now gently reminding people is different to many of the FOMO inducing tactics we see online like countdown timers and messages like “last chance” and “don’t miss out!” Instead I prefer to send an email titled “Last call to sign up for xxxx” and I’ll also do some last call posts on social. That way hopefully those people who were considering buying but hadn’t yet decided get the opportunity to buy before the deadline passes.

And there you have it 5 of my favourite launch activities.

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The Exact Formula I Use to Price My Offerings

The Exact Formula I Use to Price My Offerings

by | May 22, 2024 | Selling, Uncategorized

“If you’re not worried you’re pricing it too cheap, you’re not pricing it cheap enough.”
~ Roy Williams

Ethical and accessible pricing is super important to me. So much so that I get told regularly that I don’t charge enough for what I offer. I love it when that happens because that’s actually one of my primary goals with everything I create — to give tons of value for the most affordable price possible.

Now I say affordable, but of course, that’s subjective. What’s affordable for one person might be impossible for another person, but my strategy around pricing is to go as low as I can on price without sacrificing myself and my livelihood. I do this because I remember well how hard it was to access useful and much-needed business advice when my business was not yet making enough money to be able to afford it. Talk about a catch 22.

I knew early on that I didn’t want to be a business owner who charged exorbitant prices for my work.

So if I don’t charge the way I often see others in the mainstream marketing and business coaching world charging, how do I come up with my prices and how do I advise my clients come up with their prices?

Pricing is something that gets discussed in many of my coaching sessions. And when it does, the topic of worth often comes up — i.e. what is this offering worth to the end user? Which on the face of it might seem like a sensible question to ask but when it comes to services or digital products like coaching, workshops or courses, “worth” is a tricky one to determine.

By comparison, physical products are a different story because there is a cost to the elements included in the product itself. An Apple phone, for example, is worth more than a cheap, unheard of brand phone because the quality of materials and the technical spec are significantly higher. Worth in this case is easier to determine because of the cost to make it.

Given that there is rarely physical materials involved in what I or my clients sell, a better predictor of price is time. Let me walk you through what I mean.

When considering the price of a new offering, I first consider my minimum hourly rate. That is the lowest amount of money I want to earn per hour of my time spent delivering my services.

This is something I highly recommend you do for yourself.

In terms of how you come up with that number, I usually recommend considering the figure below which you would start to feel resentful. For example, if someone paid you $75 for an hour of your time would that leave you feeling resentful? If so, at what point would you not feel resentful and start from there.

Remember, your minimum hourly rate today can increase with time as your audience and demand grows. Starting off lower gives you that scope but if you start off high and find that price is affecting sales then it’s harder to reduce prices without sending the message that not enough people were buying.

My minimum hourly rate is currently 150 euros. The only thing I charge that for are the discounted single sessions I offer to former 1:1 clients or CBM participants. The price per hour for all other offerings is usually higher. Hence it’s my minimum hourly rate.

A few years ago I hit a cap in my earning potential with 1:1. Given that there are only so many 1:1 sessions I can do in a day, week or month and that I wanted to keep my services accessible when it comes to price, putting my rates up to 300–500$ a session (like many other business coaches with my level of experience do) didn’t feel like an option for me. So I had to think about other ways to make more money per hour.

That’s when I started to offer workshops — that way I can keep prices low and work to get more sales so that I can hit and even exceed my minimum hourly rate target.

Taking into account my minimum hourly rate of 150€, I was able to work through how to price my workshops based on how much time I needed to spend delivering the product and the number of sales I’m likely to make.

Note that I say time spent delivering the services not creating the services. This is because the creation of a workshop only happens once, but because I get revenue for my workshops in multiple ways I don’t include creation time in the price. For example, I usually go on to sell the replay of my workshops and I often deliver my workshops in other people’s group programs or masterminds and get new clients as a result. I even use the same teachings in my group mastermind which I’m generating revenue from too.

I also don’t include my marketing time in the cost of my workshops. I’m of the believe that we do our marketing to get paid not get paid to do our marketing.

You might find that including this time in the price is important but I’ve found that if I try to include creation time and marketing time, it renders the price prohibitive for many.

So let’s work through this with a real example.

Recently I’ve been charging 50€ for a 3-part workshop. This is cheaper than many of my colleagues might charge for 4+ hours of training, but here’s how I do the math.

First of all I figure out how long it will take me to deliver my workshop. Let’s use my Create More Clients with Gift Sessions Workshop as a working example.

This was a 3-part workshop which included 2 x 90 minute sessions plus 1 x 60 minute session. That’s a total of 4 hours.

But there is also some prep before each session. Let’s say one hour per session. This makes for a total of 7 hours.

If I go back to my minimum hourly rate of 150€, that means I would need to make 7 x 150 (1050) in sales for this to hit my target of at least 150€ an hour.

I figured if I priced the workshop at 50€ and got 20 people registered, I would just about make it (and that’s without replay sales).

In the end, I actually had 17 people register for the live workshop which brought in 850€ but since then I’ve made 11 sales of the replay which adds up to another 550€, bringing the running total to 1400€ which brings my hourly rate up to 200€ for the time spent delivering that workshop. This will only increase as more sales of the replay are purchased.

I’m aware that these figures are lower than I would like, but I’m aware that as I grow my audience and the number of live attendees and replay sales grow, so will the revenue.

Hopefully, that makes sense. But just in case it doesn’t let’s work through a second example. My Conscious Business Mastermind.

I charge 135€ per person per month for this program. There’s usually 1 x 75 min call every Tuesday (excluding my holidays). This year for the first time and because the number of participants was high, I decided to run two groups. So that’s 2 x 75 min calls per week. And let’s say I spend about 2 hours a week on call prep and between call support inside the Facebook Group, that means I’m spending 4.5 hours a week on the delivery of this program.

It used to be a lot more because I was doing all of the admin and creating the content from scratch but this is my 5th year of running the Mastermind so much of the content has already been created, refined and improved and I have VA support for much of the admin.

If we consider the average month is 4 weeks long then I’m spending approximately 18 hours a month on the delivery of this program. 18 x 150 = 2700€ so this is the number I need to exceed if I hope to clear my minimum hourly rate. With 22 participants each paying 135€ a month, that brings in 2,970€. It’s important to note that I also don’t run the CBM every single week of the year as I have holidays so when you take this into account it well exceeds my minimum hourly rate.

So my price of 135€ a month feels good to me, despite the fact that people are constantly telling me I should and could charge more. That said, because of the feedback and to account for inflation, taxes and Stripe fees, I will probably put the price up to 150€ next year.

Now this all might sound great, but the downside is when you don’t hit your sales target. There have been years where my Mastermind didn’t make its sales target and the numbers didn’t look so great and the same for some of the workshops I’ve run.

That’s why I always recommend having a minimum number of sales. So that you can say, if this workshop doesn’t get at least X number of sales, I will cancel it and refund people’s money. Or if you know it’s early days and you’re prepared to make less as you build it up, then go into it knowing that this is something that will grow.

My first Mastermind had 6 people paying 100€ a month and boy did I do more work than I got paid for that year, but over time it’s grown into a profitable source of revenue and one that I absolutely love delivering too! So it was definitely worth the hit in that first year.

The formula is, therefore, as follows:

Number of delivery hours (DH) x Minimum hourly rate (MHR) ÷ Expected number of sales (ES) = PRICE

So in the case of a my gift sessions workshop, my formula ran as follows:

7 (DH) x 150 (MHR) ÷ 20 = 52.50 (Price). Hence why I priced my workshops at 50 euros.

Going forward, I do feel this price has to go up somewhat because of what gets taken in fees and taxes.

Now, I’m not saying that this is how you should price your services. I do believe pricing is very personal and even when I run the formula and it looks like I won’t hit my minimum hourly rate, I may still choose the price that “feels right” but I have found this formula helpful and I hope you do too. Let me know in the comments if this breakdown was helpful to you. I’d love to know.

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The intention behind these letters is to be a voice for integrity within your (undoubtedly) cluttered inbox. To be the one email you can count on to contain strategic and soulful advice for building a business without selling your soul.

If you want to receive the Soulful Strategies Weekly, simply share with me your name and email address below and you’ll start recieving emails right away.