Description:
One of the goals of The Builders is to share stories to inspire the listener and learn from; real-life stories from the trenches. Being that pricing is such a critical component of so many businesses and agencies, this is a topic that we should visit from time to time.
Building off of Episode 4, I share my personal pricing strategies and how it's evolved over the years. What’s happened in the past year and a half since that episode? How big of a role does recurring income play now in my business and why I think it's something everyone should consider.
I round it off with a discussion about why ‘Hourly Billing’ is not always bad AND what my plans/goals are for the future. Big goals.. balanced by a no-stress approach. Enjoy!
THE MEAT OF IT!
- Intro
- Referencing Ep. 4
- How I got started..
- Where I left off..
- What has changed?
- The biggest change.. how it changed my mind.
- “Don’t do hourly?”
- Is hourly bad?
- vs. project-based, value-based pricing.
- Part of a variety of pricing strategies we use..
- IN the context of yourself.. if you are solo.
- My point is it changes when you have a team it’s charged against.
- Starting to price things with ‘who is helping with this’ in mind.
- Someone else doing the work.
- Recurring monthly enters the picture ..
- What I bring with me from my Internet Marketing days..
- Why I back-end memberships..
- VERY helpful. The foundation.
- The layer of recurring income.. is predictable.
- Introducing a new type of service .. maintenance-based.
- Narrowing the vertical.. who we are working with.
- Having a predictable income helps finance building the team.
- ALL possible because I priced things.
- Premium service.
- IF YOU CAN FIND A WAY.. to form a service that you can create a recurring income, do it!
- Example with plugins too.
- YOU SHOULD be for paying for at least an annual license.
- HOURLY WORK ..
- Everyone says don’t do it.. but!.. we do.
- It’s different, again, if you are solo.
- It’s not business we don’t need to turn away.
- Examples of how it can be delivered..
- Allotted hours to contracts..
- Packaged hours..
- Large hourly projects .. how can you turn those away?
- If you can work out the numbers, you can do it!
- What I charged in the beginning.. hourly. And why?
- Starting low.. leverage to start charging high.
- Gaining the experience to charge more..
- Pricing dictated the type of clients and projects I got..
- What’s the lesson it all?
- What’s next?
- Being 51 years old.. my last hurrah!
- All the experience gained is being applied now..
- 10-20 years.. probably going to be old.
- In that context, I do have a revenue goal.
- The first milestone achieved.. 6 figure business.
- What’s the next?
- Being 51 years old.. my last hurrah!
- I love what I do and am happy regardless of how long that next milestone takes..
- What we are currently doing is working.
- Including our marketing, social marketing, and networking..
- I feel good about the future doing what we’re doing..
- If I fall a little short? That’s ok.
- Did my pricing strategy work? Yes!
- Will I increase prices.. or how will it change?
- Two things that play a role..
- Product releases are part of this too! The Unified Toolkit and plugins..
- If you have questions.. let me know!
Check out these related Episodes:
- Episode 70: Ben Gabler – His Journey in Tech & Business, Building a Web Hosting Company, Differentiation
- Episode 67: Matt’s Influences.. How He Keeps Building. I Dare You & the Art of Commitment
- Episode 64: Week in the Life of an Agency: Unified Web Design, April 11-15, 2022
Web Developer, WordPress & JavaScript Nerd at Unified Web Design, LLC
Matt is the Founder & Web Designer at Unified Web Design, Owner of UnifiedPlugins.com, blogger at MattLevenhagen.com ( who else would be? 😉 ) AND host of this amazing podcast, The Builders!
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