Pricing Your Professional Services

If you’re going to work for yourself, you need to get comfortable with setting rates, talking about fees, and negotiating payment schedules. It’s not necessarily the point of what you do, but it’s clearly part of the mix.

The good news is that money, and the pricing of your services in particular, need not be an ongoing source of stomach-churning anxiety. Your clients’ interests are more aligned with your own than you may realize, and you don’t need to live in a constant tug-of-war over hours worked and money spent.

“I used to believe that less money and more effort were the ‘price to pay,’ the tradeoff, for the freedom that working solo provides,” Michael Katz says. “I don’t anymore. Change the way you price your services and you can begin enjoying the best of both worlds.”

With a few important changes to the way you price, package, and present your services, you can take money largely out of the discussion (really) and work happily side by side with your clients to deliver the outstanding results that they want and that you want to provide.

Come hear Michael speak on this vital topic, and you’ll learn the following:

• Why charging by the hour is bad for you and contrary to what clients really want
• Why higher fees result in more satisfied clients and less effort for you
• How to move up the ladder from “hourly day laborer” to “highly compensated industry expert” (and how to do more of the work you love in the process)
• How to establish a fee structure that pays you what you’re worth
• How the way you describe what you do affects the fees clients are willing to pay
• How the myth of objective value works against you
• How to prevent clients from “taking advantage” of flat-fee arrangements
• Why it’s easier to provide more value and wow clients with “high end,” more expensive services than it is with run-of-the-mill offerings

About Our Speaker:

Michael Katz is founder and Chief Penguin of Blue Penguin Development, Inc., a Hopkinton firm that specializes in helping professional service firms get more and better clients by positioning themselves as Likeable Experts. He is the author of three books, and has published over 400 issues of his twice-monthly newsletter, “The Likeable Expert Gazette,” which has over 6,500 subscribers in more than 40 countries.

Since launching Blue Penguin in 2000, Michael has been quoted in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Business Week Online, Forbes.com, Bloomberg TV, The Boston Globe, and other national and local media.

Michael has a BA from McGill University in Montreal, and an MBA from Boston University.

www.bluepenguindevelopment.com