One of the most nerve-wracking moments for any freelancer is the price conversation. We feel like we're on the back foot, and we often end up apologetically quoting a number we hope they won't reject.
There's a better way.
Blair Enns, author of Pricing Design and a hero to creative professionals everywhere, teaches that we should never discuss price until we have first had a “Value Conversation.”
The goal is to shift the client's mindset (and our own) from seeing our work as a cost to seeing it as an investment.
How do you do that? By asking better questions.
Instead of letting them ask “How much for a new website?”, you need to take control and ask questions that uncover the true value of a solution. For example:
- “Before we talk about my fee, can you help me understand what this new website is meant to achieve for the business?”
- “You mentioned your current site is slow. Do you have any idea how that might be impacting your sales?”
- “If we were to launch this project and it was a massive success, what would that look like for you in 12 months' time?”
When you have the answers to these questions, the conversation changes. You're no longer a WordPress developer quoting a price for a task. You're a strategic partner discussing how to generate a return on an investment.
If you can show that investing €5,000 in a new website will help them capture an extra €20,000 in lost leads, the price suddenly seems very reasonable.
The expert on this is Blair Enns. We highly recommend checking out his blog, Win Without Pitching (aff), for more game-changing advice on this topic.
