Written by: Jenny McCabe, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
Do you feel uncomfortable talking about your prices with clients? Do you struggle with what to charge and often feel afraid that you're charging too much, so you set your prices too low? How you set your prices can determine how you value your time and whom you attract as clients.
I spent my first few years in business under-charging and over-delivering. I was practically working for free for some clients. I ran myself into the ground, trying to please them, and to be honest, I ended up resenting them for not appreciating me!
Every time I dropped my prices to win business, I gave away my power, and those clients inevitably became the most challenging and demanding clients to work with.
I was stressed, and frustrated and no matter how hard I tried, they were never happy. As a people pleaser (now recovered) it made me feel that I wasn't good enough to raise my fees and that I was unworthy of having a successful business. Not to mention, the effect it had on my pocket.
Undercharging and Over-delivering
Undercharging is a huge challenge for women entrepreneurs and it's one of the fastest ways to kill a business. I've worked with a lot of women in business and there's a lot of fear around pricing and the mere mention of a price increase can send many into a cold sweat.
The problem with low fees is, they can undermine your creditability and confidence because people naturally put a higher value on something if it's more expensive, as they believe it must be better quality.
But more importantly, there is also a direct relationship between your money and your self-worth.
We live in a society where money is used as a measure of value and if you don't truly believe that you have value, it'll feel hard to charge your worth. On a conscious level, we crave a successful business, more money, more impact, and more freedom but if you unconsciously believe that you're not worthy to have financial abundance, you're going to push it away. You'll undercharge and over-deliver just to prove your worth, you'll struggle to attract or keep it, you'll overspend, fail to save, be over-generous and give it away.
To add insult to injury, when you go in with low fees, you attract the wrong type of client and you also have to keep working twice as hard as everyone else to make ends meet.
I've had to do a lot of inner work to transform my self-worth and what I've learned is if you don't value YOU… CHOOSE you … know YOUR magnificence... No one else will because the continued cost of undercharging is a lack of freedom and living a life of comprise that will cost you your dreams.
Reasons for Undercharging
When I host my webinars, I run a poll at the start asking attendees why they haven't raised their fees and the top 3 fears are:
1. What will people think of me?
So many women have a fear of being judged. They're so worried about what people in their industry or potential clients will think about their fees in case no one will buy from them if they raise the prices and move to premium pricing.
Women give all their energy to feeling judged instead of focusing on the people they were meant to serve. People will always have an opinion and you probably won't like it so don't give it any power.
2. Will I lose my clients?
One of my clients has a social media agency and by the time we started working together, she had been in business for 6 years. She is amazing at what she does, but she had never once raised her fees.
Meanwhile, the cost of living has gone up a lot in 6 years. She was stressed, worried about the future, and just about getting by. She knew on a soul level that she had to raise her prices but the fear of losing her clients was far greater than her desire to raise her fees and claim her worth.
And guess what, during our coaching together, I discovered that some of her most challenging clients were on the lowest packages but demanded the most attention. Sound familiar?
When she raised her prices, some of those clients didn't up-level with her but because she had created a vacuum, she very quickly replaced them with new clients at a much higher rate, and just like that, her monthly income almost doubled without working any harder.
3. Am I good enough to raise my prices?
This is a very common fear, especially for new business owners, they don't feel that they're experienced, skilled, knowledgeable, or qualified enough, or their program, course, or product isn't perfect yet or any number of reasons why they don't feel they are good enough to raise their prices.
This is a limiting belief about self-worth and is one of the hardest abundance blocks to overcome when it comes to undercharging and one of the root causes of imposter syndrome, perfectionism, and procrastination.
Why You Need to Raise Your Prices
In my experience, most women have the same fears around raising their prices, and maybe even, just the thought of putting up your prices, might feel uncomfortable or even downright scary but there is no other strategy that impacts the success and profitability of your business as much as pricing.
There is no magic number or pricing formula because there is no such thing as a "perfect" price, it's simply impossible to please everyone. No, this is about you having the courage to choose yourself and saying "no thank you" to a life of struggle and "yes" to your desire to have more money, freedom, and impact.
On an energetic level, pricing isn't just about money... it's a message to the world about you and how you empower yourself to unapologetically own your worth.
The more you charge, the more you can step into the energy of a premium service but the biggest barrier for women stepping into charging premium prices is the mindset.
Stepping into Premium Pricing
Premium pricing is an opportunity for more money, ease, and joy in your business and allows you to thrive.
Premium prices elevate the type of clients you work with and your sense of self-worth. Your work is of vital importance to your soul-aligned clients, and they need you to transform their life or business. The expertise that you have and take for granted is unique to you and is truly priceless to your soul-aligned clients.
Premium Pricing is a mindset that helps you shift your focus to serving clients at the highest level and which also honours your worth.
Lastly, premium pricing is not about being affordable to everyone, it's an invitation for your clients to step into a higher frequency and work with you at a higher and more meaningful level.
For more pricing strategies and mindset tips, grab my free Pricing Playbook!
Jenny McCabe, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Jenny McCabe is a Certified Money Breakthrough Business Coach and Spiritual Entrepreneur. She started her coaching business after working in the Franchise Industry as a Franchise Business Consultant. She has worked with dozens of women, empowering them to own their worth and build a six-figure business with heart, soul and ease, Jenny's transformational & spiritual journey to find her purpose work lead to her passion of helping women find their inner-power and connect to their soul. Her new signature program Aligned Feminine Business launches in 2023.
