Well, it is 100% true that “Customers only pay what THEY believe the value for your services is” – that is the most important principle of Value Pricing!
However, the real issue at hand is that accountants and bookkeepers get frustrated with “Value Pricing” and/or Fixed-Fee Pricing because customers come into the table with a predisposed mindset about what is an “CPA” or a “bookkeeper”. YES, but don’t forget that this worldview may be extremely limited by the a few (low quality) interactions in the past; you may be pigeonholed into that “commodity” category that no ones wants to be in.
So how do we solve this issue? Easy, there are 3 things:
1) You must have the strongest POSITIONING in the market: which means this customer needs to believe that your business was designed to solve for that particular client’s issues. Mostly because you are highly specialized in solving the issues they are having or you are targeting that niche market. All you marketing, social media, content are AUTHORITATIVE in your field of expertise – which just happens to match the client’s needs.
2) Make sure they walk in the your first meeting with NO preconditions: Which means you need to give your client HOMEWORK… they need to decide upfront before meeting you that you are going to be helping them from the first minute you meet, because you have a unique value proposition and you very clearly UNDERSTAND your client’s issue. You need to communicate that YOUR most important role is to make sure THEY don’t waste their time. If they don’t know enough about you to know that spending time with you (even as an initial consultation) is worth $300-$600 or whatever, they are WASTING TIME
3) Spark their curiosity. Ask them a question that no one has ever asked them before… a question that they don’t have the answer to… a question that drives them to ASK more questions, effectively sending them into a journey of self-discovery. If you can do that, you have them for life
At the end of the day, people want to do business with me that match two checkmarks:
- 1) They are EASY to do business with
- 2) They align with their higher purpose in life
It is simple as that. We can double or triple the perceived value of our services by simply checking those two boxes!
I think about YODA (the beloved Star Wars Character) YODA did not have the answers, But he made Luke ask himself the questions that lead him to path he took. Accountants need to be their client’s YODA.
If you are an accountant and want to learn from my experiences with pricing my services, take my Value Pricing course for $250 http://www.valuepricing.net
