You're exactly this valuable.

I met with a guy who is starting an agency. He’s a sharp guy, with a ton of experience with big brands, and a large network. He was telling me about everything, and then it came to price. He said he was going to charge $175/hr. He commented that it was a lot.

And, I immediately became less excited for him.

Up until he put an hourly price tag on his work, I was enthusiastic. But, once he placed an hourly value on his time- I was inherently less interested.

Ironically, $175/hr is the highest we ever charged before we stopped charging hourly. Which we stopped doing now. Like, right now, August 1, 2023, now.

We have whittled hourly pricing down over the years, but it’s time to say goodbye for good. We’re no pioneers, and anyone who’s looked into this value-based pricing knows some of what I am going to say next.

But, not all of it.

People pay what they believe something is worth.

Imagine a marketing director or business owner who wants to grow their business.
They ask for an hour of my time.
Because of my experience in brand development AND running a small business myself, I can give this person 100x the value as a freelancer on Fiverr. They will spend 100x the price on me because they believe they will get 100x the value. More, probably.

Or, they don’t.

They don’t believe they have a brand problem. They don’t need a fresh direction. They just want a logo. And, the guy hocking them for $45 will do just fine.

No one is wrong. We simply value things differently (Oh, man, I wish we applied that to humaninty.)

Value is a word that gets thrown around a lot. And for good reason. It’s complex.

A watch costs $10, and a watch costs $100,000, and they both tell time. But we know it’s not about keeping time. It’s about keeping up- about keeping up with what matters to us.

If you want to be the best- act like it. Don’t fight for scraps. Don’t try and get non-believers to buy in. They won’t, and worse, they’ll waste your time.

Work hard. Get better. Charge more.

But it takes time. Remember, you can only charge what someone will pay you.