One of the scariest things we do as entrepreneurs is pick our prices and even scarier than picking your prices in the first place, raising those prices. So is it possible to raise your rates without getting people to get scared and run away? Better yet, is it possible to raise your rates and get more clients all at the same time? Not only is this possible, but it’s the exact strategy I used to take my $97 service and turn it into a $997 service.

In this video, I’m going to talk to you about, number one, why you need to raise your rates beyond the obvious. We’re going to talk about when you need to raise your rates, how to know it’s the right and finally, how to do it, what are the steps that you need to take in order to make it happen.

<So first of all, other than the obvious, why is it so important that you raise your rates? If you’re anything like the thousands of entrepreneurs I’ve been talking to over the years, chances are you are very much undercharging for your work. Now, this is normal. When we start our businesses, we don’t have the confidence or the experience to charge high rates and we normally undercharge our services. But with time, we need to raise those rates and make sure that we are raising them with our level of experience, and confidence, and as we make our services better and better. Because the second reason you need to raise your rates is because you’re going to get more respect from your clients when you do. I promise you that with higher prices come clients who are respecting your work more and taking it more seriously. Usually, clients who are paying more money are actually easier to work with than clients who are paying less money for your services. I know. It’s crazy, it makes no sense but it’s all about having skin in the game. In fact, I can guarantee you that there are potential clients out there for you right now who would want exactly what you have to offer, but they are never going to work with you at your current rates because they’re suspicious of the quality of work that they would get at that price point.

And that brings me to some Courtney real talk. You are going to have to come to grips that most people are not going to be able to afford you. I know this can be really hard at first when you started your business in order to serve and help people, and you can absolutely do that but they are going to have to pay in order to get access to you. This is one of the reasons I love creating free content for my audience because it makes me feel justified and better about charging the high rates I do for my work. If somebody’s unable to afford me, they have plenty of videos and content they can digest to get them to that level.

6 signs it’s time to raise your rates

Now, let’s talk about when it’s time to raise your rates. There are six main signs that it’s about time you raise your rates. You don’t have to have all these signs but as long as you have a few of them, it’s probably time to raise those prices.

1. The first sign is that you already have a fairly steady stream of clients coming to you already.
2. Second sign is that it’s been a hot minute since you raised your prices. I recommend raising your prices every 6 to 12 months.
3. The third sign is that you have too much work to do and you are not making enough money at the end of the day in order to justify the amount of work that you’re doing for your clients. This is a big sign that you’re undercharging and usually comes with a side of resentment.
4. Sign number four is that you have a waitlist of clients or you have more demand than you actually have space to work with clients. This is a sign that you definitely need to raise your rates.
5. Sign number five is that you have significantly improved your service, your skills and confidence in delivering that service since you decided on your current pricing.
6. And then finally, sign number six is that you are feeling resentful of your work which is so frustrating because you used to love it.

So those are the six signs that it is time to raise your rates. Now lets go into the six steps you need to take in order to not only raise your rates but get a slew of paying clients as you do it. This strategy is based around doing a promotion on the fact that you’re about to raise your rates.

#1 How much and when to raise your prices

The first thing you need to do is decide how much you’re going to raise your prices by and when that’s going to happen. It’s fairly common for service providers to double their prices. However, if you just want to increase your prices by 20%, that’s okay too. Do whatever feels comfortable for you.

#2 Availability for new clients

Step number two is to decide how many availabilities you have for new clients. So I would look a couple of months out, decide how many slots are available and that is the number of availabilities that you have. And what you’re going to do is when you promote your price increase, you’re also going to make sure people understand that you can’t serve everybody, so maybe you only have three to five spots available at the current price. And this is how you’re going to get all the current spots booked at the current price before you raise those rates.

#3 Reach out to past clients

Step number three is to reach out to past clients to offer them the spots first. I always would reach out to my past clients and I also had a VIP coupon for my clients so they were already getting a little bit of a savings incentive to come back and do repeat work with me. And if I was raising my rates, I would always tell them first. It’s always easier to sell to previous clients than it is to find new ones so this is a great place to start and also reward your past clients for having worked with you.

#4 Announce your promotion

Step number four is to make a public declaration of this promotion. So wherever you have an audience online, whether it’s an email list or your Instagram profile, whatever you do, this is where you need to announce and promote the fact that the price is going up for your services. You want to give people the details of the service and make it very clear that the price is about go up and that they need to book by a certain date in order to get in at the current rate.

#5 Get a non-refundable deposit

Step number five is to always, always, always get a non-refundable deposit from any clients who are booking with you in the future. I know a lot of you aren’t used to getting a slew of clients all at once and the way to manage that properly is to have a booking calendar, to have clients pick a spot on your calendar, however it works in your business. And then in order to confirm their booking, they do need to make a non-refundable deposit. Normally is a 50% deposit and then the other 50% is due before you begin working on the project.

#6 Get booked at the new rate

And then finally, step number six is to wait for clients to book in at the new rate. The reason why this method works so well even though you’re booking clients at your current rate is that you’re able to book out clients for a while which gives time for your new clients to start to find you. You’re building momentum in your business and leapfrogging forward. It is the exact method I use to get my business where it is today. In fact, we do a very similar thing with our courses and products as well.

I hope you loved this video with one of my favorite pricing strategies for service-based businesses. I want you to leave a comment under the video and say, “Mo money” if you loved this strategy and are ready to use it in your business. Thank you so much for watching and I will see you next time.