You know one thing that really drives me up the wall is...Receiving a surprise bill. I get this quite often from solicitors. They’d be engaged on something like assisting with a new lease on a property and i’d receive a letter outlining their hourly rates. 

Thanks - but your rates have nothing to d...

Clients don’t buy time from you. I don’t care how lovely you are, they are not paying you because they enjoy talking to you. They’re paying you because of the value you bring to the table. The solutions. The outcomes. The results. The peace of mind. These are what they’re paying for.

When you go to...

Can I have a discount?

uhhh ...

Ok because we really want to do business with you, you can have £xx off

Nooooo! 

You should never give a discount just because your prospect asks for one 

3 reasons why not to do so in the video 

If you absolutely must give one then only do so if your prospect d...

There is never a place for time-based billing!

This might be controversial to say, but it's a really lazy way to price. The concept of the billable hour was created back in the early 1900s by a chap called Reginald Heber Smith. He was a lawyer who created it to overcome the ills in his law firm. Fa...

Back when I acquired my firm in 2008, things were pretty tough.

We were poor on our systems… we had no “ideal clients”… our pricing wasn’t great, and we had a high staff turnover.

Basically, we were a sinking ship.

And so I realized I had to do something about it – and fast.

I had to change some...

Prospect: "It's too expensive"

You: My prospects are price sensitive 

Reality: No they're not.  Most people in life are not price sensitive. They are VALUE SENSITIVE. If the value we get is greater than the price being asked, we buy.

Value though lies in the eye the beholder. Different people val...

Timesheets or no timesheets - that is the question 

Always a subject which generates healthy debate 

Which side of the fence are you on? 

Still think timesheets have a place? 

Or should they be binned into history forever 

For #accountants and #lawyers IMHO they should be binned 🗑

Why?

Becaus...

Struggling with scope creep? 

Feel like you and your team are working too hard with little return? 

Chances are, your pricing needs attention 

Given the nature of what we do as accountants, our services are very fluid 

You've adopted fixed fee pricing because you know that time is not what clien...

STOP billing by the hour!

STOP using timesheets!

Time has nothing to do with what your clients value 

Client's are not buying time from you

They are buying results, outcomes, solutions to problems 

You are not a commodity 

Your 'time' is not what you're selling 

When you track time - or get y...

If you're an accountant, do you still bill by the hour?

Now I know in recent years, many accountants have transitioned away thankfully from time-based billing. But there is still many that do, however, have very strong opinions on this.

I believe that time-based billing is a crazy way to price. A...