The typical project goes like this...
Plan it then do it. Send the bill.
The typical invoice has one line item: Did it, please pay $xxxx.
I've spent most of my career trying to get agencies, freelancers and consultants to charge for the plan.
Because the most valuable thing you have to sell is your thinking and you're not billing them for it.
This issue of The Monetize will put two line items on your invoices: Strategy $xxxx and Service $xxxx.
I stumbled on selling my knowledge early in my career because I didn't know ad agencies were "supposed" to give away their strategy in order to get clients.
I didn't know I had to come up with a bunch of creative ideas, pitch them to clients and then hope they chose me over the other agencies pitching.
Since I knew nothing about how a real agency got business, I would pitch the ad campaign strategy first.
I had a few prospects tell me I was doing it wrong. Luckily, most of my early clients didn't know they weren't supposed to pay me until after I gave them my best ideas for free. They saw the value in developing a strategy before creating an ad campaign.
My ignorance made me a lot of money. I got paid to think and then paid to do.
You too can get paid to think by starting here:
Make a list of every thing you have to strategize before you can do your service.
Make a list of every time you have to think to continue doing the service.
Do you already have a planning process you follow with each client? If not, formalize how you plan a client project. Compile everything you have to think about to perform your service. Once you have it written down, you need to find its value proposition.
It has one. If it is necessary to the success of your project then it has value to your clients. You've got to find the value and make it known.
One of my clients has been paid $2000 per for 5 months ($10k) to do the strategy before switching into the doing phase of his service. I told him it would be valuable as a service on its own, but he had to experience it before it sunk in.
When you know the value proposition for your strategy, give it a name. Treat it like a product and sell it the outcome they will get.
There's only two reasons clients won't purchase it from you: 1) they don't understand its value, or 2) they don't believe you can deliver enough value for the price.
Technically they're the same reason. If they balk at the price it's because they don't understand the value they'll get.
Obviously, you won't be able to sell strategy you've already delivered to existing clients, but you've already identified the ongoing thinking and planning you do for your clients.
You've just not packaged it in a way they'd be happy to buy.
If you've got monthly reporting you do for your service, then you've got the potential to have paid strategy sessions.
A content agency client added content strategy. He had been doing the thinking needed to attract an audience for his clients, but was only charging for the delivered content.
Once he branded himself as a content strategist, he met with his clients each month to help them grow their audience... for a fee. He even sold a Black Friday/Cyber Monday strategy package to align content with their ad and email campaigns.
He went from being only a content writer in his clients' minds to being a trusted advisor for growing their audiences.
We are in Q4 of the year, which means your clients are starting to think about wrapping up this year and planning for the next one.
This is a perfect time for you to create a strategy program for your clients to figure out what they need to do to end the year strong and have a solid plan for 2027.
How can you help them do this? What do you know about their business that they aren't thinking about?
Write it down.
Make an offer doc to sell this strategy service.
Then test it with your most engaged clients. Once you've got feedback from them, improve your offer and pitch it to the rest of them.
If you're unsure of your value proposition or have questions on how to rebrand as a strategist, reply back with your offer or questions and I'll give you feedback on how to dial it in.
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