← The Art & Business of Writing Podcast with Nicolas Cole
The Art & Business of Writing Podcast with Nicolas Cole
How To Package A $10k/mo Ghostwriting Service As An Irresistible Offer
00:31:08
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- [00:00]
A
Okay, great. Thanks for taking my question. So to everyone else and and to you, I I write a ghostwriter for early stage founders, mostly B2B startups, early stage tuck and seed to series B. I help them with what I call founder led branding on LinkedIn, essentially writing in the CEO's voice on LinkedIn, helping them build a presence, become a person online to attract more customers and more investors for their business. Now as I've been building the business, I've been raising my prices thanks to your advice. And I've raised them from originally 3K a month, 5K, now about 7 1/2 K. And I want to continue raising those prices to 10K plus and doing that as an individual and solopreneur without bringing on a team or other people. Now my question for you is kind of like what levers can I pull in order to increase the price and how do I articulate the irresistible offer in a way that's different at that higher price point? Is it a sort of different problem that I'm solving at that higher price? And one thing I've noticed for example is that the higher paying customers appreciate the kind of trusted advisory work, the sort of more like communications consulting along with the ghostwriting more than the lower paying clients who just kind of want the actual brass tacks LinkedIn posts. And so that just has gotten me thinking about, okay, you maybe the value is different to the 10k client than an early stage client. So my question's like, do I articulate the value differently? Do I go up market to better funded companies, later stage companies? Is the offer more about like that brand value in general rather than on the other end of the spectrum, the more direct response. I want to use LinkedIn to actually get leads. That's the question.
- [01:48]
B
Yeah. So there are a bunch of different levers you can push and pull. This is going to be a non linear conversation because there's tons of different things to cover. So I'm just going to bounce around. So one we talked about. Yes. The difference between, you know, quote unquote brand content versus direct response content or even just effort. You know, some people use LinkedIn because they just want to be a real person. Some people use it because they want to get nitty gritty and get as many leads as possible by DMing and things like that. Right. Those are usually two completely different goals. When we talked about this last, I think we both sort of landed on you want to be more on the brand side and not the direct response side. Correct? Correct. Okay, so couple things that I just want to like point out and share. So one is have you run into, you've been increasing your prices 3k 5k now 7k. Have you run into any pricing friction yet?
- [02:49]
A
Yeah, on my last client I pitched him, I pitched him two packages. One at seven and a half K, one at 10. And he wanted the seven and a half but said it was expensive. So essentially I gave him a discount down to 5k for 2 months. I told him I'm very confident in the value of the offer, I'm happy to give you a two month discount and that'll ramp up to seven and a half K. That's actually the only client I've pitched at that price point, so that's my only data point.
- [03:14]
B
Okay. So yeah, so one is just because someone says it's expensive doesn't mean that you need to change anything. I've, I've had a lot of people tell, say to me, that's really expensive and then proceed to pay it. Right? So it doesn't, you know, it's like you go buy a really nice watch, you're like, that's really expensive and you still buy it, right? You go buy a Ferrari, it's really expensive, you still buy it. So I wouldn't change anything based on that. The, the thing to look for first is you. I would recommend pitching and landing more people at the seven, seven and a half K because you want to get that data around. Like there might not be a problem to, to, to solve. You know, you're, you're like, what do I need to change? And you might not actually need to change anything. A lot of times people just don't know where the pricing ceiling is. And I'll. So I'll tell you when I, when I like got to the end of full time ghostwriting, I was ghostwriting for a small handful of founders. This was after my agency. I was ghostwriting for a small handful of founders at 10k a month per pop. And there was, there was no like pricing friction. They were just like, yeah, I guess that's what it costs. And at the time I was sort of just as floored by that, to be perfectly honest. Like I, because up until that point, you know, like when I was building my agency, I was charging like three grand a month or five grand a month, you know. And so a lot of times you also don't know where the ceiling is. So you sort of just have to like keep pushing it and then see, like, I wouldn't start coming to conclusions until you go, I just pitched 10 people, I had 10 sales calls, I pitched 10 people and like one of them signed up. Right? But then even still, I just want to walk through the logic. Even still, if, if 1 out of every 10 signs at 7K a month, 7 1/2K a month, and you can consistently generate sales calls and you don't have a team and you don't have a staff and you don't have payroll, and this is just you. And you can only take on one new client every two months or every three months, you still don't have a problem. Right. So it is worth sort of slowing down and just going through the logic of like, what am I actually trying to solve for, you know, so that's, that's the first, first part. So I would encourage you book more sales calls, gather more data, pitch more people at seven and a half, see what the conversion is. If it's 0 out of 10, that's different. If it's 1 out of 10 and your bandwidth is, you know, you're near 80, 90, 100% bandwidth, you don't have a problem. You know, like, keep, keep stacking the bench and keep raising the price. Like, if you're full with everyone at 7 1/2 K, go pitch 10 and see what changes. Right. So that's, that's sort of my, my first answer. I'm going to get out. I'm going to give you something tactical after this, but that is what I would recommend. Does that make sense?
- [06:19]
A
Yeah. Thank you.
- [06:20]
B
Cool. Okay, so let's say you do all that and life's great, and you have a full roster of clients and they're all paying you seven and a half K, but you're like, now I want everyone to pay me 10. What are the levers? What, what can you do? Something I've been thinking about a lot, and this is a Horosi ism. He talks about it as unbundling words and unbundling language and operationalizing language. And now that I've become aware of this, I can't stop thinking about it. And so when I hear people talk, I can, I. I'm now becoming more and more attuned to when people use bundled terms or bundled phrases. And I can also typically tell, based on the context and the way that they use them, whether or not they have clarity over what they just said. So this is a great example. This is why I wrote this when, when I heard you say it, because this is a bundled phrase. So you go, like, I help them become a person on the Internet now. There's nothing wrong with this, but I want to point out that this is a bundled phrase because if we were to unbundle this, what does it actually mean to help them become a person? Right. And so just as an exercise, let's list out Andrew and if anyone else has ideas that pop up too, drop them in the chat. If we were to unbundle this phrase, what are all of the things that need to happen? That when all these things happen, there's like a checkbox and they become a person on LinkedIn. Just list out like as many as you can think of.
- [08:07]
A
It's funny, I think I actually got that, that phrase help them become a personal unit from you in our last conversation.
- [08:12]
B
You definitely did.
- [08:13]
A
Yeah. And I, and I, and I resonated with it. What I, the way I usually articulate the offer is, or what it actually is, is that I'm helping these founders leverage their unique knowledge and insights, converting that wealth of knowledge and insights in their mind to clear, compelling content on LinkedIn in order to attract more and better customers, more and better talent, more and better investors.
- [08:41]
B
So all of that is true and we need to go deeper in terms of literally what does that mean? So how do we know when they are successful on LinkedIn?
- [08:59]
A
They unlock they, they, they attract a, a caliber of opportunities that would not be available to them otherwise. Attracting more speaking opportunities, podcast opportunities. It could be attracting leads, it could be attracting invest dms from investors. It could be attracting. It could be when they put out, when the company puts out job applications, they get like 10x more applicants given their brand value than what they were getting previously. They get quoted more often in, in articles. Their stock price does better. Curious to hear your thoughts than anybody else's. What the other benefits?
- [09:41]
B
So it, it took a little bit, but then you got in the groove, right? Like the, this is what I mean. Like literally like and just, just to make it as, as stupid simple as possible. It's like you have a one sentence bio that says who you are and what you do. Like that is 1% of you are a person on LinkedIn. Right. Like your company's opt in is listed as a featured product on your LinkedIn page. Like how on mine is like start writing online is one featured product and write with AI is another featured product. Right? Right. Your headshot is up to date and professionally lit th this is what it means to unbundle this. Right. And the reason that this exercise is so important for you and for everyone here is because the more of these you list out the more of these that you become aware of, the more valuable your service is. Now, here's the nuance that everyone misses. Most people who do this work all do these things. The difference, the thing that I ended up finding is the primary difference between someone who charges 3k a month or 2k a month ghostwriting for someone on LinkedIn and someone who charges 10 is that the 2 or 3k can't articulate these. They just say this, right? The person who charges 10k can sit on the call and go, well, let me walk you through. Like, the end goal is you want to build your presence on LinkedIn. And so the things that enable that to happen are. And they start rattling all of these off. It's your ability to articulate the fundamental pieces. Right? Yeah. Kelsey said differently. In a lot of ways, this is sort of your offer stack as well. Right? And this is why it's such a small nuance, but it's something that people really misunderstand. It's like, this is why you have one group of writers that does great work, but they're like, I cannot figure out how to charge more than two grand a month. And it's because they can't articulate the tangible things that actually goes into the end result, right? Whereas I was charging 10 because I get on a call and I'm just like, yeah, let me rattle off 50 of these things. And the person gets overwhelmed, and then they're like, oh, my God, you're doing so much work for me, 10k seems like a steal, right? Does that. Does that make sense? Andrew?
- [12:27]
A
Yeah. Can I ask. Can I ask, in your framework for the Irresistible Offer, which I've been reviewing a lot recently, where does this fit in? Is this the. It's obviously not in the problem section at the beginning. It's in the second half at the end, when you talk about the ultimate desirable outcome that you're helping them unlock. Or it's more in, like, here's what I. Here's what I'm actually doing. Here's. I'm gonna operationalize to you in language.
- [12:47]
B
It's that it usually is what comes after that script. And then they're like, so what does that actually mean? Or what goes into it? Right? And that's where you educate them on, like, all the little things that they aren't even aware of. Okay? So to take this a step further, and the reason why it's worth doing this first is the larger idea is I found that there is a very clear, like, invisible boundary at 10k a month. For a service under 10k a month gets evaluated very differently than more than 10 grand a month. And I don't really know what it is. It's like just this invisible layer that sits there. And something that I've really found over the years is that whenever you're pricing something above ten grand a month, you almost want to stop thinking about it through the lens of monthly. So instead of like if someone has a 10k a month service, right. One way of viewing this is I do these tasks, I help you solve these problems or achieve these goals, and you pay me 10k a month. Right. Like roughly. That's essentially what you're saying, right. A different way of viewing this is you're like, you want this big outcome. We can get you there in six months. Each month we're going to tackle something different to achieve this big outcome. It costs 60k, or if you pay in full, I'll do it for 50. This is still 10k a month, right. It's, it's, it ends up being the same thing, but the frame is completely different. Right. And so I, this is, I think if you keep pushing the, the pricing ceiling, this is where you will ultimately end up is at a certain point it, it becomes harder and harder for the client to, to rationalize what they're buying through the lens of monthly and you have to extend the time horizon and change the way that they're evaluating what they're looking at. Does that make sense?
- [15:28]
A
Yeah. Can I ask, in the context of my business, founder led branding, how you would articulate what this big outcome is after 6 months?
- [15:40]
B
Million dollar question, right? I mean, I would probably, you would probably anchor it to something like it depends on how specific you want to get. Like a couple options are, you know, six months from now, you'll position yourself as a thought leader in your industry. This is what we did for years. Like it takes approximately six months to start building that perception. That was, that was like the very simple thing that we did. If you wanted to get really specific with it, you could be like, you know, six or even 12 months from now, you'll position yourself to raise your Series C. Like you anchor it all around like the next fundraising thing, because then it's really easy to rationalize 50 grand, right? You're like, oh, I'm going to raise 500 million. Like this is probably, if I was to redo this today, I would probably do something like this because then you can do the, you can frame it all around. Like your next round you're going to raise 50 million. Think of this as an insurance policy that increases the likelihood that investors get excited about your company. And to get you there, it takes approximately 6 months. And we charge 60k or 50k if paid in full. Right. Like, once you hear the 50 million, you're like, well, this is, this is peanuts. Right. And. And it's anchored to the thing that they care about the most. Right. So that, that's probably where I would start. But just to reinforce for you, like, you can experiment with this if you want, but I still think that you have more headroom to just pitch more people with what you have, max out your current roster and then play from there.
- [17:58]
A
Okay, thank you. I appreciate the inspiration and the guidance and.
- [18:01]
B
Makes sense.
- [18:02]
A
Yeah.
- [18:03]
B
Awesome. They're great questions and I love. I love digging into them. So hit me. Hit me with them whenever.
- [18:09]
A
Thank you.
- [18:10]
B
Awesome. Thanks, Andrew. Quick follow up for everyone here. A mistake I notice a lot of people make is here's what happens. Let's say they have five clients, and this is what their roster looks like. They have one client paying them 2,000amonth. They have another client paying them 3,500amonth. They have another client pay them $500 a month. They have another client. Let's see, what are we at? 3, 4, 6. Okay, check my math. 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 6. Was that 16.5k a month? It's not bad. Doing pretty good. Okay. All right. So a bunch of people in the chat. Oh, my God, it's me. Right? Okay. So, yeah, it's all. It's almost like I've seen this before. So there's a couple things to point out here. Okay. When you are trying to optimize yourself as a writer, right? You're. You're like, I want to max out my earning potential, maybe. Period. That's the end. I want to max out my earning potential, or I want to max out my earning potential because I want to eventually scale into an agency, right? Whatever it is, there is a progression that needs to happen. And I find. And I've observed it so many times in PGA and in Liftoff. I've. I've observed so many times when writers try and skip that progression. Okay. And so how they get there is. This is normally what happens. Okay. Their first client, it's like we tell them, you could easily pitch 4 or 5k, they're nervous, they can't do it. Instead, they pitch 2k, right? No problem. You got your first client, you're excited, they're in the door. But they're still on your roster, right? Then your next client, you muster up a little bit more courage. We're like, hey, you could charge 4 or 5K. They're like, I'm not ready yet. They pitch 3500 instead. Client says, yes, no problem. They're like, damn it, I should have listened to you, right? It's all good. Now you have your second client, okay? Then you have a third client who comes in, and you really like them, and they're really nice. And then you find out they have no money, right? They're, like, in the seed stage of their startup, and they've raised a hundred grand, and they can't afford your services, but you really like them, and they really like you. And so you go, I'm going to do you a favor. I will do this for you at an extreme discount. 500 bucks a month. And then. And then we will. We'll figure something out in the future, right? They say yes, you say yes. And then you show up to a hot seat here, and I'm like, what the fuck are you doing doing this for 500 bucks a month? But that's okay, right? Because this is all part of the learning experience. Then the next client comes in the door, and we're like, yeah, you could charge four or five grand. And you were about to, but then you got nervous, and you even forgot that you charged 3,500 in the last time, so you charged three grand instead. And now you got your fourth client on the roster, right? And then one day, something magical happens, right? This is usually four, five, six months later, these things finally start clicking. And you get on a call with someone, and you looked up their company, and they just raised $878 million. And you're like, you know what? I'm feeling lucky today. So you pitch. You're like, I'm going to do the same work, but I'm going to charge 7,500 for it. And the client doesn't even blink. And they're like, sure, let's do it. And when that happens, your entire worldview breaks. And all of a sudden you go, oh, my God. There's things that I didn't know. As much as it sounds like this is directed at you, Andrew, it's not. I've watched this so many times, okay? Your entire worldview breaks, and you think, oh, my God, I think that I need a different offer in order to keep doing this. I need to charge more. I got to change everything. And the reason that happens is because you just experienced your first offer realization of. I actually don't know where the pricing ceiling is. And when. When that happens, you rethink everything, okay? And that is not the conclusion. In fact, that is the worst conclusion, right? Because you just got something that is starting to work, and the moment that you start to realize that it's working, you want to go change it. All right? And that is that this is one of the hardest skills to build, is fighting that urge and going, okay, no, I don't need to change everything. I need to do more of what I'm doing better. Okay? So here's the progression. This is the thing that you need to understand when you are trying to maximize your own earning potential as a writer. I like to think of it like you are a. You know, you're a warehouse, and you can only store so much stuff in your warehouse, right? Okay, so let's pretend you have a very small warehouse. You sell T shirts, and you can only fit five boxes of T shirts in your warehouse at one time, okay? You don't have more space. You can't take on 50 clients. You only have five boxes, right? So everyone drop in the chat. If you can only hold five boxes in your warehouse, how does your warehouse make more money? You only have one lever. You have to charge more. You have to kick out the small boxes, right? You have to kick out the boxes where it's like, hey, I've got one box that goes to a nonprofit every week. If you want your business to grow, you gotta replace that box and replace it with something that makes more money. Now, hopefully, everyone here's a good person. Maybe you convince your friends to keep the nonprofit work going, right? But, like, fundamentally, that's what you have to do. Okay? And so for everyone here, you have to look at your roster, as, I can only hold so many boxes, which means you need to increase the value of each box. So when someone gets to here, they think it's time to scale, or I should hire someone, or do I need a va Or I should change my offer. And you don't actually need any of those things. What you need to do is the first thing you need to do is you need to go to this client and say, hey, my business has grown a lot. I'm really sorry. Either I need to get you up to my current pricing, or I'm going to have to stop working together. That's the first thing you need to do, right? Very first. Because what happens if you go have that conversation? They go, hey, actually, great news. We just raised our series A I don't mind being on your pricing, and that becomes five grand a month. Well, you just took this to, what is that, like 21K? Something like that. 79. 20. 21. Yeah. Okay, so you just increased the profitability of your business by 20%, 25% just by having one conversation with one existing client. So, no, you don't need to change your offer at all. But even still, then, when someone does that once, they're like, but now, do I go do it? No, you don't. You have more work to do. What's this $2,000 a month client doing here? I know your friends. I know you've been working together for a year. What are you doing? Now you gotta go have the next hard conversation. Hey, I've loved our work together. I really appreciate it. But my ghostwriting business has been growing a lot. I either need to get you on my current pricing, or I'm gonna have to make room for someone else. Right? That's it. They say, ah, sorry, I can't afford it. No problem. You kick them out. You go get somebody else. This time you get do another 5k, right? What is that, 24k? And that's it. Over and over and over again. So then what's the difference? It's the same writer. What is this? 7,500 times 5? Writer A, writer B, what was it? If your roster doesn't look like that, you should not be sitting there thinking about what the next thing is, period. Full stop, End of story. And this is true for every level, right? This is true for here. Okay? It's like, step one, get to here. Step two, get to here. Step three, get to here, right? Because that's how you maximize the number of boxes that your warehouse can hold. If you don't do that, then what happens? And I've observed this. I can't tell you how many times. What happens is you have someone with the janky. You know, I already went through it. They have the janky. They have clients all over the place at different price points, right? And then they try and do something different, and then they inject a massive amount of risk into their thing that's working, and then it might not work. And then they're trying to figure out the new offer, but they have old clients on the old offer. You just make your life really, really complicated. And I think it's. There's something so, like, calming about, like, what is this? 3, 6, 9, 12, 15, 16, 17. Was that 17.5? Like, that's incredible. That's like an Absolutely incredible outcome. Like, congratulations, you're in the top 5% of earners in the world, right? And it. We are not talking about, like, you have to go build something really complicated and really difficult. You need five people paying you a reasonable amount of money at the same time. That's. That's it, right? And then once you do that, you're like, huh, let me do that again. This is the whole game. And so much. So much of where people go wrong is they want to skip steps. And I promise, like, your life is so much better, and you end up making so much more money if you realize that the longer road is actually the shortcut. Because I. I can tell you what the shortcut looks like because I lived it. We went from 0 to 180 grand a month selling ghostwriting services. And I. We. We skipped, like, every level. Like, every level you could skip. We skipped. And it ended up. It was the most just taxing and overwhelming thing I've ever experienced in my life. You do not need to do that. And if I. If I going back had done this, my life would have been exponentially simpler and I would have made way more money way earlier. So that is part of why I care so much about just hammering this home for all of you. Because whenever I see someone start to repeat this thing, I'm like, I can tell you where this goes, and it doesn't go where you think it's going to go. All right, is this helpful? This is my little monologue for the day. But I. I want to make sure that this clicks for everyone, because this is a. It's a very simple thing that I find people have a really hard time understanding.