Three reasons for not making any more money
Three reasons you’ve capped your your income:
You’re booked out and don’t have anyone you trust to assist you in the process
You’re not outsourcing
You’re not charging enough, and you’re especially not charging enough for rush jobs
Want to know the common thread of why this is happening? Simply put -> it’s you! BUT guess what -> YOU can also change it!
Here are my quick answers to fix these three money problems:
#1 - You’re booked out and don’t have anyone you trust to assist you in the process
Start investing time into building a community of people with similar values, but specifically different strengths
And if you truly need someone to take over the technical processes/work that you’re doing for your clients, then create a community of people with similar strengths
#2 - You’re not outsourcing
Before you go crazy here, let’s start simple: What are your clients raving about? And what is annoying each of your/your clients about the process? Do you get the same *dumb* questions over and over again? Write all of this down.
The biggest problem I see people making in outsourcing is trying to outsource BEFORE they pinpoint and fix the problem = much more expensive to work and manage it
Solution (time-pending): Troubleshoot first, hire second. Depending on how much time you have, clean up your processes and make all of the 5-minute fixes in your business before you bring someone onboard into a broken process. Bringing on a hire or outsourcing will require TIME, so make sure you have time or are willing to make time to communicate effectively.
#3 - You’re not charging enough, and you’re especially not charging enough for rush jobs
Pivot today, set up boundaries and procedures for clients on typical turnaround time.
Update your email signature to reflect new office hours, and stick to your own policies and procedures
Stop taking on rush jobs
Redirect clients and say, I would love to work on XX for you, and the earliest I can start this project is on (XX date). However, this is based on receiving both a signed agreement and retainer payment by XX day.
If you do take on rush jobs, charge a PREMIUM for the inconvenience or lack of planning from the client. It it’s really urgent, let them know the cost to rush it (may be 2-3x the standard cost if you have a full roster), assuming the reason they’re rushing the job isn’t originally because of you. At this point, the client is also in a bind and they don’t have a lot of time to handpick or overthink this process if it’s truly a rush project.
