Hey, creative, don’t you love that little dance we do with prospective clients when we don’t want to tell ’em our price? You know the dance, someone calls you and is asking about a project and you have a price in your mind and you, but you don’t wanna say it because you want them to fall in love with you first. And you want them to hear all your great ideas and, and how amazing you are and all the stuff you’re gonna bring. You wanna really build your case before you mention money. And then you do all that work and maybe you share them some ideas and maybe even you even like sketch something out or give them some kind of proof of concept just because you’re desperate to prove how great you are and you’re gonna be worth that price. And then what happens? You give them that price and they go, I can’t, I I didn’t, I had no idea it would cost that much <laugh>. And then they walk away and you’ve wasted your time.
You need this book I’m about to show you. It’s called The Win Without Pitching Manifesto by Blair Ns, E n n s, the Win Without Pitching Manifesto. This is a tiny little thing. This is a marvelous little book and you need to read it for lots and lots of reasons. But there are two that I wanna share with you right now from this book that will help you with that dreaded dance of of, of not wanting to say what you caused. And they all that, all that garbage in the book Blair Ends says that every creative uh, business should set a minimum level of engagement to work with you, A minimum level of engagement. In other words, if this per this prospect will not pay at least that much money, they are no longer a prospect. You walk away, you don’t beg, you don’t plead, you don’t lower your prices, you don’t get all, you have a minimum amount of money you must have to get outta bed for this client.
And if they don’t have that kind of money, if that’s not their budget, no harm, no foul. But you need to walk away and you need to do it early. Okay? So the first thing from this book you need that will help you get over this, knocking yourself down and chiseling your price down cuz you’re so desperate, is to set a minimum level of engagement and stick to it. We have one at we all films. We’ve implemented this. It really works wonders. Here’s the other thing though. You have to have the second part of the minimum level of engagement and one of the other parts of the manifesto, uh, the win without p oops, sorry. The win without Pitching manifesto is you must learn to talk about money early and often in your very first conversation, the first time somebody engages you, the first email, the first conversation on the phone, whatever it is, you bring up your minimum level of engagement in the first conversation.
You don’t give them ideas, you don’t give them some giant sales pitch. They’re gonna say, Hey, saw your stuff. We’re thinking about doing this project, or we’re thinking whatever your, your art form is, and boy, we just love your stuff. You go, great. Oh, this is awesome. I would love to hear all about your project. Um, our projects usually start about blank and there’s your minimum level of engagement. You say that right in the first conversation right away, one of two things will happen that is gonna help you. Either way. The first is they’re gonna go, okay, all right, cool. That sounds awesome. Let’s keep talking. That’s what you want, right? If that happens, now you’re off to the races because you, they know, you know that mu at least that much money is gonna be involved. The other option is they go, oh, oh yes.
See, I didn’t know it was gonna be that much. Sorry, I, I’m sorry, I misunderstood. And you go, no problem, no problem. Um, and then you go and have a talk and have a nice talk, but you’re not gonna, you’re done that, that, that business relationship is over, but it’s over right away. And that helps you cuz you’re not wasting time, you’re not wasting effort and you’re not giving away ideas for free to people who aren’t gonna pay you. So get a minimum level of engagement. Talk about money early and often in your very, very first conversations. And dang it, there it is. The win Without Pitching Manifesto by Blair Ends. You can stop doing that silly dance around your prices. You’re worth it. You can do this. I love you.