Thank you Adam, Lee, and Nicole. (this list is according to date)
Back in March, Michele Scism invited me to Take Action Get Profits. Great event with fabulous speakers. At that event was Adam Urbanski, and he talked of charging for your knowledge. You spend a lot of time gaining that knowledge, so you should not worry about what you charge. Do not undervalue what you know. And I have been learning for a while….
In high school (let’s just say that was earlier) I was writing simple codes. So it was no surprise when I started coding websites in the very early 2000s if not before. But my true talent emerged when WordPress appeared.
The Coding Addiction Started
This software first came to my knowledge in 2004. Unlike those other programs I could bend WP to do what I wanted. Rather than see the blog potential as it was touted then (this blog already existed, and it didn’t even cross my mind to move it) I saw the potential for a business. Soon I had business sites… yes sites.
Soaking up knowledge from anyone who would give it…. favicons, WordPress themes and plugins that then took hunting on WordPress.org and downloading and uploading, hacking a code was not nearly as easy. Often I hacked a themes until they literally broke, uploading a new theme or starting over again with a new site. Time and time again.
Yet people were afraid that I didn’t have the skills to relate to my prices.
And here years later Adam was saying that knowledge was valuable, and worth all the blood, sweat, and tears. I need to start charging for it. I needed to realize my value.
StomperNet
A month later Lee Collins called, asked me to look at a website. I told him the issue. Next thing I knew, I was working for a high dollar business, making a ton more. And I can never thank him enough.
Then a month later I was at SEO Pro, listening to Nicole Muñoz. She said to really think about the prices you should be charging. Like Adam said, consider the knowledge and charge your true worth. Do not be afraid to charge more, do not be afraid to say either pay me or don’t. My skills are growing by leaps and bounds as you can see from Changing a website, and now there are more people who are not scared of my hourly rates which are more than double last years.
They also know that if I set up a site that it will be complete and easy to use and color matched. My prices may be higher than some, the quality of the work is higher than anyone can offer at this price…
Now this is not ego, but knowledge that my skills were built with a lot of perspiration and inspiration. My skills are still improving as I study daily and while SEO in and of itself is not my skillset, how to make it easier and how to social media work are part of my skills. Branding, marketing is part of who I am and is inside each theme, site, even page I create….
You do not hire MJ Schrader, you hire my knowledge and skills…..
Thank you Adam, Lee and Nicole.
