S06 E06 - Consulting, Pricing, and Understanding your Clients with Hillary Weiss

Hillary Weiss 0:00
People coming back to me even a year later being like I got this thing here’s what I did like my calm making great money in my copywriting business for the first time because of like what you gave me and all this stuff. It is such a pleasure to see people to see the light bulb go off

Jason Resnick 0:23
Welcome to Episode Six of season six of live in the feast. I’m Jason aka rezzz helping you grow your business by having a conversation with someone who’s been there had success and built the business designed around the life they want to live. That’s live in the feast. If this is your first time listening, hit that subscribe button so that you get notified every time a new episode drops live in the feast is in your favorite podcast app. If you’ve heard the show before. leave us a review on iTunes and I’ll be happy to share it on a future podcast. Also drop us a comment in breakers forecast box. Today’s co host is fellow New Yorker Hillary Weiss. Hillary is a concept development consultant speaker copywriter and founder of statement piece studio at Hillary Weiss dot com. She’s also the co host alongside Margot Aaron of the cult favorite YouTube Marketing Show HAMYAW, and has had her work featured on Business Insider, The Next Web, the observer, and many more. Hillary and I are New Yorkers. And if you normally listen to podcasts that two X speed, you might want to dial it back a bit to at least one and a half speed for this show. In this episode, we dive into how to create a consulting service and price it so that you are in demand. We also talked about how leaning on your strengths and being able to identify not just the client, but the personality of the client and listening to what people are repeatedly asking for is key. And I outright ask Hillary how she chose the price when she started to transition from the implementation into consulting. You’re going to love this episode. I’ve listened to this episode a handful of times already. You are going to be shocked as I was when you hear how she shares how small of an audience she launched all of this too. So let’s dive in

Hey Feasters, Welcome to another episode of living in the feast. I am super excited to have Hillary Weiss here. Welcome Hillary.

Hillary Weiss 2:38
Thanks so much for having me, man. It’s great to be here.

Jason Resnick 2:40
Yeah, awesome. I’m glad we connected. It’s always awesome to connect with an A fellow New York as I was saying, even though the World Wide Web or whatever you want to call it, but like, it’s always cool to connect with fellow New Yorkers, because there’s so many people here that like even in the in the midst of the internet, you don’t even realize like, hey, this person seems like we could go grab a cup of coffee.

Hillary Weiss 3:02
I know. It always blows my mind. The internet is a small town in so many ways. But nevertheless, every time someone’s like, Oh, I live in your neighborhood, or like I live in New York. It’s like, Oh, my God, you’re real. Like, we can meet in person we have. My goodness. You know, is the case with New Yorkers, it’s a lot of, Hey, we should meet up for a drink. And then three years go by and then maybe

Jason Resnick 3:26
meet at some conference that’s up in Canada or something like

Hillary Weiss 3:28
that. We should totally get together back in this. It doesn’t happen. I mean, you made your way out to Long Island. So respect, respect. Congratulations on the backyard. And the quality of life. No doubt.

Jason Resnick 3:41
Yes, yes, I did actually parked my car without stress,

Hillary Weiss 3:45
decadence.

Jason Resnick 3:49
It’s awesome. Well, first of all, let me just briefly bring people up to speed you are a copywriter, you are consultants, you help people with their personal brands. But why is is it you do what you do?

Hillary Weiss 4:01
Why is it I do what I do, I have no choice. But no, because I have this large personality. And I was kind of born to do this. But so a big reason why I do what I do and why I’m so passionate about what I do is because I absolutely love sitting down with creative entrepreneurs and help them dig out the exact thing that not just differentiates them in the market. But the ideas point of views perspective and personal philosophies that get them excited to show up every day, and continue to sell and create and put their content out there. Because I think especially in our world of creative entrepreneurship, there is so much fear around stepping out of specific frameworks. And so putting anything in your OPT in besides like a five step sales page audit. And I think when people dare to step outside of that box and create things that they actually want to create to create things that are in their specific, I don’t want it. Well, I don’t hate the term zone of genius, but it is a little over us. But to help them really dig down into the thing that makes them unique and fills them with energy and gets them excited about their work. I think we forget about excitement, and amplifying our personalities as part of entrepreneurship and being a personal plan. So often people are like, I want to be a thought leader. So what I’m going to have to do is just copy the steps of thought leaders before me and then I will succeed. Whereas it’s very much about sort of digging into what makes you unique, what you are the gifts you are bringing to the table and finding a way to crank that up to 11. So you are unmistakable, not just in your industry, but to your target market. Because that’s also the fun way to do business. So it’s a huge part of what I do and why I absolutely love it.

Jason Resnick 5:36
That’s awesome. Yeah, I mean, for myself, I was very much as a developer, I was very much like, Hey, this is how my site looks like because 18,000 other people have the same exact navigation items and everything else. And then it was about 2014 2015 where like, the personal brand idea was like, Hey, I can use this to like, Yes, I don’t feel like I’m a big personality, I’m not going to get up on stage or do a set or any of that sort of stuff. But it is me my clients are hiring for me versus somebody else that could stand right next to me and do the exact same thing. So how can I express that in a way that makes sense and attract people that I want to work with?

Hillary Weiss 6:13
Absolutely. And it just cranks up the quality of client to not just higher ticket clients, but people who resonate with your personality, and the way you work and the way you love to do things like that is so often not just the money is the game changer when people start sort of coming at their brand and self promotion from that angle. But it’s just the experience totally transforms.

Jason Resnick 6:31
Yeah, absolutely. And and for me, I always love I mean, as a part of my sales process. Yes, there’s budget, there’s time, there’s scope of work, all that stuff. But I have a personality checklist to like I have to mesh with that person. In a way that makes sense. Because if we’re going to be working together for weeks or months on end, I don’t want to like feel like, I got a call with this person every time like we’re stepping on each other’s sentences. Like, it’s just, I don’t want to work like that. So yeah,

Hillary Weiss 6:59
and it’s so interesting, especially because I I’ve been in the field almost as long as you have I’d be it’s gonna be eight years, maybe nine years this year, I think I forget, you lose count, because it’s you know, every year and entrepreneurship is like dog here. So I’m actually

I think I probably worked with 1000 entrepreneurs at this stage, like, between my consulting and my classes, and my speaking and my workshops, and all the things that I do. And it really is you really get ability to pinpoint the kind of people you want and don’t want it for 50 paces. It’s ridiculous. Like I can tell from the first email if somebody is not a fit, just from the nature of what they say how prepared they seem to be, and especially if they’re like, I don’t really know what I’m doing. But I just really love to sort of work with you. And it’s like, oh, well, I have an offer for you. But it’s probably not copywriting. It’s just very interesting. I find so many entrepreneurs I know who’ve been in the field for a long time are actually incredible judges of character, when they’ve been working in the format that you do, where they’re sort of making taking care to make sure the people in their orbit are people they like and enjoy working with it. It really is a game changer.

Jason Resnick 8:05
Yeah, yeah, my wife always says that, like, she didn’t realize it at first when we were dating and all that stuff. But as she got the, you know, as our relationship grew, she started to understand a lot more about my business, who I worked with, and all that stuff. And I’ll say things months in advance about somebody, whether it’s a client or lead or something. And then months later, that thing happens. And she’s like, Hey, you know, I don’t know, it’s just, I read people well, or I, you know, I’ve been down that road a couple of times, so I could kind of know where this is headed. So it’s, it’s definitely experience is really what it comes down to. But before we get into talking about pricing, cuz I definitely want to dive into that ham. Yeah. I love that. I love the diamond dynamic that you you both have, you know, you and Margo, but can you share with us or share with the audience? what that is? Why?

Hillary Weiss 9:01
Why not? I can answer that question. So I don’t know if you read the origin story. But for those listening, I have a YouTube show with Margot Aaron called them Hillary and Margot yell at websites. But it’s known by it’s a hashtag, which is hammy Ah, which is a should not be the name of the show ever, but is and works. But the reason why. So Margo and I are very good friends. And we have the same sort of sense of humor about marketing, we’ve both been in the field long enough to be able to as Jason, you and I were talking about to be able to laugh at the trends and sort of poke fun at things that are working and things that are and talk about marketing on a high level. Because when you get to a certain phase, as somebody who works in marketing and the online business space, like some of this stuff is hilarious, like you look around, and you just have to sort of laugh about it and talk about it. But there’s still the possibility to have high level conversations while still keeping a sense of humor. And, and we want to just serve sort of marketing super nerds, because that’s what we are. But there was nothing out there that felt sort of it all felt almost like a lecture, as opposed to something like you and I are doing where it’s because it’s more of the podcast, sort of structure where you’re having a conversation back and forth, as opposed to having like an interview or going through something and acting like you’re doing an audit. And how it actually started was we went out to dinner and had a few too many drinks. Yeah. So we were in Union Square actually. And so we went to a bar afterwards for a nightcap. And we started having this, like a debate about pricing or something and, and we were like, We should put this on Instagram and see what people think. And Margo was like, I can’t do video. And I was like, Okay, give me your phone. You’re doing video right now I’m going to show you how to do video. So we actually ended up since she then she stole my phone. So we ended up stealing Instagram lighting on each other’s phones, just like having this argument on both ends, inviting people to like watch her story and watch my story. And people loved like both of our Instagrams kind of exploded. And we had a conversation where, you know, maybe we could turn this into something where you’re just having these conversations, not necessarily explaining to people what like pricing strategy is what like what makes a website work, because our audience already knows that stuff. But talking about like the nuance of branding and talking about, we have an episode coming out about pricing, we have an episode about really bad websites that actually work. And we just wanted to have the conversations that we didn’t see happening, because so often, something like a TV show or podcast is a means to an end for the user. I mean, obviously it should be for the host, present company included, I’m sure, but we didn’t want we don’t actually we haven’t monetized it yet, because we’re not 100% sure what to do with it. But we have had so much fun just getting on and talking about things. And we we essentially put it together just to play around as a way to kind of put things together because everyone was coming out with podcasts and shows are like, let’s give this a try. But we sat down and it really took on a life of its own. From the first episode, we’ve had a really solid following across platforms. And it’s been really an extraordinary thing, not just to create something like this, but to see the results spots and see the value people get when you’re not necessarily like sitting at the front of the class at playing teacher, but rather when it feels like two friends who understand the things you understand having those conversations. So it was a real joy to put together. And it’s we’ve done I think 11 episodes today, we’ve filmed probably closer to 15. And we’re going to be moving from bi weekly to weekly in the coming months. So it’s been a blast.

Jason Resnick 12:25
Yeah, it’s all thank you. I mean, it was funny, too, because I’ve seen several episodes. And then I know you said it was bi weekly and all that stuff. But yeah, I don’t that’s okay, I think subscribed to it. Right? And I didn’t know that until today. And I was like, Oh, let me subscribe to it. But like, what’s fun about it is that it is it’s exactly how you describe it. It’s like two friends talking about this thing, whatever the topic is, and then saying, Hey, I have this, this to show you, I have this to show you. And then you go ahead and educate on the back of that saying like, this is why this is working because of this target or audience or whatever the that the lesson there is. So I love it. I think it’s a great show. Thank you so much. I’m excited to see what’s next.

Hillary Weiss 13:08
It’s been so cool, because I get like when we get like the weirdest emails about it, like we had someone who’s like a friend of ours, email us being like, so I came home drunk last night, and my kids were asleep. So I binge every episode of ham, you’re in the bathroom on mute. So we’re like, wow, we’re onto something. And it’s just been it has been really just, again, fun to do a joy to create. And it just feels really good to do something that you actually enjoy that seems to be going well and smoothly. Which is so interesting. And we have people who are like I’ve watched every episode at least twice, or they because and they think about it like in the day to day like some people will check in where all our subscriber numbers are slowly going up. But what I think is a sign of success in any kind of content is that people don’t necessarily have to be prompted to go back and check it. They’re like, Oh, I haven’t seen him in a while. Let me go back and check it out. And that I think is the coolest thing for both of us. Because that to me is a following beyond just like I think subscribers are like sending it out to your email list. So they watch it, it feels really cool to have kind of like this. We wanted to create a cult favorite Marketing Show. And I think that’s what we managed to do.

Jason Resnick 14:08
Yeah, perfect. Yeah, I mean, had some said over. Yeah. So this season is about pricing. And I know your target is businesses that are trying to essentially inject creativity, personality, whatever it is into their business. How do you first of all, how do you price that so that the client or the lead understands the value that they’re going to get on the back of that.

Hillary Weiss 14:34
So the nice thing about it is like my original I came in as a copywriter speak, a lot of people knew me for that. And that is also a credibility builder. Because I’m not just saying like, Hey, you want to be more creative? Like come hang out? Because I have that knowledge base. And I have a strong strategy, mind and a strong mind for business strategy as well. But when it came to something like consulting, which is what I which is the other piece of my business here, am I speaking, that was actually much more difficult to price? Because the question was the What am I going to be able to do? So I actually did, I made furious beta tester almost to a fault. So what I did when I actually launched my my idea generation framework for entrepreneurs ready to kind of dig out their unique opinions and point of views on things I had was a funnel that led into actually 10 beta coaching sessions. And I think I priced those at 350 or something, um, just to see who could get in the door and what would happen because that I’m on the higher end that is a low. That’s a low price point for my sort of corner of the universe, which is a real pleasure and an honor. So people came in and we did our long coaching sessions. And what I realized was that people were getting so much value, but I wanted to see, I think I thought I knew I could do more by helping them execute, and terms of just like overseeing what they worked on. So every time they got into a consulting session with me, I would do follow up with them. And I do something that’s called follow up Fridays. So you have the session, we do the consulting session, and I work with clients on all kinds of things I work on overall messaging I can give feedback directly to salespeople is I work with peoples in house copywriters to help improve their knowledge of strategy and work on an individual page. They can take what they learn and kind of go forth. I help people develop programs and series and all this stuff. So there’s so much I can do within the consulting bucket. But having the follow up Fridays allows me to give people ideas and homework and then see what they do with it. Because I found when I was doing my consulting work and sort of again, helping people shape this messaging, seeing how they translated my like, what I want I showed them and gave them really helped me figure out if what I was doing was valuable and working. Not Unfortunately, it is blessedly so I cranked up it is about three times that price now. So I am which I’m really thrilled by each session is let’s see, it’s 90 minutes now and to follow up Fridays, and that to meet and so that we don’t meet on the follow up, they will send me an email and actually will send feedback via loom or bom, bom video. So there’s no more sort of like showing up and being present and holding the space for me. It’s just a look at Okay, I’m seeing your outline. Here’s what I think here’s what’s working, here’s what’s not like, go back and do it again. And the reason why I did to follow ups was again, like I think people in my understanding and especially as a teacher, because I taught a copywriting course for a while I’ve taught hot seats and client masterminds for years. So I’m really in this sort of space of entrepreneur education and I find people get the most value not when they’re forced fed information. But rather when they’re forced to take action and get their hands dirty. And I my entire audience is a learned by door audience I am a learned by to where I was not a good student, I’m not great with theory, I have to roll up my sleeves and kind of get into whatever it is in order to fully understand it. And I it took me a while to realize those the people I serve. So that is how I’ve designed my consulting and my right now the price point is at will not triple actually, excuse me, right now the price point for the 90 minute sessions is 850, which feels good to me. And the price will be going up. I believe in the next six months as I continue to kind of get people into this world and all of that. But something like mentorship for in house copywriters is closer to 1500. Because again, that’s something that those writers can take us over and over again. But in the in the organization.

Jason Resnick 18:11
I stopped everything right here for you. And the last three or four minutes, Hillary told you exactly how she went from doing the services into consulting, and then how she priced it. Let me just sum this up real quickly for you. First, she defined who entrepreneurs who are ready to dig out their unique ideas, opinions, and point of views on things but also that they are learned by doing audience, then she tested it by running 10 beta sessions at $350 each for an hour after she realized that while they were getting value, if she could then help them execute by overseeing what they worked on, it would be an added value to it. So she added that follow up Friday to check in on homework and other things. She didn’t do the work for them. But what that allowed her to do was then to be able to know what was working and what brought them value. Now she’s charging $850 for these and that price is increasing. So many of you want to know exactly how to shift from implementation to consultant, she just gave you that recipe. It’s very much the same process as how you build your business today, if you want worksheets and exercises, and the fast track to do this module, one of feast is exactly this head on over to feast course.com today. And if you use the code personality at checkout, you’re going to get your first month for only $20. feast is the community and resource hub for developers and designers ready to get off the project searching hamster wheel and actually run the business that you set out to build feast helps position you in the market with what you do, who you help and helps you build the processes and systems for client management, sales, marketing, delivery. And of course pricing, your business isn’t the same as everyone else’s. When you are a member of feast, you get personalized guidance from me, it is essential for me to meet you where you are, and make sure that you are getting the exact tools that you need. So you don’t get lost in the shuffle. The moment you sign up, we will have a chat so that I could create a custom syllabus of resources within fees to meet you where you are, if you want to stop chasing down that next project all the time, so that you could start living the life that you want go to feast course.com today and use the code personality at checkout and get your first month for $20.

So the follow up Fridays are more of, Hey, this is due on Friday. Yeah, I’m holding you accountable to show up and send me what we talked about on the consultants. Now what happens if they don’t show up,

Hillary Weiss 21:07
then they lose it. That’s it, okay, like they get like one or two rescheduled. And that’s it because some people aren’t going to follow up, and that’s fine. Um, it’s a valid, it’s a value add. But in my experience, my ability to help people is by working alongside them, like I am a wizard in a hot seat. Like it’s just my skill, I’m really great with direct feedback. So finding a way to implement to combine that with my skills in consultation calls, and being able to drill down to the root of the issue, being able to pluck out the most compelling creative thing that’s like getting them excited and filling them with energy is something that is something that comes natural to me and a skill that I spent years honing. So being in that format, for me having the consultation and then having the follow up allows me not just to make sure that people are getting value, but to see it work, which is also in wiring for me and for them because they’re making progress and be forget how important momentum is as entrepreneurs like we absolutely that’s, that’s why there was like, Oh, no, why do 97% of people not finished programs, it’s like because the textbook, like, there’s so much stuff, and they don’t, they can’t even think about the end result at that stage. And there’s probably so much value in the learning so much theory that they’ll be able to use. But in my experience, like it is very, that direct action is what it’s about. And I actually have an offer all about that called thunder, which is the follow up to the lightning rounds, which are my hot seat sessions, which I can talk about in a second because that requires more context. But this sort of serving the learned by doing entrepreneur has been really powerful and rewarding for me, and is the reason to charge premium pricing.

Jason Resnick 22:34
Yeah. And I think the fact that you know, because of the follow up, what they’re getting on the back end of that, because you’re engaging with them, you’re not just, hey, we’re having this conversation, here’s some action steps off again. And then you don’t know what they’re going to get back. You kind of have an idea, but you don’t see it happen until those two follow ups. And then they say, hey, yeah, I got this client, I landed this contract. And I, you know, we, you know, launched this thing and got X dollars back. So now you have something to price anchor yourself to

Hillary Weiss 23:07
Yeah, and it’s so cool too, because I people coming back to me even a year later being like, I got this thing, here’s what I did, like, Mike I’m making great money in my copywriting business for the first time because of like what you gave me and all this stuff. And it’s, it’s just really, it’s incredibly powerful. And I all respect to consultants who you know, it’s the 60 minutes, 90 minutes, and then they leave and they’re off into the world because of course, people are autonomous, and they should be able to take action by themselves. But for me that little extra, because it takes what an additional like 20 minutes out of my day, what to do the follow up. It is such a pleasure to see people to see the light bulb go off. Absolutely. And that’s what I’m That’s what I meant to you. That’s why my logo on my website, it’s a disco ball light bulb, because I’m not just about like giving you good ideas, like I want to give you the light bulb moment that then turns into light that scatters everywhere and brings people onto a dance Florida Boogie Down, you know,

Jason Resnick 23:56
nice. I love it. Yeah, that’s awesome. I was gonna ask you about that.

Hillary Weiss 24:00
layers of metaphors.

Jason Resnick 24:04
So to your point, it’s very much how I am too. I’m very, like, yes, the method, the theory, all that stuff is fantastic. But how do I roll up my sleeves? And what do I do? And how do I do it? What I try to do inside of feast is something very similar. When somebody signs up to feast, I scheduled a call with them the first week to find out who they are, where they’re at what they’re struggling with, so that I can point them in the direction kind. I always say to myself, I’m like a guidance counselor, if you will, or college admin or whatever it is that kind of help you navigate the course in the community and all that stuff. And I’ve never experienced that elsewhere. But for me Makes sense. And

Hillary Weiss 24:43
it probably reduces churn massively in a way to in terms of like people, you know, staying in or leaving the community. And, and that’s so interesting. And this is something that I talk about all that so often with with colleagues is that for a long time, and maybe you saw this, when you were getting your start to was the mo of building an online business was to build an online business, and then gradually build so many layers between you and your customers that you can go be off in like Bora Bora, while your funnel is bringing in six figures every hour, you know, that was the vision. And then consumer consumers sort of get wise, especially consumers who are action focused who are entrepreneurs. And I find that just to live, like while people sometimes are like, Why are you following up, it’s so much more work, like just take the money and like they can go and do it. It’s not your responsibility, I find just being willing to be present is a differentiator, like in a huge way, and it will bring back people to you again and again. Because you’re not they don’t feel like a number. And because they feel like they’re able to get where they want to go because they’re being seen, you know?

Jason Resnick 25:45
Absolutely. I mean, to your point, I’ve been in those kind of course, yeah. The talent, if you will, is the one selling it. And then when I get in there, there’s like nothing. I’m like, Who am I talking to here? Like, am I the only person in here? For me? It was like, okay, when I started down the road of like saying, okay, there’s enough of a thing here where people are asking me for something else, not my development services. I was like, Well, I don’t want to be like those people. Like, I want to know the individuals. I want to know what their pain points are. I want to know who they are as people and what their goals are. Because if if things are to work, like you said, like, why didn’t 97% of the people that enter a course never finished? Well, because there’s nothing there for them to finish. I don’t even know where to start.

Hillary Weiss 26:30
That’s the thing. requirement, right?

Jason Resnick 26:32
There’s no accountability is no nothing held. And the touchpoint at least initially, and I’ve been thinking about a quarterly touchpoint

Hillary Weiss 26:41
really cool

Jason Resnick 26:42
is to try to figure out, okay, where are you? Like, I mean, I don’t want you in here, if you’re not going to do the work. Like there’s no point for me. It’s not not helpful for you. Like, you know, I’m not here to take your money. Yeah, I could, but I don’t I don’t want to and it’s just it’s one of those things. It’s refreshing to hear how can solvency because that is something else that I’m starting to work into my business as well. And I did that follow? I do one follow up. Yeah. And it just via email as well. It’s a week later, not a set date. But like I was like, Okay, I don’t hear anybody else doing this. Maybe I’m doing extra work. But isn’t

Hillary Weiss 27:17
that weird? Like, it’s like, oh, being a sir. I mean, that’s I mean, if anyone listening who does consulting and is a one off, that is perfectly fine. I’m sure it works fabulously, but also in the line of work that I do and my strength. And I’m sure it’s the same for you like it that if you’re gonna have somebody digging into what makes them creative, if you’re gonna have somebody pouring their heart and soul into rewriting, copy that with messaging you gave them like you should be present for that to make sure it’s working if you can, absolutely. And that’s that’s the way not only people get value in results, but they remember you forever as a teacher, like all of my students come back again and again and again, because I love them. And we’re friends, but also because that attention, attentiveness and care is disturbingly unusual, huh?

Jason Resnick 28:04
Yeah. And it shouldn’t be, I think, I think that whole idea of the mom and pop shop is going to figure its way back onto the web. And I think, you know, in certain certain aspects, I think you’re starting to see that in more of a good way, which I think is nice, really.

Hillary Weiss 28:18
And I actually did this with a so I have a concept development mastermind called thunder, where people bring their ideas and how I launched that, as I do, I have hot seats every month called the lightning round. So I actually was just selling one today, and it’s tense, it’s just 10 spots, 50 bucks. And there’s a it’s a 90 minute Hot Seat session. And people love it. And I love doing it. And it fills me with energy. And I sent out the email and I was 70% sold out in like 15 minutes, I was like, Oh, right, and the people so people go through the hot seats would experience what it’s like to get that direct feedback. And then the funnel expands into thunder, which is actually a high ticket offer. But this round is going to be 2500. And I in the for the first round. I did it I baited it at 600. I was actually listening to that, like, you know, you can be a little more hands off. But you don’t necessarily have to, you know, be there like in the trenches with people in order to teach them and thunder is really awesome because it is designed again for learn by doers. So people I get people, I get their concept, we talk about what’s going to make it better. We have weekly hot, bi weekly hot seats, bi weekly implementation weeks where I have office hours when I got to get something to me. So it’s all about like that momentum and building. But I wrapped it up. And it’s a number one thing people were asking me for after the beta, and they were like, I needed more like one on one support. I needed more help. And I was like, Okay, how do I do this without running myself ragged? The answer is, you know, 10 people at 2500 each coming in the door. And that’s definitely enough impetus for me to be able to give everyone lots of presence. But I’m really cranking up the hands on because I think again, the first instinct from what we’re taught in online business is like, step back, step back, step back, the further you are away, the more layers, the more automation, the less work you have to do, and the more money you can make. But then somebody goes ahead and build a funnel and realizes how difficult it is. So that’s what that was an interesting lesson for me just confirming again and again that in my world and what I do that that high touch that being present, that not necessarily creating 1000 person, evergreen program, but rather the small niche programs for people who really care, and really putting that energy out to help them and make sure I put change makers out into the world with whatever it is they’re working on. And that feels good to me. It really does. And other people might think I’m an idiot for doing so much work and do it. But I it’s worked. And it’s what I love to do. And it’s it’s a pleasure. And I don’t think people hear about that enough.

Jason Resnick 30:42
Yeah, I love it. And definitely not hard enough. I mean, and there’s so many things running around my head.

Hillary Weiss 30:47
I talk really fast, sort of why

Jason Resnick 30:51
we’re New York, people might actually have to listen to this study. But in the context of when you first started trying to think like, hey, look, you know, you moved from implementation into consulting you like, I’m going to beta test this, I’m going to throw a price at it. See if it hits. How did you say like, Okay, I’m just gonna throw this price at it. Like, where did you come up with that price point?

Hillary Weiss 31:19
The reason why I did 350 is I just, I was like, that’s actually a great question. Because I was sitting there and my price had just gone up to 150 for an hour. And this was like, a year and a half ago, it’s a little higher now. But I sat down and I was like, Okay, I I’m my first temptation was to price it at $100. Because it was much like, Okay, well, this is an hour of my time, and like I’m testing this out. But we do forget with pricing, it is a very, it’s a dance, because not only do we want people to invest in us, but we want to price it at a point where people will show up. And I find out with my $50 offers, people definitely show up. But when it’s something when it’s for some reason over the three, just over the $300 mark, like between 306 hundred for me, beta testing seems to be kind of the magic number. And biggest people come ready to play. I’m not like hungering for money and feel like my time is getting wasted. Because you really want to make sure that both sides are supporting that sort of energetic exchange that happens when you when somebody hires you. So you want to make sure it’s worth it for you. And you want to make sure and the customer wants to make sure it’s worth it for them. So for a beta rate, 350 just felt like the right idea, because I was originally planning to premiere it at 1200. But I’m still kind of testing my market because I work with entrepreneurs who are probably like, you know, two to five years in and kind of ready for the next level of their brand and messaging and all and like know what makes them unique. But those are also not necessarily the people making the six figure launches. So figuring out where the sweet spot is that both serves me and my market has actually been really fun. Because I consulting is a part of my business. It’s not 100% yet, hopefully it will because I will be Sunday because I love it. But finding out where that sweet spot was, it was just a matter of testing. So I did 10 spots at the 350. And then I actually did 10 more spots at 550. And for both of those having the 10 slots only created their urgency where I was able to sell them out in a matter of you know, a day or two. But bringing it up to the 850. And having it be makes it feel like a more official offer. And it makes it feel higher end. And it makes it feel because it is and it represents the amount of energy and value that I’m presenting I think in terms of value, like I’m giving people ideas that they can use for a lifetime. That can be the bedrock of their business. And I think like how do you put a price on that? You do? I think the price will continue, I think to rise as I continue to be more in demand. But right now I am. I’m in demand now. But what I’m bringing people in the door to continue to do this work at a level that feels good to me. It’s out of beta. Now a 50 just feels like a good number. And the price will I’m sure continue to rise as the years go by. But it really was again, testing that like what feels good for me and what can i market afford? And what’s going to make me really excited to get on a call and do 90 minutes and to follow ups.

Jason Resnick 34:10
Yeah, no, I think you’re 100%. Right. It’s that delicate balance there that, you know, I struggle with it like the services side, because I’ve done that for so long. Like, okay, that’s easy. This is what the market can bear. Like I know exactly what I’m bringing to the table there. But then like switching to other things, products or consultancy and stuff like that. I’m like, but I know how much per hour effectively I make over here. I doing this? How do I get this to that quicker than taking eight years? Yeah, I wanted to take that look. But yeah, I mean, so the idea of all right, first, I have to ask when you first launched this thing, how many people did you launch this to?

Hillary Weiss 34:51
With with the the beta? beta that Oh, so I did? Um, that’s a great question. So my list was smaller. Then I did this to grow my list. So this was a summer of last year, I think my list was because I had done like very little email mark. I was like the world’s worst email marketer for myself, great for my clients. But I was a shoeless Shoemaker very much in that regard. So as part of my rebrand, I put the statement piece framework, which is my, again, framework out there. And then I actually sold to those folks. And actually, I think, let’s see here, I did at the end of the first week, and the the framework took off, I had like 200, signups within like the first six hours, which was really cool. And then it continued to grow. So I think I launched the first idea, I invited people who had signed up for the framework. So that was probably to a list of about 350. And then I, when I filled out, I just sent them a sequence, basically, like I’m opening this to the public shortly, you have this amount of time to grab a spot, there’s only 10. And then I released it to my list, which I think was probably about 800 at the time. So then that was the follow up. And then I when I did the the continued beta rate that was to the full list. So that was probably under just under 1000. At that stage. Awesome.

Jason Resnick 36:07
Yeah, I mean, so that’s one thing that I hear a lot is like, I can’t come up with something new, because I don’t have a huge list. Yes, not true. Now, you launched this thing to 303 50 people, but it was engaged. Oh, my God, the lead magnet, which will link up in the show notes, the statement piece framework is basically I mean, you could say exactly what it is I have my own like content idea generation framework. But because that lead magnet lead naturally into the next step, which then lead now the lightning round, and then thunder, they all connect, right. And that is so critical. And that’s what that’s what I have to tell my clients. Like, you can’t just throw up something and think that you’re gonna sell off the back of it. It doesn’t make any sense, right? Like, it’s

Hillary Weiss 36:53
like, there’s no continuum. It’s wild. And that’s and that was you say, like, I think I this is what I preach all the time to my clients, like it is not a numbers game on your email list. It is any engagement game, how many people are excited? How does it make sense? What are you helping them do before you even make an offer. And in the in the funnel for the framework, I’ve got stuff like how to use it in 90 seconds. Like how to like here’s what other people have created. Here’s what I’m doing with it. When I first launched it, I did a five day video challenge based on the ideas I came up with when the framework by the way, the one sentence explanation is it’s a framework to help you come up with a damn good ideas. Damn good damn original ideas. I like it. But it is it was very interesting, because then the the coaching my consulting is called the statement piece sessions. So those are basically originally it was Bring me the ideas that you came up with in the framework. And let’s shape them together. And while I still offer that, as part of my consulting, the consulting is now a little more broad. So like, are you working on a new offer? Are you putting a new offer program together? Are you doing this? Or are you coming up with a new series? So it has shifted a little bit but that was as you say, like it was very, very, very intentional comment. Let me show you how many amazing ideas you have, that you didn’t realize that there was a way to dig them up. Let me show you how to use it and apply it I mean courage you along the way and cheer you on. And then if you want to go deeper with this work if you want to know exactly what to do with those amazing ideas like calm have a session, let’s talk about it. It worked. It was beautiful. And it wasn’t it was not something I pulled from like a seven steps to saw your six figure program was

Jason Resnick 38:21
from a yacht.

Hillary Weiss 38:25
We’re talking about you Tai Lopez. Yeah, it’s very, it was fun. And that was the biggest thing too. If you’re not enjoying yourself and loving what you’re selling, it is going to be such a chore to move anything. Oh,

Jason Resnick 38:36
I love it. Yeah, that’s what I say all the time. Like if you don’t, if you don’t wake up in the morning, thinking it’s Saturday night feeling like it’s Saturday, then what are you doing it for? Right? Like, that’s how it is for me, right? Like, Saturday is always like the best day of the week. You don’t have work tomorrow. You’re today it’s whatever, like, Hey, what do I do today? You could sleep in that kind of thing. But um, yeah, I mean, I think this has been a awesome. I mean, this is it’s refreshing to hear because there’s so many like for you, dear listener, I know you have the objections. I don’t have my the email. It’s hilarious, showing you that you don’t need a large list. You just need a targeted list. And you already as a service based business, you have leads coming to you. I know you have sales conversations, those people are on your list now because they’ve engaged with you at some level, you know what their pain points are, go build something to address their pain. And that’s really what it’s all about is just and then experiment. Have fun with it. Like you said, 100%. You just kind of like, hey, how’d it how do I get this price point close? Like, and I want it to exceed what I’m doing now. Like how do I get it there. But that doesn’t make sense. And like for the person that’s buying it, and then figuring out that balance. But before I let you go two questions, one, have you experimented with pricing or pricing anything? I know I’m throwing this from left field. But have you experimented in a way where it was a complete flop?

Hillary Weiss 40:05
Oh God, of course, oh my gosh, where do I even start?

I when I was starting my when I was starting my business, I was actually trying to do consulting. And that was super embarrassing, because I had absolutely nothing to offer. And I think I wanted to charge like I mean when I charged like 80 bucks or something for it. And I got crickets like I was putting it on social media. And I was, you know, trying to be visible. But I had no I know street cred nofollow. And I thought that I was just going to get someone and like talk about good ideas for their copy, which is fine. But at the same time in terms of a value proposition, there was nothing there. Like if you want to sit down and just talk about good ideas, or like come up with some creative concepts, then you’re not necessarily like people can do that. They feel like they can do that on their own. But binding away what what really changed the game was finding a way to turn that into strategy. But also when I created another the next time I created an offer. I listened to what people were repeatedly asking me for. And I think what where we make mistakes as creative business owners and I see this all the time is it’s like, oh, I want to start like a blog series. Dear audience, what do you want to hear? And you either get crickets or you get a bunch of like diamond ring and a pony type answers are people are like I want something’s gonna solve my all my life. Whereas I created the framework because people were coming up to me and asking, like, how do you come up with such original ideas for blog posts, because my my blog presence is a little like wacky and out there and talks more about the nuance and under discussed certain pieces of entrepreneurship. And they were coming like I wish I could write more often I think I’m so interested by all like I watched you follow you on Twitter and Social Media and Facebook and and you’re always so interesting. You always have something to say like, where does that come from. And that’s why I created the the framework. But before that I actually shut down a copywriting course that I built the couple months ago. And I don’t I wouldn’t necessarily classify that as a failure. It was a failure in that I stopped, I stopped, I just fell out of love with it. I worked myself right out of love with it. It was a there were two versions of it, there was a self study version that was 500. And there was a 1500 like live version that was four weeks. And while I sold the live version every time I consider it a flop because I did nothing to build the funnels around the $500 version of it, guess I just wasn’t excited about it anymore. And it was the easiest, like move I could have made because I spent 10 grand putting that together. I put spend 10 grand putting it I spent three years putting the content together. And I sat down with my friend Shay Howard, whose fantastic share her brand is patient a she’s a brand consultant and all around badass. And she was like, okay, so you’ve got all this content, that you’re just sitting on why? And I said I just have again, no energy. I’m not excited to sell this. And it doesn’t feel like it fit into the newest version of my business, which is this consulting, consulting, consulting, speaking, sort of thought leadership space, I didn’t necessarily want to be teaching just copywriting. I didn’t necessarily want to be known for that. So she was like, Okay, well, what we’re going to do is I think you should take it offline. And then we’ll repurpose the content. And you can also turn it into a copywriter certification course in a couple of years. And I was like, that’s an amazing idea. So what nessa wasn’t necessarily a flaw in pricing, it was a flaw in creating something that was supposed to be the next step of my business that took so long that it was it was just no longer a fit. And the while the pricing may have worked, it should have been much more expensive for the live version. I think that was another thing. I think I underpriced bad experience just because of the amount of support I was giving people. But that was I think, probably my greatest failure to date, just spending so long creating something and then because of my own, just tiredness and unwillingness to move on it because I wasn’t in love with it anymore. I had to let it go. But it was really empowering to do and now I have to so many things that I’m in love with and I’m energized my business every day. So I think it was the right move. Absolutely.

Jason Resnick 44:05
Sounds like it for sure. So what’s up next? What for the next 612 months with you?

Hillary Weiss 44:11
Oh, well, I will be producing him. Yeah, obviously. And then we will be I’ll be continuing to do consultations and I actually just kicked off the first monthly of my monthly lightning rounds where I do hotseat sessions with entrepreneurs. And actually, an experiment I’m running is that I sell upsell it into my thunder mastermind quarterly. But what I’m going to be experimenting with actually is these are basically paid webinars, so the hot seats while you’re getting direct feedback and laser coaching, like on your individual work, um, it’s it’s sort of it’s webinar style most. So you will get direct support, but there’s no follow up or anything like that. So people come in, and we have 10 people per round. But actually, for the third round, I’m going to open it to the public, to watch to be spectators. So 10 people buy the ticket and sort of join in and everybody else can come watch like a reality show. Because I think voyeurism is something that deserves to be leveraged in the online space. Because it’s it’s so much fun when people actually go through the experience, because they’re watching other people get coached and hearing about their problems and getting contact coach, without even realizing that was something that was going to happen as they’re watching. So that’s something I really want to experiment with is almost have it be like Welcome to the arena. Like you can either have a seat in the audience, or you can be in the middle of everything. But that’s only 10 people. And I use also upsell the lightning rounds into thunder. So that’s a way to reach more people with the sales pitch. But also it works because of the high ticket, the high touch nature of thunder. So it’s like, here’s what I can do for you in 10 minutes. Imagine what I could do for you in six weeks. And so it sort of inspiring people to that by giving them kind of a fun outlet and giving the people who have paid and invested real value that they can walk away with.

Jason Resnick 45:49
Awesome, that kind of thing. That sounds that sounds really awesome.

Hillary Weiss 45:55
It’s a grand experiment. I love to experiment in my business. So we’ll see. I’ll let you know how it goes.

Jason Resnick 45:59
Yeah, that’s Hello. I might have to be in the audience. I’ll send you the link when we go live. Awesome. Where can people reach out and say thanks,

Hillary Weiss 46:06
you can say thanks. I’m over at if you want, you can contact me over at Hillary weiss.com that’s HIL la RYWEISS. Or you can reach me on twitter at HCYS. I’m the same handle HC vice on Instagram. And you can find me on Facebook under Hillary Weiss awesome.

Jason Resnick 46:24
I will have all of those links in the show notes. Of course. Thank you, Hillary for sharing your wisdom sharing your experience with us. We appreciate it.

Hillary Weiss 46:33
Thank you so much. It was an absolute pleasure, Jason, and thank you for being a fan of him. Yeah, everyone. Watch him. Yeah, that’s another place you can find me. guys. Thank you so much. This has been amazing. Thank you and everybody else.

Jason Resnick 46:43
Until next time, it’s your time to live in the feast.

If you enjoyed today’s episode, I can see for both Hillary and myself by saying that we’d love to hear the one takeaway you got from this episode. It’s super simple in the podcast app of your choice, presumably this one drop in a comment or do or go ahead and share it in a tweet and tag me at Resnick also hit that subscribe button so that you’ll be the first to be able to listen next week. We’ll be back with Joe collect a copywriter and case study expert talking all about case studies, how to get them and then leverage them for your business. Till then it’s your time to live in the feast.