Candice (00:00.204)

If you're trying to attract higher budget couples and maybe you recently even raised your rates, but you thought, my gosh, I don't know if anybody is going to pay for this. Or maybe you thought I should just lower my price so that they say yes. Today's episode is for you because while you are busy worrying that your price is too high, your future high end clients are thinking something completely different. So let's talk about what your pricing is really saying and how to stop selling

from fear. You're here to grow a business, but not just any kind of business. You want to grow a profitable business with purpose, a business where you wake up every single day driven to serve your customers and make a difference in your own life. I'm Candace Coppola, published author, business coach, and your guide to building a profitable business with purpose. Join me here every single week

as we explore how to build and grow your business with purpose. Get ready to dig in and have meaningful conversations about the strategies and techniques that will help you build your dream business. This is the power in purpose.

Candice (01:17.966)

Hey there friends, welcome back to the power and purpose podcast. It's your host Candace and boy, that was a mouthful. I don't know why that was so hard to say this morning. You know, you'd think that I would have stumbled on that a few times by now. I think that was the first time. But welcome back to the power and purpose podcast. It's me, your host Candace and we're going to have such an important conversation.

Get settled. you're taking me along with you on your walk, you're dialed in, you're listening. I'm so happy you're here. If you are listening to me as some background noise while you work, I'm going to ask you to pause your work for a second. Come and hang out with me. This episode today is packed with a lot of really important information that personally, think every wedding pro, especially those who are aspiring, who currently working with higher and higher budget clients needs to hear.

And we're talking about pricing and what luxury clients really think about your price. So if you think high end clients are side eyeing your price, today's episode is for you because I want to throw back at you, what if they're actually thinking, why are they not charging more? So in today's episode, we're going to cover three really important things. The first,

the truth about how luxury clients are interpreting your prices. We're going to get that going right out the gate in today's episode. Second, some of the subtle red flags that scream inexperience or insecurity. And quite frankly, I don't know which one is worse, inexperience or insecurity. What do you think? I think insecurity is worse because you can have confidence for days and be inexperienced and sell yourself.

But if you lack confidence and you have experience, nobody's buying from you. I think insecurity is worse, but let me know what you think. And we're also going to talk about the real risks of undercharging and how it's costing you a lot more than just profit. Before we get into today's episode, I want to let you know about the brand voice workshop that I hosted this week. Shout out to all my faithful listeners who joined me. was so great to see so many of you and to meet many of you. So thank you so much. If you

Candice (03:29.432)

join me live or you bought it for the replay. It was just great to see your names come through my inbox. If you missed it, if you're like, girl, what brand voice workshop? What are you even talking about? You can go to CandaceCopla.com slash workshop and pick up the replay. You're gonna want to do this. So let me just explain what this is and why it's so important and why I want you to go grab this while it's still available. In this training, I teach you how to establish your brand voice.

so that you can use tools like ChatGPT and make them sound more like you. As we rely more and more on AI to do a lot of heavy lifting and copywriting and marketing and communication in our business, you are at risk of sounding like everybody else. And if you haven't established your unique brand voice, and if you haven't taught your favorite AI tool, whether it's Chatty or Claude or whatever, to write and sound like you,

your brand voice is going to sound like Claude's or Chat GPT's. And that just means you're gonna blend in and be very basic. I see it happening every day as I scroll the timeline and I'm like, ooh, that doesn't sound good. I love that you took a shortcut and I love that you're using AI. I just want you to use it better. So inside this workshop, I'm going to help you establish your unique brand voice.

And we're going to do this in just a couple of minutes. You're going to be so surprised at how quickly and awesomely this comes together. We're also going to use some of your voice of customer so that your brand voice plus your ideal clients brand voice are merged together. And then what you're going to walk away with is brand voice guidelines that you can use with team members, subcontractors. You can give it to a copywriter. Even a brand designer in the future can use this as a basis for you.

and to help you develop your business even further. But you're also gonna use it to train your AI tool of choice to sound more like you. This is gonna be one of those things that you think, this changed how I used AI and it helped to elevate everything I'm using AI for to the point where it's gonna be almost undetectable that you're using AI to speak for you, because it's gonna sound so much like you.

Candice (05:48.142)

Go to CandaceCoppola.com slash workshop, go and grab this training. You'll get the full replay. You'll get all the tools that I gave during the workshop. Plus you're going to get my custom GPT. And if you haven't used a custom GPT yet, you're in for a real treat. Think of it like a custom AI robot that is trained to think like me is trained on all my trainings that I've had years, my years worth of experience. And it helps you establish this in minutes rather than months.

It's gonna be a game changer. Go to canetscopla.com slash workshop, go and pick this up while it's still available. I don't know how long I'm gonna make this available. So go and grab it now and you'll have lifetime access to the replay plus any updates to the GPT that I make in the future. All right, so let's talk about pricing. know, pricing is so emotional.

So emotional, so psychological, so emotional. This episode was really born out of the hundreds of conversations I've had over the years with some of my private one-on-one clients, like the women in my mastermind, wedding pro insiders, many a student, even going back to when I was doing one-on-one coaching while I still ran my planning business. And I also have my own experience with luxury clients, luxury pricing. My journey was one of

Slow growth. I started in a mid market, which I was very fortunate to do. And over time, I developed a brand that luxury clients started looking to and hiring. It took time. And I eventually found myself planning very expensive weddings, working with very wealthy, awesome, wealthy people and charging a lot of money. I didn't start out that way. And I know that's the story for many a wedding pro, but I also know these days, so many people

are looking to ascend into the luxury market much quicker. They don't want to wait two, three, five years to finally be the pick that people with a large budget choose. And I respect that. You, if that's you, you often run into a lot of obstacles on your way to this market shift. And today's episode is going to be, I think, really beneficial for your business and also for your mindset.

Candice (08:10.53)

For those of you who are already working with luxury clients or you desire to work with more, maybe you're kind of, you got one foot in and one foot out. Today's episode is also gonna be really eye-opening for you. And then for those of you who are mostly working with higher budget clients, congratulations. I love it for you. Today's episode is gonna be a really good reminder in anchoring your price and anchoring your value. Okay, so first things first, I wanna talk about the high-end client.

mindset and the truth about how luxury clients really interpret your price. Here are some things I want you to know and notice how this is going to differ from the market that you have either left behind or that you're currently trying to escape. Okay. I eat the budget clients or the clients who are very budget conscious. So high end clients are making decisions based on a few factors when they're choosing their wedding vendors. They're making decisions based on alignment.

How does your business align with their desires, with their problems? How does your values align with their values, your aesthetic? They're also looking for vendors with expertise. They want to hire the best. And what does that mean to them? And are you the best? Do you come with specific expertise? Do you shoot film? Do you shoot in a certain way as a photographer?

Are you an invitation designer with specific expertise or a specific style? Are you a planner who specializes in tentative weddings or home weddings or destination weddings? Expertise really matters to luxury clients. And they're also looking for somebody with confidence. They want to know that they can trust you and they want to know that you are capable of planning their wedding, managing their budget. If you're a planner,

you're capable of photographing their wedding and they don't have to worry about you. Do you notice how nowhere in there did I say that they're making decisions based on price? Price is not the ultimate motivator for high budget, high end luxury clients. We're going to talk about more about that after this segment, but price is not the number one thing that they're focused on. So that means that they're not

Candice (10:31.374)

price shopping, their experience shopping, your high end luxury clients are looking for an experience. What is the experience like working with you? And you have to ask yourself, is my business and is my client experience set up to support a luxury client or a high end client? And it's not always about processes and automations and all that stuff. Everybody always goes to that. And I'm like, guys, it's not necessarily

where we need to be thinking. Experience shopping and what high-end clients are looking for is hospitality. When somebody who has the means travels, they pick specific hotels, specific resorts to stay at. And there's a reason for that. It's hospitality. It is the way that they're treated. It's the small little details that matter. It's how they're made to feel. It's the environment that they're surrounded in.

And so you have to ask yourself, is my business like staying at a Marriott or is my business like staying at a Relay Chateau property? Is it like staying at the Ritz Carlton? Is my business like staying at one of those highway motels? Or is my client experience more like staying at a luxury resort? Ask yourself that question. Luxury clients are experienced shopping, not price shopping.

Which means pricing, your pricing is often a signal of your value. And it's not just a line item that they're looking to get down, which is something you might be used to if you've gotten a lot of price pressure from clients in the past. What you're gonna find is you enter into a luxury market. That's not the case. And so if your prices feel like a gamble, if they're looking at your price and they're like, why is this photographer so cheap?

Why are these invitations so inexpensive? It's going to feel like a gamble, not a guarantee that they're going to get alignment, expertise, confidence, and a great experience. And if that's the case, they're not going to buy full stop. And so they think in their head, my God, if they're charging that, I'm going to assume that they've got it together. That is the type of price I would expect from somebody with expertise, somebody who is at the top of their game.

Candice (12:55.744)

somebody that has confidence and somebody that I can trust. What ends up happening as you begin to enter into a new higher level market is you bring a lot of baggage to selling and you bring a ton of baggage to your price. One of my favorite quotes of all time in business is by Seth Godin, no surprise. And no, it's not people don't buy paint, they buy painted walls. It's a different quote by Seth.

He says, reason it seems that price is all your customers care about is that you haven't given them anything else to care about. The reason it seems that price is all your customers care about is that you haven't given them anything else to care about. Let that sink in for a second because so many wedding pros don't even realize that they're doing this. You're pouring all your energy into the price.

And what's happening is you're unintentionally teaching the client to do the same. You are coming from a group of clients where they are price conscious. They are price shopping. It's the reason why you're trying to move up. You're trying to gently, kindly, or maybe aggressively.

with your middle finger in the air, shout goodbye. I am done serving this type of client. They're stressful. All they care about is price. They don't value me. They hound me on price. I'm not able to, I don't feel trusted. I don't feel like I can fully express myself. And I'm not making a living. Like this isn't paying my bills. All it's doing is bringing me down. You're trying to leave these people behind. But unfortunately, you're bringing them with you.

as you ascend in your business to a higher budget client. And it's coming across in a few different ways. The energy you bring into the conversation as you're trying to pitch yourself, that matters a lot. That nervous little pause before you say your price. People can instantly pick up on body language, tone. When you are bullshitting your way through something, you got to become a real good bullshit artist.

Candice (15:15.086)

Maybe I should have a podcast episode on how to be a good one. But people can tell, and I know you can tell when somebody is bullshitting their way through something. Trust me, I have bullshitted my way through a lot. I'm actually pretty good at it these days, but I'm also, I have a long history. They can tell when you are unsure, when you're nervous, when you lack confidence, the apologetic, I know it's a lot, little side comment, that paragraph or paragraphs.

long explanation that you think justifies the number, but all it is is just like, why is she like over explaining this to me? All of that is selling from fear. And listen, no wonder why you've probably spent years working with clients who nickel and dined you, whose first question was, how much does it cost? Who made you feel like your prices were always too much, even when they were like,

barely enough. You didn't even make a profit. They were just barely enough to cover your expenses. And that's a sucky place to be. But in order for you to work with a higher end client, you're going to need to put this baggage down. Okay? You're going to need to leave it by the roadside, put it in a dumpster. You need to get rid of it. Because if you're going to continue to carry this into how you price yourself going forward,

and into how you sell yourself with higher end clients, you are not going to sell. And so here's the truth, you're not working with these people anymore, even if they're still on your calendar because they booked you a year ago. You have made a conscious choice that you are aiming to work with people with a higher budget. So you're not going to work with these people anymore and you're not the version of yourself anymore either.

The person who was in startup mode, in hustle mode, who priced themselves attractively, who tried to get business on the books, who gained experience, who learned a lot, you're not that person anymore. But if you're still carrying that mindset into your pricing conversations and into how you price yourself, you're sabotaging your own positioning because high end clients, they're not scared of your number. They're watching how you present it and they're

Candice (17:35.432)

looking to make sure that you can back up your price with your expertise. And if you present it like you're unsure, you're insecure, or you present it like a liability instead of an asset, they're going to treat it that way. So the next time you feel hesitation creep in when you're presenting your price, I need you to remember that your job isn't to convince somebody that you're worth the price. That's not your job. Not even in the slightest.

They need, they convince themselves. Okay. People convince themselves to purchase. You don't need to convince somebody that you're worth the price. Your job is to believe that you are worth the price first and to communicate that belief, that confidence clearly. That's your job is to be anchored in your price, in your expertise and what you bring to the table. Okay. So it's not about price. It's.

about how you're thinking about money. And this is where we got to just talk a little bit about money mindset, because this is a sale killer. And I have fallen victim to this myself. And I fact learned this lesson through my own experience where I was like, wait a minute, I'm speaking to somebody who has seven times the amount of money I do. And I'm telling them that if they want, they can get this cheaper package. Like, why am I doing this?

Why am I doing this? And then I realized that I was bringing my own beliefs around money into the sale. So let's talk about this. This is extremely important because often when we're working with higher budget clients or luxury clients, we're usually working with people who may have more means, more money, more access to things than we do. And that's kind of hard at first.

You know, I grew up in a blue collar town. My mom was a waitress. So like this was a foreign world to me. mean, trust me, I adapted pretty quickly. I was like Gucci, Chanel, Louis Vuitton. Where? I need all these things to look professional. I'm not actually not kidding. Sometimes the way we were, grew up and the money that we have access to now is a lot different than the people that we're working with. So how you think about money plays a big role in how you're going to sell yourself and how you're going to price yourself. So if you want to personally pay what you're charging,

Candice (19:55.158)

It's going to be hard to sell. You have to reconcile that with yourself. If your own buying habits are rooted in discounts and scarcity and saving money, you're subconsciously projecting that onto your clients when that is not what they're looking for. Remember what Seth Godin says. The reason why your clients care about price is because you're making it about price. If you're making assumptions about what people can afford, which is so wrong of you to do, you're not giving them the respect or trust they deserve.

I see this over and over and over again. And this has actually happened to me before where I was looking to hire somebody for a service and they were telling me how they could cut the service to save me money without me ever even indicating that money was a deciding factor in investing. And in fact, what I wanted to do was really treat myself. I wanted to like spend some money, girl.

It was a total turnoff when they were like, we could save you some money here. And I'm like, I don't want to save money. Like I want to spend this money. I deserve to spend this money. I want to invest in this experience. Are you doing the same thing? It's an immediate turnoff. You cannot sell luxury with a scarcity mindset. You just can't. So in raising your price and becoming more comfortable and confident in the luxury market, you're going to have to untangle.

some of the money mindset stuff that gets in the way of you selling. High end clients are gonna read between the lines. To them, a low price is a risk. They're gonna think this should be higher. Other quotes we're getting are higher. Why is this person so inexpensive? I mean, think about it. If your car was broken down and you took it to three mechanics and two garages quoted you $5,000 to fix the car,

and one garage quoted you 800. Of course, mean, the 800 is really attractive, but wouldn't you say to yourself, like, why is this so cheap when the other ones are so much more expensive? And isn't that a red flag? they going to do a good job? Do they even know what they're doing? what even are they charging me? I don't understand. Why is there such a price discrepancy? So low price can equal low risk. They're going to think, well, I need to micromanage them. You know, is their portfolio

Candice (22:17.858)

real, am I going to get the experience I want? Also inconsistent pricing to me signals disorganization. If your pricing is all over the place, I think you're all over the place. So they're gonna think, can I even trust the process with this person? Am I gonna have a consistent process with this person? And if you're undercharging, that signals misalignment. Are they even in the same league as my other vendors? If they're hiring, if you are a photographer,

and they've spent 20 grand on a planner and they're investing $35,000 in flowers and you're charging $3,500, do you think that that is, you think that they're going to think that you're in the same league as some of the other vendors that they've hired? That screams misalignment, screams it. I mean, and these are real things that they think about subconsciously and even consciously. Luxury clients,

aren't wondering if you're too expensive. They're wondering if you're expensive enough to do the right job. Now there are some hidden costs to undercharging and I want to talk about these. Some of these you're going to expect, but maybe some of these you're not even recognizing. The first is energy leaks. I see it all the time. You're resentful, you're overworked, you're stretched too thin, you've got a gazillion clients because you're priced so nicely.

and they're so demanding of you that you can't give everybody a consistent experience. You don't have a personal life. You low key hate your work and you're wondering, what am I doing this all for? Raise your hand if that's you. You're gonna erode your authority. other vendors, if you're not even playing in the same league price-wise and experience-wise, people aren't gonna refer to you. And you can go back and listen to last week's episode, which was a hot one.

about why you're not getting referred more to hear more about what I mean by that, but you're eroding your authority. Other vendors aren't going to refer to you. People aren't going to take you seriously. It also leads to a lot of client misalignment. So even though you're striving to work with higher budget, higher end clients, you're going to continue to attract people who are really sensitive to price, who are budget conscious to an extreme level.

Candice (24:36.322)

but also boundary pushing people, the exact people that you're giving the middle finger to as you drive off and you're like, I'm never working with you again. Those are the people who are gonna keep calling you. Shifting markets, especially if you're trying to do it quickly, is difficult. It's really difficult. It takes a lot of consistency, a lot of perseverance. It's a lot of risk and a lot of trust. And also it's costing you slow growth, slow growth in your business where you can't hire.

You can't invest, you can't elevate your services. Maybe you want to go to a conference, maybe you want to invest in an in-person experience, maybe you want to hire a part-timer, a full-time employee. Maybe you want to grow your brand with additional photographers or hire a business coach like me. And so it's costing you slow growth. Every time that you discount your services for the right client, you're teaching them that your price is negotiable.

And one of the biggest hidden costs is you're sabotaging your sales process before it even begins. And this is what happens when you lead with your money fears and you signal a lack of belief in what you offer. Or when you're like overly apologizing or nervous, people pick up on that and it breaks trust before you've even built it. I'll say confidence is key. Confidence is the key to most things in business.

Even fake confidence is better than insecurity or lack of confidence. And sometimes we got to fake it till we make it. And I know people think that's a bad thing, but I don't. I think you have to fake it till you make it in many instances. And small little action steps are what help to build confidence over time. I want you to recognize that when you pitch your price, especially to a luxury market, your job isn't to decide what someone can afford. That's not up to you. That's actually none of your business.

What someone else can afford is none of your business. And the term affordable means different things to different people. Your job is to clearly show your value confidently and let them make the decision. So what I want you to stop doing is I want you to stop asking, can they afford me? And instead try asking, do my prices reflect the experience I actually deliver? I want you to start owning your category of one.

Candice (26:59.938)

You bring a lot to the table. have your unique perspective, your aesthetic, your way of doing things, your expertise, and your pricing isn't just about what you deliver, whether that's photo, video, invitations, your planning services. It's about transformation. We talk about transformation so much on this podcast. It's about the time saved, the stress avoided, the joy that you bring, the memories that you capture or that you create.

And I want you to be the one who explains pricing confidently. That confidence, it builds trust instantly. You'd be so surprised at how confidence creates trust. If you're confident and anchored in your price, you know your value, you know what you bring to the table, you know that you're the shit. Not in a cocky way. In a way that's like, I've worked hard, I know what I'm talking about, and I'm not gonna let anybody

Crawl in my brain and make me second guess what I bring to the table. That confidence is what books clients, especially luxury clients. So what I want you to know is that high end clients are not afraid of your prices. You're afraid of your prices. What they're afraid of is hiring somebody who can't handle the weight of what they're paying for. And that's something that you have to reconcile with yourself. If you want to work in a luxury market, if you want to work with luxury clients, you have to first be

luxury. have to be confident in what you're charging and in who you are and what you do. Also what you don't do. And you need to know that you can handle the weight of what your clients are paying for. I want to ask, what are your current prices say about your confidence, your experience and your leadership? If a high end client is looking at your price right now, would they feel trust or would they feel like

This is weird. are they? This price is so different than the price that we've been paying for our other vendors. And if you want help creating pricing that positions you as premium and it books the right clients, come and work with me. Come and join my mastermind, Wedding Pro Insiders. This is a space where we do so much, but what you need to know is you're going to have me one-on-one as your coach, my hands on your business.

Candice (29:22.488)

plus 40 other women in the wedding industry who are all excelling at what they're doing, but also growing just like you, their hands on your business too. It's where you re-elevate your service, your brand, your business model, and help you step into the business that you were really born to have and charge what you know you should be charging. So you can learn more about Wedding Pro Insiders and how you can work with me at weddingproinsiders.com.

sign up for the wait list. I'll send you some information on how you can apply if we have any open seats and you get one-on-one coaching with me, community of women, a retreat, you get to come to my home and Barbados, lots of support. It's really an incredible experience. So I'd love to send you more details. You can also email me personally if you'd like. All right, friend, this is where I leave you today. So are you pricing for trust?

Are you pricing yourself too low? Why are you not charging enough for the clientele you want to work with? All questions I want you to reconcile. I'd love to hear what you think of today's episode. So feel free to DM me, share this episode with a colleague or a friend, and I'll see you in the next episode.

Thanks so much for tuning in to this week's episode of the Power in Purpose podcast. If you enjoyed the show, be sure to subscribe so you never miss an episode and consider leaving a review. Head over to powerinpurposepodcast.com to access all of the resources and links mentioned in today's episode. That's powerinpurposepodcast.com. I'll see you next time.