Episode 4: Your Money Set-Point: The hidden income limiter!

EPISODE 4: Your Money Set-Point: The hidden income limiter!

Charging a high-ticket price is one of the biggest challenges facing transformational entrepreneurs. In this episode, Pamela talks about Money Set-Point – your hidden limiter that keeps you from raising your fees (even if you should), prevents you from investing in your business appropriately, and holds you back in scaling your impact. Understanding this concept means it’s possible to make more with less effort.

In this episode, you’ll discover:

• How Money Set-Point negatively affects your fees.
• Why examining this limiter is critical to scale your impact.
• The 3 growth factors and what to do to expand them.

Timecode Guide:

01:30: Get a thorough introduction to Pamela’s coined concept, ‘Money Set-Point,’ with comprehensive definitions, real-life examples, and personal stories.
09:25: Uncover your hidden limitations in this Money Set-Point Activity. You can complete this exercise while you’re listening along or later as a homework assignment – just be sure to write down the time (10:11, exactly) so you can go back.
16:03: Learn about the three growth factors – Pricing, Support, Vision – that rely on your Money Set-Point, and what to do to expand them.

Podcast Transcription

Episode 4: Your Money Set-Point: The hidden income limiter!

Intro to Money Set-Point

Intro (00:00):
You’re listening to ‘A Profitable Impact.’

Pamela (00:02):
It’s so critical to identify and examine your Money Set-Point because that’s your hidden limiter. It can keep you from raising your fees. It can keep you from scaling your business. It can keep you from having the impact that you want to make in the world.

Gene (00:18):
Welcome to ‘A Profitable Impact,’ where every single week we help coaches and healers to expand their reach, to increase their impact in the world, and to be well-paid for their extraordinary skills and talents. I’m Gene Monterastelli; I am the Lead Coach of Pamela Bruner’s Impact Accelerator coaching program. And please welcome my friend, my colleague, and the CEO of Attract Clients Online, Pamela Bruner. How are you doing today, Pamela?

Pamela (00:43):
I’m doing great, Gene. And we get to talk about money today – one of my favorite topics!

Gene (00:47):
We do. Not only do we get a chance to talk about money, but we get to talk about the way that we have a relationship with money and how that actually impacts our ability to run successful businesses and to really make a difference in the world.
As you are listening to Pamela and I’s conversation today, if you bump into something around this idea of money and how we deal with it, and you’d like to have a conversation, we actually have an opportunity for you to talk to one of our coaches, absolutely free.
If you go to BookMyBreakthroughCall.com, that is BookMyBreakthroughCall.com, you can have an opportunity to have a conversation with one of our coaches about money and how money impacts your ability to sell based on your relationship with it.

Pamela (01:30):
Let’s start talking about Money Set-Point.
Now, we talk all the time about weight set-point. If you’ve interacted with the diet industry at all, you know we talk about, “What’s the normal point for your body to be at?” Well, we have a normal point for what we expect around money too!
I’ve coined the term ‘Money Set-Point’ to talk about this, which is what I see as a hidden limiter. It keeps you from making a whole lot less, but it also keeps you from making a whole lot more – just like how a weight set-point tends to keep you at an optimal weight, whether you like that weight or not.
So, your Money Set-Point impacts things like raising your fees. It can hold you back from investing in your business, and it’s definitely going to hold you back from scaling your impact. So, we’ve got a few wonderful things we’re going to do in this episode. One is: in this episode, I’ll talk about how the Money Set-Point could be negatively affecting your fee structure and what you charge. Also, we’ll talk about why it’s critical to examine your Money Set-Point in order to scale your business, scale your impact, and make more of a difference in the world. And, we’ll go over the three growth factors that rely on your Money Set-Point and what to do to expand them.

Gene (02:41):
And I think that that’s a really great Roadmap of where we’re going to head today. But, I think before we jump into that, could you give a little more comprehensive definition of what you mean by Money Set-Point, so we’re all on the same page as we have this conversation today.

Pamela (02:56):
Absolutely. I’ve got a great example and a really funny story about this. So, for defining Money Set-Point: Your Money Set-Point is how much you feel it’s appropriate to pay for anything.
You have a Money Set-Point for an article of clothing, for the mortgage or rent on a home, for the price you might pay for a vehicle. Your Money Set-Point may vary according to different values in your life.
For example, I know people who have a very high Money Set-Point for transformation, or a high Money Set-Point (as I do) for organic healthy food, but, perhaps have a low Money Set-Point in other areas. I know some people who have a high Money Set-Point for handbags and shoes, and a low Money Set-Point for other things in their life.
So, one of my favorite examples to demonstrate Money Set-Point is the analogy of a hotel room.

Pamela (03:50):
So I’m guessing if you’re listening to this podcast, you probably have a Money Set-Point for a hotel room that’s somewhere in the $100 to maybe even $250-300 range. Meaning, if a hotel room were that much on any given night, then you would be willing to stay in that hotel.
If a hotel room was, say, $3,000 a night (and there certainly are hotels that charge that), you would probably say, “No, that’s too expensive,” “That’s ridiculous,” “That’s unreasonable,” or something like that. Because the price of the hotel room is outside your Money Set-Point – it’s too high.
But, what if a hotel charged $25 a night?
I’m guessing that’s also outside of your Money Set-Point, but it’s on the other side – it’s too low. You’d probably look at that price and go, “What’s wrong with a hotel room? Does it have bedbugs? I don’t think I should stay there.”

Hidden Limiter Impact: Dive Into Definitions and Examples

Pamela (04:40):
So, from this simple example, you can see how your Money Set-Point causes you to choose a certain vendor.
The interesting thing about Money Set-Point is, wherever you set your fees for your transformational services, there will be people who think you’re too expensive. And there will be people who aren’t even looking at you because you’re so low; they won’t trust the services that you provide.
Now, I said I had a really funny story about this, and I wanted to tell this because I think it’s a great way to demonstrate that Money Set-Point is not fixed. It’s not like if you are wealthy, you have a high Money Set-Point in all areas, or if you make less money, you have a low Money Set-Point. No, not at all.
My ex-husband builds harps, like you see in orchestras. And in fact, that’s my previous profession; I used to be a professional harpist. And when he brought out this top of the line, $30,000 harp (a brand new harp), he said, “You know what, I think I’ll deliver the first few of these. If they’re on the East coast, I’ll just drive to make sure the owners are happy with them.”
So, he was delivering one of the harps and the GPS was guiding him into a neighborhood that he didn’t believe could be where the harp owner lived.
He was looking at this neighborhood thinking, “This is not right…”
He pulls up outside of a single-wide trailer and says, “Well, nobody here would have bought a $30,000 harp, but I’ll knock on the door and I’ll get directions.”
He knocks on the door, and the harp owner opened the door.
That person had a very low Money Set-Point for housing, but a very high Money Set-Point for musical instruments.
So, can you see from this example that Money Set-Point is not uniform across all things?

Gene (06:26):
As you talk about that, I think about my own life, and about things that are high and things that are low. Like, I personally have a really, really high Money Set-Point for food and for alcohol.
I have spent over $500 on a single bottle of bourbon before because I appreciate that and it’s something I think is worth investing in.
And if you looked at the blue jeans that I wear when I’m not dressed professionally, you would think that I had a very low set-point for clothes.
And for me – my casual clothing, I have a very low set-point for. For my professional clothing, I am always in bespoke suits that are custom made for me.
And so even inside of a specific area of our lives, we can be in a circumstance where we even have different Money Set-Points based on the context in which we’re using that particular thing with them.

Pamela (07:18):
Mm… I love that as an example, that’s so illustrative and so perfectly you, Gene.
So, you can see in these examples, Money Set-Point’s just interesting. It is interesting to look at.
But, why it’s so relevant to your business is:
If you have a low Money Set-Point for personal things (like Gene gave the example that for his casual clothes he has a low Money Set-Point), you may assume that means the same for your personal growth services. You feel like people are going to look at you as though that should be a low Money Set-Point.
Or, you may have a low Money Set-Point for yourself, but higher for others. You spend more money on your children, you spend more money on your spouse, and you spend very little money on yourself. That’s going to tend to make you think that you should set your fees lower, because after all, who would spend money on you?
When you examine this (and this is why I think it’s so critical), you can see that for the most part, people in the transformational industry have a high Money Set-Point for transformation.
You’ve probably paid a lot for your transformational training in order to become a coach or healer. You may have paid for business coaching. You pay for personal growth. And so, you see it’s very common because you have a high Money Set-Point for transformation.
I’m going to encourage you to consider that there are other people who have a high Money Set-Point for transformation, and those are the people you’re actually looking for.

How to Examine Your Money-Set Point (Bonus Exercise)

Gene (08:46):
I think it’s really great the way you’re pointing out the way that our Money Set-Point impacts the way that we see values of what we’re going to charge for things.
But, what’s interesting in the description that you gave right there, is talking about how those of us who do transformational work are willing to invest a lot of money in ourselves thinking that the transformation is very, very high. But, we have a different Money Set-Point for what we think we are offering and what our work is worth to the people out there.
And so we get comfortable paying a high Money Set-Point, but we have a different Money Set-Point for what we’re willing to charge because of the way we perceive the work that we’re doing.

Pamela (09:25):
That’s why it’s so critical to examine your Money Set-Point. I’m a big believer in investing in your business – I mean, that sounds a little self-serving, after all, I’m a business coach – but I’ve invested hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars in my business because I see my business as an entity. It’s an individual. It’s something that I want to nurture and grow and take care of. And so I do invest in it – just as you might nurture and grow and invest in a child.
If you have a low Money Set-Point for yourself, one of the interesting things that can happen, is you think, “I’m not worth it,” or “I can’t make that much money, therefore I can’t invest.” And without investment, you can’t scale, and you’re stuck at the level of revenue that you’re currently at.

Pamela (10:11):
So, I’m going to give this as a sort of a homework example, or an exercise that you can do right now, in the moment:
Look at your own life and see where you might have different levels of Money Set-Point.
What do you have a high Money Set-Point for? And what do you have a low Money Set-Point for?

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High-End Services Call for High-Ticket Prices

Pamela (10:54):
I’ll tell another funny story about myself, which is from when I first met my partner. 

I remember the first time he walked me to my car and he had, of course, heard about me and seen stuff about me on the internet. He said, “Wow, you know, she’s this really successful businesswoman,” and then he saw that I drive, you know, a seven-year-old domestic car. And his first thought was, “Is she blowing smoke about how successful she is?” 

Because the truth is, I have a fairly low Money Set-Point for cars, and he has a high Money Set-Point for cars. 

So, even as you interact with people, you’re going to see things that surprise you. And one of the common reactions I find with Money Set-Point is that people look at other people’s Money Set-Point and say, “That’s too expensive,” or “That’s too inexpensive,” and it’s just a values choice. It’s not right or wrong, good or bad – it’s just a values choice, based on what lights you up.

Gene (11:52):
And I think what you’re saying there, I agree with it 100%. I think it’s really important for us to recognize the fact that when we’re talking about Money Set-Point like you just said, we’re not making a value judgment. We’re simply making a statement about what people value. 

As we look at this in the way that it impacts our business (like by having a higher Money Set-Point in what I’m willing to charge for my work), by necessity people who are willing to pay actually take our work more seriously because they value it really high. 

And how wonderful is it for us to be compensated really well for the work that we’re doing by people who are really excited to be working with us? 

Because where their Money Set-Point is, it’s demonstrating the value of the work that we are doing with them, which means they’re going to be more invested in the work that we’re doing.

Pamela (12:44):
Exactly. And that’s the next point I wanted to build on. What you said, it’s true. 

When people pay attention to what they pay for, so when you charge more, if you can push through your Money Set-Point, raise your Money Set-Point and charge more or charge higher fees, it means that other people will value your work more because they’re investing more in it. The other interesting thing that it means, is they value themselves more, because when people look at what you offer and they say, “Wow,” you instantly know. 

But if it’s a low thing that they’re investing in, they’re not going to take it very seriously. They may not do the work – and the worst thing in the world for transformational work is an uncommitted client. So, you don’t want them to be lackadaisical about the work. You want them to be very invested because they’ve put in a significant investment for them. 

The other thing is, studies have shown that what people get out of transformation often is based on their perceived value, like how valuable they think the work is at a higher price point, reflects that. So, you’re actually helping people get more transformation out of your work when you charge more for it. It’s a little counterintuitive, but very true.

Gene (13:49):
And not only is it very true, but it’s really, really exciting. 

To be in a circumstance where I’m going to be paid more for my work and my clients are going to get more out of it at the exact same time, you’re right, it sounds counterintuitive, and it is the thing that I want in the work that I’m doing.

The 3 Growth Factors: Pricing, Support, Vision

Pamela (14:04):

Yeah. So let’s finish this out by talking about the three growth factors that rely on your Money Set-Point and what to do to expand them. 

So, there are three things that I think you’re gonna want to scale. 

#1 is you want to scale your Pricing, which means you want to look at “How can I increase my pricing?” 

One of my favorite ways to tell people to do this is most people can give themselves a 25% raise without a lot of Hullabaloo. If you’re charging $2,000, you can charge $2,500 without really changing the people you’re targeting, changing the marketing that you do, the way that your brand is presented. You can scale your pricing at least 25%. 

If your pricing is very low, you may be able to scale at 50-75% and bring it up a little bit in the valuation. So look and say, “Can I give myself a 25% raise today?”

Pamela (14:57):

The next arena that you want to look at is scaling Support. 

So, if you have a low Money Set-Point, say, for hiring help – and I know I’ve got a number of clients who are very proclaimed DIYers. 

Now, I will admit that I have a little bit of a crafty streak – I like making things, I like creating things, I like painting things – and in those regards, I’m a DIYer. I do those myself for the joy of doing them. 

But, when something is critical and when my business or my life or my health relies on it, I’m not a DIYer. Then, I want to invest. 

So, if you are a confirmed DIYer, one of the things that you may have a little Money Set-Point for is bringing in people or infrastructure to support your business. 

So, do you resent getting help from a web designer or getting help from a techie virtual assistant in order to do some things online that you need to do? 

What’s your Money Set-Point for that? 

Because if it’s too low, you’re going to hold yourself back. So, you need to scale your pricing. You need to scale your support.

Pamela (16:03):

The third growth factor that I believe you need to scale is your Vision. You will not earn it if you can’t dream it. 

I’m gonna put some rails around this to make it more real, because a lot of people say, “Well, I’m dreaming of a six-figure business,” or “I’m dreaming of a seven figure a million dollar business,” but they’re not really clear what they do with that money. What I’ve found is, if you don’t know how you would spend it and you aren’t very specific about it, the number is just an empty number. 

One of the things that actually contributed to my being able to scale my business and serve more people and increase my revenue, was creating a dream of giving away a million dollars in my lifetime. Because making more money just for the sake of making more money isn’t that exciting to me. Making more money for the chance to make more of a difference in the world, that’s exciting to me. 

So, when I created that dream, all of a sudden, now I had a new goal. I was scaling my Vision, and that enabled me to scale my Money Set-Point for fees, my Money Set-Point for revenue, my Money Set-Point for support. 

While I gave these in the order of Pricing, Support, and Vision, to actually create them, you do them in the reverse order. 

Do your Vision first, then look at “what kind of support do I need,” “how do I need to scale my Money Set-Point for Support,” and then “what does that mean I need to scale my Pricing to?”

Gene (17:26):

I love those three, and I love the way that you laid them out and then talked about them in the reverse order. And I can talk tangibly from my own experience in a way that might sound a little less altruistic than what you just described. 

You did a really good job of saying, “I want to make more money so I can make a bigger difference in the world,” and that’s awesome, I am all for that. 

So, I live in New York City, and because of what is going on in the world right now, New York City real estate has changed in a pretty radical way as lots of people are leaving the city. And because of that, for the first time since I’ve lived in New York City, I have thought about, “What would it be like to be a homeowner and not a renter in New York City?”

Gene (18:07):

So, I did a little research and I figured out basically what I needed for a down payment. 

I set a new goal for myself, that I wanted to increase my income next year by $150,000. Not increase my sales, actually increase my income by $150,000, because I would like to be a homeowner in New York City. And as we’re recording this, I just pulled up my numbers really quickly, I am on pace for this calendar year of making 164% of what I had projected as my income for this year. 

And, as I look at my numbers, it started to change the moment I had a clear vision of what I wanted different in my life and why I wanted to do it. I move that to the front of my brain and I’ve been working in my business in a really different way, and my business is growing into that particular vision. 

So, when we’re setting these visions out, we can have goals about our impact, we can also have goals about what is happening in our life, but having that clarity makes such a huge difference in our ability to make more thoughtful choices day to day, which allow us to have that incumbent we want.

Pamela (19:15):

And I 100% love that example. Because the truth is, I don’t want to sound like I’m just little-miss-altruistic. I love giving money away, I also like making money, and I have things in my life that I have a high Money Set-Point for. So, I am a firm believer. 

Whether it is buying a new home, sending your kids to the college that they want, giving money away, buying an expensive handbag, it doesn’t matter, I’m not here to judge your values, I’m only here to make sure that you don’t short cut what you want in your life, because you don’t think you can get it, you don’t think you can deserve it, you don’t think that you have the Money Set-Point to support it. So I 100% love that.

Closing Time…

Gene (19:56):

So as you have been listening to the conversation that Pamela and I have been having today and you recognize that you are in a circumstance where your Money Set-Point is too low, you’re having trouble getting clarity around that Set-Point, or, more importantly, you don’t see what the first steps are to transforming that Money Set-Point so you can really have the impact you want to make in the world, I would really encourage you to reach out to have a conversation with one of our coaches who will help you to figure out what you can do to start transforming your Money Set-Point. 

If you go to BookMyBreakthroughCall.com, that’s BookMyBreakthroughCall.com, you can have an opportunity to really start to transform that Money Set-Point so you can have the business that you truly want.

Gene (20:39):

If the conversation today is something that you think someone else in your life would really appreciate. 

You know, another coach, another healer, another transformational professional, please pass it along. You might be giving them the perfect gift that they need today to start to transform their own business. 

If you haven’t done so already, we’d also encourage you to Subscribe to the show. You can subscribe to the podcast in Apple podcasts, Google podcasts, Spotify, Amazon music, anywhere you get audio, just search for ‘A Profitable Impact.’ Make sure you click the Subscribe or the Follow button so that every single time a new episode comes out you get a notification. 

If you have a question, if you have a comment, if you have a topic that you’d like Pamela to talk about at some point in the future on one of these episodes, you can always reach out by going to AttractClientsOnline.com and click on that contact link. 

Until next time, I hope you have an impactful week.

ABOUT THE PODCAST

Building a business as a coach or expert is challenging, especially if you’re trying to find your clients online.

Join business coach and online marketing expert Pamela Bruner as she uncovers the secrets of successful transformational businesses. If you want to make a difference in people’s lives, expand your reach, and attract high-paying clients, you’ll love this show!