When it comes to success and life, mindset is literally everything. Not having the right mindset is literally like removing the doorknob to the “door” of opportunity. You’ll know it’s there but you won’t believe you can open it. There is also a caveat sometimes, the fear of earning money.

A common mindset shift that is needed once you decided to journey the path called “entrepreneurship”, is your mindset about money. A lot of entrepreneurs struggle with charging what they’re worth. Today, I want to help break down this mindset and make you feel at ease when it’s time to send those invoices.

Facing Your Fear Of Earning Money

Your mindset on money will depend greatly on your background and the conditioned beliefs that were ingrained into you from a young age. This fear of money, specifically charging enough for your time will vary based on the type of business you are in.

Imposter Syndrome

When you’re just starting out as an entrepreneur, every day is a learning experience. You’re just trying to figure things out, step by step, mistake by mistake. All of this lack of experience can lead to a ton of insecurity in your business, and in the way you deal with your customers. Even though you know “enough” you still feel like you don’t. These early insecurities will affect, how you promote your services, acquire new customers, and charge your clients.

You will eventually figure out the first two, but the last one “charging your clients” can prove to be a major obstacle.

Getting rid of “imposter syndrome” will help you.

Earning Money Isn’t Dirty

Unless you come from a business-focused environment, the idea of charging people for your time/services could seem abstract at best. A question most entrepreneurs struggle to answer when starting out is….
“ How much should I charge for my products or services”

Trying to answer this question can prove quite difficult when you’ve never done it before.

The next issue is your own personal conflict preventing you from assigning an accurate value for the services that you provide. You’ll most likely have thoughts that go something like this…”Who’s gonna pay for this” or “Is my product/service valuable enough.”
Questions that could lead you to feel like you’re deceiving, or misleading your customers. Your prior beliefs lead to you being unsure of yourself and the value of your business.
Which then leads to undercharging and overworking yourself for less than you are worth.

What you end up doing is downplaying your worth and robbing your customers of the significant value that you can provide all because of your own internal beliefs.

Where do these internal beliefs originate from?

Cultural and social barriers teach us the employee mentality from adolescence. If you came from a family of traditional blue-collar or white-collar workers you have no doubt been conditioned that making tons of money is dirty, maybe even evil.

With these limiting beliefs, you are basically your own worst enemy.

Know your worth

The first step to overcoming this fear and getting over this obstacle is to know and understand your worth. You have spent the time in the trenches developing your skill set, your product or your service. You know enough to provide real value to your customers/clients, you just need to believe it. You may be thinking..”But Annetta, I’m not the best!”… No, you may not be the best, and you don’t have to. You just need to know enough to provide value to others.

We live in a competitive market but that doesn’t mean you have to price war yourself to the bottom. You may think that undercharging for your services will help you earn more clients and leave a great lasting impression. However, this couldn’t be the furthest from the truth.

When you charge low prices, you are also leaving a subconscious impression of low quality to your potential customers. Not all bargains are good. For example, let’s talk about cereal. You have name brands like “Fruity Loops” and you have off brands like “Fruity Circles”. For those on a budget, going with the off-brand maybe a steal. But you would be lying to yourself to think that the off-brand taste better. They seldomly do.

The same concept applies to your business. By charging higher prices you are attracting premium clients, lower prices and you’re attracting more budget clients.

You get what you pay for!

So what should you do?

Double down on your value, focus on being the best at what you do and charge accordingly. You’ve put in the work and you are bringing real value…charge for it!

Think Results Not Time

So what should you charge exactly? As an entrepreneur you are no longer being paid for your time, you are being paid for the value you bring. That’s the only thing your customers care about. Think of bundled value.

Secondly, you need to figure out how much YOU need in order to sustain yourself and grow your business. If you need $4,000 a month to meet your standard living condition you should price yourself accordingly. Based on a standard workweek of 40 hours. You would need to make $25/hour to meet this income requirement (add a few dollars to account for taxes). This should be your baseline when calculating your initial price points. As you grow and your skills/products develop you will need to reflect this in your pricing. Don’t be afraid to do so.

Remember as long as you are providing your clients with real value, the price is moot!

Don’t Be Afraid To Earn Money

In summary, overcoming your fear of charing money starts with your internal mindset. As long as you are providing value to your customers, don’t be afraid to charge what you feel you are worth. Even if you have few clients or do fewer sales, the offset in price will more than makeup for it. If you provide premium, charge premium!

I hope this article helped you gain more insight and provides a few ways that you overcome your own internal money struggle!