EP72: [REPLAY] Pricing BS and the Trouble with High Ticket Offers

Can you really justify charging $100,000 for a VIP day? 

In this replay of one of my most popular episodes, I challenge the conventional wisdom and dismantle the flawed logic behind high-ticket pricing strategies. 

With nearly a decade of experience curating exclusive events for high-net-worth individuals, I reveal what truly justifies those hefty price tags. I discuss the shift from six-figure to eight-figure success benchmarks and highlight the pitfalls of adding zeros without adding value. This episode dives deep into the complexities of high-ticket offers.

Discover how to create high-ticket services that genuinely deliver exceptional value, whether they're priced at $5,000 or $25,000. 

I also expose a $25,000 coaching program that fell short, underscoring the importance of thoughtful pricing and tangible results. 

Whether you're a service provider setting your rates or a consumer considering a costly investment, I equip you with critical insights to navigate these waters wisely. Learn to set well-justified price points grounded in experience and market value, while recognizing and avoiding flashy sales tactics that hide a program's true worth.

Chapters

• 0:00 The Reality of High Ticket Offers
• 12:45 Pricing High-Ticket Offers Effectively
• 17:36 Navigating High Ticket Offers Wisely

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Hey, blasphemers, welcome back. We are officially on break, but that does not mean that we're taking a break with the podcast. I thought this would be a really, really great opportunity to reshare a couple of my favorite episodes with you. So for the next few weeks we're going to dive back into some episodes you might have missed, but ones that really resonated with a lot of you. So I want to kick it off with the episode that currently has the highest number of downloads, and it's all about pricing BS and the trouble with high ticket offers. I share an experience that I had in a program where, well, they tell us how to make a million dollars really, really easily, and I slapped on my sassy pants and decided to break it down. And you know, really share what goes into high ticketticket offers, the reality behind it. So, without further ado, pricing BS and the trouble with high-ticket offers, hope you enjoy.

Speaker 1: 0:55

Welcome to the Business Blasphemy Podcast, where we question the sacred truths of the online business space and the reverence with which they're held. I'm your host, sarah Kahn, speaker, strategic consultant and BS-busting badass. Join me each week as we challenge the norms, trends and overall bullshit status quo of entrepreneurship to uncover what it really takes to build the business that you want to build in a way that honors you, your life and your vision for what's possible, and maybe piss off a few gurus along the way. So if you're ready to commit business blasphemy, let's do it. Hello, hello blasphemers, how are you? I'm going to jump right in with a question. Do you want an easy way to make a million dollars? I bet everyone, all of you're listening right now. I'm going what? Yeah, obviously Don't we all. Well, that was the question I saw on a sales page for free experience I was curious about last year.

Speaker 1: 1:47

So now I remember when I first started in the business space, the benchmark for success was six figures, as in like $100,000. That's what everyone was aiming for. Then it evolved to multiple six figures, which I assume means anywhere from like $250,000 to $750,000. Then it became a million bucks. Six figures wasn't cutting it anymore, and now you hear some of the really big names talking about eight figures being the gateway to success or the goal for the most ambitious business owners. So a little while ago I attended this free event where the coach talked about how to make a million dollars really easily in your business, and they shared a number of different strategies, one of which was to simply charge more money for VIP days. That was one of the examples that this coach gave. The suggestion was to simply charge $100,000 for your VIP day. Sign 10 clients, boom, million dollars.

Speaker 1: 2:38

Now this goes right back to all of the rhetoric in the space about pricing things like charging your worth or just double your prices because you should, or any other arbitrary pricing method like just add an extra zero. That doesn't actually look at the realities of what the cost of a program or service should represent. So I will do a pricing episode one day. Right now, I really want to talk about this particular idea of simply charging a higher price to make more money, because here's the reality of it. I can make math work too, and, yes, 10 clients at $100,000 a pop is a million dollars.

Speaker 1: 3:13

But let's break down what a high ticket offer really needs to have in place. Spoiler alert it's never just about adding extra zeros. And don't get me started on the number of coaches and strategists who've jumped on this high ticket trend, not just in terms of like charging high ticket prices, but suddenly being able to teach you how to do it too. The reality is far fewer of them actually have experience with high ticket offers than you think. Now I will acknowledge here that there is no agreed upon number where something suddenly becomes quote unquote high ticket.

Speaker 1: 3:43

High ticket is generally an offer that's priced quite high, you know, to avoid tire kickers and people who aren't serious about investing in it. That's what everybody says anyway. But the reality is everybody's financial situation is different and what they can comfortably afford to invest in is going to differ, and high ticket is going to be different to different people based on where they are financially at any given time. But most well-known coaches and I'm putting emphasis on most use the term high ticket to mean a five figure investment or more. So keep that in mind as you listen to this episode. It's ridiculous to me how many offers have sprung up that are high, five figures or more, though the offers themselves are nowhere near what you would think warrant a price that high. Lots of people rely on themselves right and their aura, their celebrity, to justify the price point and not the actual content of the offer.

Speaker 1: 4:36

Anyway, carrying on a little context on what's about to come, I worked for nearly 10 years as an event professional, organizing and executing high ticket events for high net worth individuals that were clients of the corporations that I worked for. So we're talking, like you know, weekend excursions to Portugal to play golf. You know things like that, like really high ticket, all expenses paid, type stuff. So believe me when I say I know what warrants a high price tag and what people expect when paying that much. So here's the first thing you need to consider when putting together a high-priced or high-ticket offer.

Speaker 1: 5:07

Now, for the sake of this rant, let's use the example. I kicked off with a VIP experience priced at $100,000. Now, maybe it's a day, maybe it's a weekend. The timeframe isn't really that relevant for now, but we know collectively a VIP experience is usually a shorter term engagement. Right, it's not something that's spread out over six months or a year, but even spread out over the course of 12 months. $100,000 is a fuckload of money. And this advice to just charge $100,000 and you only need to sign 10 clients it came from a well-known coach in the space who, I will say, very likely understands everything I'm about to share with you. But the fact that it wasn't even a footnote in their training makes it all feel super irresponsible. So let's get into it First things first.

Speaker 1: 5:54

Do you have the infrastructure to actually support someone's $100,000 investment. Now, I am an operations expert, so this is immediately where my brain goes the logistics of how something's going to work from start to finish. So the question I have is operationally, what does a $100,000 experience look like? What does it feel like for them from the moment they book the sales call to the moment they show up for that VIP day and when they walk out the door when it's finished? I mean, how many of us have actually ever invested in a $100,000 experience? Do you even know what one is supposed to feel like? Sure, we can look at what other people are doing, but that's not the way to play something like this.

Speaker 1: 6:33

If you suddenly decide to offer a really high ticket service, then you have to be able to support the experience itself, and from an operational perspective, that means everything needs to be utterly seamless from the moment they get their contract or their invoice or they pay. Are they going to get some kind of onboarding material? Is it going to be some cheaply put together PDF and Canva, or is it going to be something that actually represents the price they just paid? People are not going to want broken links and missing onboarding steps and they probably won't even appreciate something that feels like it's automated. I'm not saying you can't automate your operations, particularly at higher levels, but you don't want something to feel like it's automated. You've all experienced it right the email where you get the dear insert first name here instead of your first name because somewhere in the back end a link was broken or a command didn't execute properly. You don't want to be experiencing that kind of thing when you're paying a really high price.

Speaker 1: 7:26

Honestly, for that price I'd expect my own fucking concierge to help acclimate me to whatever the process is going to be. I mean, personally I'd expect to coach themselves at that price. But I also understand the need for a team to support something that big. But I would expect a lot of touch points at the very least, or check-ins before the actual experience to see how I'm doing. I'd expect a lot of hand-holding right. So that requires team hours, it requires attention to detail. So do you have the infrastructure or the resources to support something like that? Or are you a solopreneur who is barely keeping your head above water in your sea of to-dos? Most people's onboarding experience sucks for regularly priced offers, nevermind high ticket ones. And if that is you. If you're now questioning your onboarding experience, check out the show notes, because I do have someone to refer you to who is an expert in client experience. So go and check out the show notes when I'm done, not right now.

Speaker 1: 8:19

The second thing to consider is how much is it going to cost you to actually deliver an event or an experience that's worthy of a $100,000 investment? So, for example, what kind of venue is it going to take place in For 100K? It better not be your house and it better not be some random Airbnb unless, of course, it's a freaking mansion. And what about food? Is it going to be stuff you randomly pick up from Target on your drive over? Is it going to be freshly prepared meals by a chef, a gourmet chef? What about travel? Do I have to book my own travel? That's one thing that always makes me pause. If I'm paying for a location experience, the price of travel isn't included, for obvious reasons, because everyone's coming from a different location. I get that, but for 100K, are you going to make me book my own travel? Because if you think I'm booking my own travel or accommodation or my own food for 100K, you're wrong. I personally, me, would expect someone to pick me up at the airport in a Bentley after my premium flight. I'm only partly joking.

Speaker 1: 9:16

Are there going to be peripheral events outside of whatever core experience the VIP engagement is? Are there going to be excursions? Are we going to do massages? Is there going to be yoga, whatever? So you have to look at what you have to spend from that revenue in order to make the investment worthwhile. When people are spending that kind of money, whether it's in installments or pay in full, they have a very high bar in terms of quality of delivery and, again, if you've never experienced something at that level, it's going to be a little bit challenging for you to understand or determine what you need to provide in order to make that experience a high ticket offer, for the client to feel like the investment was worth it. Now, I'm not saying if you've never experienced a high ticket offer, you're never going to be able to replicate one, but it's common sense. If you've never experienced a thing, it's going to be challenging for you to replicate it in any way that actually matters. Now, this is one of those hashtag. I said what I said moments. If you disagree, by all means, please send me a message. Let's talk about it. I'd love to hear your perspective.

Speaker 1: 10:15

The third thing is what value outside of the physical experience are you going to bring that's worthy of this investment from the client so many coaches tell you to? Just, you know, raise your prices. And even if your offers don't come anywhere near the $100,000 range, even if they're just a few thousand dollars, that's still a substantial amount of money for most people. So what value outside of that experience are you going to bring? Do you have training in this area? Do you have certifications? Do you have something that helps you stand head and shoulders above the crowd? That warrants charging this kind of money.

Speaker 1: 10:47

And I'm not sitting here trying to invalidate your experience. Everyone's experience is valid. What I'm talking about specifically is you better have some real special sauce if you're going to be charging a really high ticket price to work with you one-on-one. And it better not just be trading on your name, which is what a lot of the really big celebrity entrepreneurs do now because they feel like they can. And the sad part is I'm digressing a little bit here I have seen some of the offers on the backend of some celebrity entrepreneurs, celebrity coaches. They're trading on their name, but what they're actually delivering from a content perspective is a shit sandwich. It's nothing that would warrant that kind of price tag. So I'm not going to sit here and debate the rights and wrongs about that. It's just something I want you to be aware of.

Speaker 1: 11:28

If you're going to be charging something high ticket, what are you bringing that sets you apart from everybody else? Generally, that means you've gotten some killer results for multiple clients in the past and people are clamoring to work with you because you've gotten proven results, and that's the other thing. At that price, I better not be in a group or a cohort. I'm going to want one-on-one, face-to-face, whether it's in person or over Zoom although, to be fair, if it's $100,000 short-term investment, it should be face-to-face and it better be in a nice location because absolutely 100% I am paying for that experience. It's a VIP experience, not weekly coaching, and I know you're sitting there thinking obviously, sarah, people don't do groups for VIP experiences. Some people do. I've seen it happen, so I just wanted to throw that in there.

Speaker 1: 12:14

So really, it's questions like this that people need to think about, and the reality is most people don't. They don't have the context for it, so how or why would they and do the coaches out there teaching this stuff? Have the context. And then there's the actual VIP experience itself. What are you gonna do or teach or impart that is gonna change my life or change my business? That is worthy of a $100,000 experience. What will my business look like when we're done? How is this going to have changed my life?

Speaker 1: 12:45

My whole point with all of this is if you're going to be selling high-ticket offers, they need to be worth the investment for the person. So, going back to what I was saying before, even if you're not charging $100,000 for a service or for an offer of some kind and you're just offering something for $5,000 or $10,000 or $25,000, which I'm seeing a lot more coaches do there is still an expectation of high quality of delivery Because, again, remember, everybody's financial situation is different and what they see as high ticket is going to be completely different. I think the bottom line here is client experience. Right, it's what are you delivering that is going to make the client feel like every penny they invested with you was worthwhile. I will never forget talking to a coach that I was really interested in working with last year and the investment was $25,000 for six months. That's a lot of money for most people. In fact, it's a lot of money for a lot of people.

Speaker 1: 13:35

And when I looked at the curriculum, I only actually got to speak to the actual coach that I was interested in working with once every other month, so three times in total, and it wasn't even one-on-one, it was in a group context. The rest of the program was self-study, with one I think it was one monthly one-on-one call with a team member. It was like a 20 minute call. That made no sense to me. If I'm paying that kind of a price, it makes no sense for it to be so hands-off or the content needs to make wings grow out of my ass and give me the power to turn lead into gold For $25,000,. I want some face-to-face time. So these are the things I want you to think about, right.

Speaker 1: 14:13

And coaches are here telling you to charge high ticket this and high ticket that and don't even know if a million dollars is even what you want, because we haven't even talked about what it takes to sustain that level of income in terms of investment or in terms of team or in terms of operations or marketing or ad spend. We haven't even touched on what it actually takes to make that much money and continue making that level of income or revenue sustainably. So let's just say, a million dollars is, in fact, what you want, what are you offering and what's the value of it to your client? We really, really need to stop just arbitrarily pricing our programs and our services and our offers. When you look at pricing oh shit, I guess we were talking about this today, okay, cool.

Speaker 1: 14:54

When you look at your pricing, first of all, your worth has nothing to do with it. You, my friend, are infinitely worthy and we really need to get away from charging based on our inherent value, because, as a human being, you are and forever will be more valuable than any service or any offer that you could dream of or anyone else could ever dream of, and so that's the wrong way to do it, that's the wrong metric. Take your worth right out of the game and, as we've been talking about, stop telling people to just double their prices arbitrarily, because, again, what are they delivering? And, as a coach, I think it's incredibly irresponsible to tell people to just double their prices or add an extra zero when you've never actually worked with them or experienced their programs as a buyer, as a client. How do you know how good that program is? How do you know what they're delivering? Have you gone through it? Can you vouch for the results? How do you know what the results are that they've been getting for their clients, or if they've even had results with clients before? But you're sitting there telling someone to double their prices because they're worthy of it. That's just bullshit.

Speaker 1: 15:50

So what does pricing actually require? A lot of things, but here are some of the things that I consider when working on pricing with my clients. The pricing with my clients. The first is experience. Right, whether it's a certification, some sort of formal training, but primarily, have they done it hands on? You don't need a certification for most things, but if you're just starting, you can't charge what someone who is seasoned in that particular area charges, because you can't back it up. You don't have the experience. And having a certification doesn't automatically mean that you are seasoned. You have to't have the experience, and having a certification doesn't automatically mean that you are seasoned. You have to actually do the work.

Speaker 1: 16:26

So when I talk about experience, how many clients have you served in that capacity? How many of them have gotten results? How many years have you been doing it? How long have you offered that particular offer? That's what experience means and that's one of the very first things you should be taking into consideration in setting your prices.

Speaker 1: 16:42

The second thing that I usually walk through my clients with is market value. What are other people in the space charging for a similar service or offer? Now, I'm not saying you copy people at all, but what are people charging and what are people paying? It's one factor to consider. What is the going rate for that type of service offering? And again, it's also going to depend on your experience and it's going to depend on the third thing, which is investment in self.

Speaker 1: 17:06

So this is where we talk about training and development and education and certification. What sort of continual growth have you invested in for yourself? Are you invested in growing your expertise in this area and are you keeping up with ever-changing trends? Now, I'm not saying your clients are responsible for helping you recoup that investment. If you paid $5,000 for a certification, it's not your client's responsibility to help you recoup that income or that investment, but your level of continual development warrants consideration in your pricing.

Speaker 1: 17:36

Me, for example, I have 20 years plus of experience and while I don't charge a super high ticket to work with me. I certainly don't undervalue myself either. I come with a shit ton of experience, and so you will pay for that, and not just because of the experience, but because that experience allows me to get results for my clients. I have social proof, so that also factors into pricing. And then there's the final piece that I generally talk about with my clients, that a lot of people don't talk about, and it's your budget.

Speaker 1: 18:04

What do you need to earn in order to survive? In fact, that's probably the place you should start right. Again, your clients are not responsible for funding your lifestyle, but you have to take into account your living expenses. What do you need to make as an absolute minimum in order to break even in your own life? To pay the bills, to pay the mortgage, whatever it is that you have to pay rent groceries, because that's where you got to start, and so when you start to put all of those things together, you start to get a better understanding of what pricing should look like, and the great thing about doing it this way and not just plucking a number out of thin air, is that you share that price with more confidence on sales calls, and when someone asks, what do you charge for this or how much is this offer? You've done the work to quantify it and qualify it, so you know exactly why you charge what you charge.

Speaker 1: 18:50

And that's, I think, one of the places where most entrepreneurs get really stuck is like how do I confidently convey my prices? Well, you do the work. You do the work to qualify why you're charging what you're charging. You're not just looking at X coach or X consultant over there, x service provider, and saying they're charging $4.97, so I'm going to charge $4.97 for the same thing. You've actually done the work and it makes it so much easier to stand behind your pricing. When you can do that and you'll know, obviously, that as you gain experience and you start to get clients, real results that you can showcase, it's going to become obvious to you when it's time to raise your prices.

Speaker 1: 19:26

I'm not going to talk about scaling or anything like that today. That's definitely a topic for another episode but what I want to share is that pricing isn't arbitrary. It's not something as simple as adding extra digits to your pricing, which is essentially what a lot of coaches are telling you to do. They prey on your self-worth, they prey on your mindset and your confidence. And the reality is pricing has very little to do with mindset or confidence. It has nothing to do with self-worth. We already touched on that. So we've looked at high ticket from the perspective of a service provider.

Speaker 1: 19:56

But what about when you are the consumer? What about when you see an offer as a buyer, as a client, that is out there, that is high ticket, high priced. You absolutely must look beyond the sales page and you've got to look beyond the flashy sales call. You need to dissect what's really being offered. Like I mentioned before, most people aren't really even in agreement about what high ticket actually means. I've seen people say that they can be offers priced at $10,000 to $30,000. I've seen some say high ticket is anything over $2,000 to $3,000. But it also depends on timeframe. Right, like a $10,000 offer over a day or a weekend is high ticket, but that same 10K investment for a year-long coaching program is not the same. So the bottom line here high ticket offers are generally a big financial investment. For the vast majority of people they're not pocket change. So if you're any offer really. But we're on the high ticket train today, so let's keep riding Discernment becomes key.

Speaker 1: 20:55

Recently I was interested in a program with a $22,000 price tag for six months. I don't know if the six month programs are all in the 20,000. It's ridiculous. I applied Okay, more on applications in a minute. I want to touch on that for a second, but first of all let me finish this piece. I applied and was accepted and I booked a sales call with a team member and they went through the nuts and bolts of the program very briefly but were really really focused on sharing the main coach's accolades and her influencer status and testimonials from a bunch of people and lots of income statements.

Speaker 1: 21:28

Now I was interested in the program itself, like the framework, but something didn't feel right. So I reached out to two incredibly wonderful, savvy women who are in my circle and they took a look at the sales page and they took a look at some of the information I was sharing with them that I had learned on the sales call and they co-signed. It felt a little bit funny. The sales page was essentially a wall of testimonials very little detail about the program itself for the amount of money they were asking for and you had to apply which I had done, you know to get any of those details, because that's what they want, right, they want to get you on a call because FOMO is a powerful thing. Fomo is fear of missing out. And even with all my knowledge and expertise and experience and I, you know, I mean, I consider myself pretty savvy I was feeling really caught up in the sales chatter and the promises that they were making that this program was, you know, supposedly going to deliver for me. So my two wonderful friends, they reminded me no clear details on the sales page, red flag, number one and applications.

Speaker 1: 22:27

You know, sometimes I will apply to programs just because I want details and I don't really have any intention of actually taking the program. And here's the thing. Look, I know I am pretty awesome if I do say so myself, but I have never been turned away from an application process like legitimately. Nowadays you're seeing a lot of programs having application processes and they will say something like we only take 30% of applicants or we turn away a lot of applicants and blah, blah, blah. But it makes me wonder if I have never been turned away, if I've never been turned down for a program, whether it was like a $2,000 investment or a $100,000 investment, I've never been turned down, which makes me wonder how many people are actually being honest when they say they turn people away or they only accept a certain percentage of applications. Frankly, I personally think it's a baloney marketing tactic. But again, I digress. Applications can be another red flag. Have you ever clicked on an ad because you wanted details and they're like nope, I need your name, email, phone number and blood type first. No, thanks.

Speaker 1: 23:29

I think any program worth its salt will have details available for anyone who wants them, especially at a higher price point. Like, don't make me work for it. You should be working for my business, not the other way around, right? But they'll tell you no, they only want serious applicants. That's why they have hoops and why they supposedly vet candidates. Whether they actually do or not, I have my doubts. But my two wonderful friends.

Speaker 1: 23:50

They also came up with some really great questions for me to ask, which I did, things like what types of businesses did successful partners end up working with? So a little bit of context about the program. It was going to help me pitch to larger organizations, and so I'd ask the question, like your successful participants, being fully acknowledging of the fact that successful participants, it really depends on how much work they put in, et cetera, et cetera. But what kind of businesses did they end up working with? And the second question was was there a refund or option to opt out after a certain period of time if I joined and found that the program wasn't aligned or that I didn't really think it was the right fit? Because that's one hell of a commitment $22,000 for six months, right, it's like you're asking me to marry you and we haven't even met yet.

Speaker 1: 24:35

This is another reason why, by the way, I love lower priced offers. It gives people an opportunity to work with you as a test drive right, test driving what it's like to actually be in your space and you get to test them out too as a client, instead of being stuck with them for six months or for a year and dreading every single call you have with them. Lower priced offers definitely still have a place in the service business hierarchy. So, anyway, I asked these questions of the sales coach that I'd had the call with, and they came back with a vague list of industries, no actual business names, which I get can be like a confidentiality thing, but it was really vague industries, right, like shipping and sports. It didn't really niche it down enough for me to understand whether this was going to be aligned or not, and there was the blanket no, there are no refunds available at this time. Look, I don't know what it's like where you live, but where I live I can buy a car and by law I get seven days to change my mind.

Speaker 1: 25:29

It's called the cooling off period. Why the hell don't we offer a cooling off period for high ticket programs, like I'm sure you can drip content out, so those jerks who just want your content won't join and download everything and then bail? There are ways to control that. I really think we should offer get out of jail free options, right? The bottom line is, as a consumer, as a, as a potential client, it's your money. So if you're expected to make a huge commitment, financially and time-wise, empower yourself to ask questions. Ask uncomfortable questions, ask questions that require them to dig deep and not give you the rehearsed sales pitch answer. And if you don't like what you hear, trust your gut. Be empowered to walk away. Because guess what? High price does not automatically equal high value and regardless of what you offer, there needs to be intention behind your pricing. And as a consumer, it's your right and your responsibility to ask questions to make sure you're comfortable with the investment that you're making and confident it's going to be delivered in a way that gives you the results you desire.

Speaker 1: 26:32

One of my favorite people in the world said a while ago that if you're trying to make a decision about an investment and you feel a sense of urgency or desperation around it, it's probably your intuition telling you it's not the right investment at this time. If you're trying to make an investment decision and you feel really calm about it and you don't feel this like desperate urge to sign up right now and you're not feeling FOMO, then you're probably on the right track and it warrants a little bit more investigation. Anyway, that's just a really cool piece of advice that I got once and it stuck with me and I thought I would share that with you. So hopefully you found that helpful. Hopefully this has given you some food for thought and you're going to start looking a little bit differently at what high ticket looks like, at offers in general, at client experience and pricing.

Speaker 1: 27:19

And if you enjoyed this episode, please feel free to share it. And if you want to have a conversation about your pricing, about your client experience, check out the show notes. That is all I have for now. I will be back soon with more blasphemy that you can get behind, because remember, my friend, you can have success without the BS. That's it for this week. Thanks for listening to the Business Blasphemy Podcast. We'll be back next week with a new episode, but in the meantime, help a sister out by subscribing and if you're feeling extra sassy rating this podcast, and don't forget to share the podcast with others Head over to businessblasphemypodcastcom to connect with us and learn more. Thanks for listening and remember you can have success without the BS.