#245 - Why You’re Afraid to Charge More (And What To Do About It) - Secret Sonics

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey everyone, it's been and it's been passed over over here.
So life has been a bit nutty. So we've decided
Carl and I to share the audio from this video
that Carl recently made about raising your rates. We thought
this was a good thing to share with our audience
here on Secret Sonics. So here it is. Hope you
enjoy it and let us know if you found it valuable.

Speaker 2 (00:20):
Here you go.

Speaker 1 (00:22):
Hi, I'm Ben and I'm Carl, and you're listening to
Secret Sonics Honest conversations chock full of tactical advice to
help you build your dream career in music and audio.

Speaker 2 (00:33):
Whether it's skill development, mixing mindsets, personal branding, or work
life balance. We talk about ways to help set yourself
up for success in the ever changing music industry.

Speaker 1 (00:41):
Let's get started.

Speaker 2 (00:44):
Every music producer and engineer wants to raise their rates,
but most of them don't. And it's not because they're
not good at their craft. It's not because they don't
know how to make our clients happy. It's because they're afraid.
They're afraid of losing their existing clients, they're afraid of
scaring away new clients, and a lot of these reasons
they tell themselves why they can't raise their rates. Most

(01:06):
of them are complete bullshit. So today we're going to
break apart some of the lies that studio pros tell
ourselves because we're too afraid to have the difficult conversation.
I'm Carl Bonner, and I spent the past twenty years
in the music industry as a drummer, mixing engineer, and educator,
building a global freelance business without living in a major
music city. Now I help gaming winning engineers and producers
to grow a business that doesn't rely on luck or

(01:28):
word of mouth. It is a scary thought that you're
going to lose your clients. When I talk about these assumptions,
I want to be very clear. I think that they're
based out of humility and also maybe even based out
of genuine love for what you do. Like that's I
think one of the hardest things for us as creatives
to get over is the fact that we also love
doing this, So it feels harder to justify charging more

(01:52):
money because it's not like something that we hate doing.
If we hated doing what we do, we would raise
our rates every other day, you know, we would have
their promplesive but it's it's not even just the relationship itself,
and we're afraid of losing It's like, well, if I
don't work with it anymore, even money aside, I like
making that music. I like doing that thing. So there's
also this internal struggle too, where we're trying to figure
out the balance between how do we justify getting the

(02:15):
rates that we feel like we really should be getting,
but without scaring away something that we enjoy doing. I
want to be clear of that. I'm not trying to
say that it's a totally irrational fear of raising your rates,
but I think some of the specific reasons that producers
and engineers use are not entirely based in reality, or

(02:35):
at least they're not based on data. They're based on
an assumption, they're based on fear, and they're based on
what they think might happen. I'm going to make a
musical analogy for this, like an actual production and creation analogy.
I get a lot of ideas. I have ADHD and
I like making music, so unsurprisingly, I get a gazillion

(02:56):
ideas about what to do. We can try in different ways.
We can approach this. The section of the song, and
one of the things that hurts my soul and makes
me want to cry is when an artist shoots down
an idea before we try it. I have a long
history of bad ideas. Musically speaking, I'm probably for my
life as well with that's another story. But I've made

(03:16):
a lot of mistakes. I've heard a lot of things
that didn't work. But in those situations where I've tried
to do something weird and new and unexpected and unfamiliar,
there are sometimes where that just completely opened my eyes
to the artist's size, and I get so mad when
an artist assumes that an idea that we have this
think going to work, and I want to try it

(03:38):
and find out for myself. Most producers of engineers probably
feel that same way too, Like if they have an
idea they really believe in, they want to try it,
and they get mad when somebody makes an assumption that
it's not going to work. But thinking about raising your rates.
We make a lot of these assumptions and instead of
actually get having that conversation trying to figure out how

(03:59):
to make it work, we catastrophize and it's like, oh,
if I try, oh my gosh, if I try adding
reverb to the vocal, the artist is never gonna work
with me again, Like that's not a thing, right, And like, yeah,
money's a touchier subject than reverb. But the idea of

(04:21):
finding ways to have the conversation and finding ways to
present your idea in a way that makes it seem
like the obvious choice. If we go back to the
production analogy, I could say, I think that we should
get rid of the bridge. I don't think the stemy
is a bridge. The artists might get a little panicky, right,

(04:42):
maybe they'd agree, maybe they trust me and they just
do it, or maybe they get a little bit panicky.
But if we say, because of the story arc of
the song and the way that this is growing, and
like right now, that bridge isn't really adding a whole lot,
and I feel like if we maybe shopped it in half,
I think that's going to be way more effective in
telling the story that you're trying to tell. Then if
we go through this long, slow build of the bridge,

(05:05):
that doesn't really quite go anywhere. So I think we
should try this. I think a lot of the artists
that trust you will at least try it. So how
does that relate to rates? When we have clients, especially
clients that we've worked with before that love us, and
they found something about us that they are really drawn to.
That's not just the music itself, right, It's not just

(05:27):
the sounds. It's not just some microphones that you have.
It's not just the comfy couch and the endless supply
of bottled water or whatever like, it's not that. There's
something about you, something about your personality and your tastes
and your experiences and your perspectives, and that is what
makes them keep coming back and working with you. Well,
an artist that really cares about what they do and

(05:48):
an artist that actually values what you bring to the
table when they make the decision about hiring you. It's
not just about the money. Yes, everybody's going to have
through limit. I don't what to stick them across is
like some pie in the sky, like every artist is
magically going to just like be able to triple their
budget tomorrow. But or artists you've worked with before that

(06:10):
love you, They love the process, They love the collaborative
energy that you bring to the project. Having that conversation
about raising your rates isn't going to be as much
of a smack in the face to them as I
think you're thinking it's going to be I've got bust
of numbers out of thin air. But let's say that
you were working with an artist for a while and
the last time you worked together it was four hundred

(06:31):
dollars for a mix, and now you want your race
to be six hundred for a mix. A really great
way to handle this conversation. I've done this many, many, many,
many many times. I mean probably dozens or hundreds of times.
At this point. What I do is I will say,
I am so excited to work on new music with you.
I've always had a really great relationship with you. I
feel like we see to eye on a lot of things,

(06:53):
and I feel like it's always just like a great time.
I know the last time I worked together, I was
charging four hundred personal and just want to let you
know my rate now for new clients is six hundred,
But because you're awesome and we've worked together before, I
don't want to charge you that full rate. So I'm
happy to do it for like five hundred if you
want to meet me in the middle. It's a way

(07:14):
that you're able to get twenty five percent increase in
your rate. But they feel like they're getting a deal
so ultimately the issue is we're afraid of saying the
high price because we think that all they're going to
think about is the high price. But really, if we
frame it in a way that they realize the excitement
that you guys share together in the studio, they remember
how fun it is to be with you, they had

(07:35):
great experiences, they love you, they love the music, and
they're going to find more value than just the price tag.
And when you're able to have that conversation acknowledging your
appreciation for them, acknowledging that energy that you have when
you work together, and then saying, hey, this isn't the
new price, this is the new full price for new artists.
But because you're you, I don't want to charge you that.

(07:59):
I'm happy to give you a discount and meets you
in the middle at whatever that number is. There are
gonna be people that can't afford it, right, and obviously
depends on how big your your price changes. But if
you try this conversation and they end up saying that
they really appreciate it, but they just they physically can't
do any more than that because of like their their job,

(08:20):
or like medical expenses or you know, whatever the other
things are in their lives. Then number one, they're gonna
still appreciate you even more and I fe'e leave it
more special because you extended them in that discount. And
even if you say you know what, you're awesome, let's
just stay at four hundred for the dog. And even
if you say you know what you're awesome, like CD,
shut up, look you're awesome. I don't care. Let's just

(08:44):
do the old price. Don't even worry about it, like,
I just love working with you. They're gonna feel super appreciated.
And also you're not going to be any worse off
than you were three minutes ago. That's the thing. It's like,
you're not going to know until you try. And if
anybody does come back and it's like, what the hell,
Carl you think you are? That's a pretty big red
flag about that person anyway, And if anything, you were

(09:07):
dodging a bullet. I think only than one artist ever
actually fight me on it. And I don't work with
them anymore, not because to look prices, but because they
were pain in my ass. But the worst thing that
can happen is they can't afford it, and you decide
to stay at that same old rate, or you decide
that maybe you don't like that client as much and
they're not as good as a fit, and you just say,

(09:29):
let me know if things change, let me know if
your situation changes, and we can get moving on the song.
It allows you to make a decision instead of an assumption,
and I think that's huge. Hey, real quick, since you're
still watching this, that shows you're probably pretty serious about
improving your studio business and that you want to be
a reasonable human while we do it, which means you'll
probably love Studio Land. It's where we deep dive into

(09:51):
attracting more creatively fulfilling clients and make more money while
you do it. So there's a link to the free
trial and the description. Yeah, okay, back to the video.
I'm sure that as you're listening to me ran about this,
you're probably also starting to feel a little bit anxious.
You know, maybe this is bringing up some bringing up
some memories, or maybe you are feeling that the stress

(10:13):
of even thinking about having that conversation and it's not
just a conversation of raising your race with past clients,
having money conversations in general, that's something that so many
producers and engineers have such a hard time with because
it's generally not something taught in audio school. If you
came up through a big studio system, like let's say

(10:33):
you were an an intern and then a runner and
then an assistant to the assistant to the regional manager
or like whatever you were like kind of working your
way up, the pricing was never one of your responsibilities.
You were told what you were going to get paid.
And if you started out, you know, school of hard
knocks figuring it out, and you try to learn about
pricing through YouTube, business books or whatever. So much of

(10:55):
it is tailored for other industries entirely, and even if
you think about it, within the creative fields, we are
in this weird, unique spot where we are creative, weirdo
of humans trying to sell a service to other weird
creative humans where we want them to trust us with
their musical baby. Right. It's like we're a therapist and

(11:18):
we're a babysitter, and we're a technician and we're a
collaborator artist you know, I mean, we're all of these
things at once. To say that, money conversations just feel
murky and uncomfortable, like duh. That's why the people that
we're talking to also feel very uncomfortable about the money conversation.
So how do we get over that? The first up

(11:40):
to getting over that fear of even having the conversations
in the first place is prominding ourselves that we're not
going to know until we know for sure. So the
idea of they're not going to pay our rates because
they could get somebody else cheaper. Okay, they could probably
get somebody else cheaper, but are they going to get
me cheaper? Am I doing a good enough job expressing
what makes me unique and highlighting those things that make

(12:02):
my happy return clients come to me over and over again.
My highlighting that enough so that people see it and
they don't make a comparison between me and the other
person on engineers aren't sound better, and they just see
me as like this unicorn that happens to be a
super badass at the weird specific thing that they need
help with. Like, am I clear enough about that? If

(12:25):
the answer is yes, they're not going to hire anybody
else because there is no other option. Supply and demand
works in your fever when the supply is you and
you alone, right. Another big assumption is if there are
people with bigger credits charging less than me, why would
they want to hire me. So one of the most
counterintuitive things that I've seen when working with so many

(12:47):
engineers with Grammy's number ones all these things, is that
they still have a really hard time finding clients and
they have a really hard time getting paid real rates.
It seems so backwards. But the people with the bigger credit,
especially those that have been in the industry for a
long time and didn't really need to think about branding
and marketing and their website and social media and all
these things. They came from a time where if you

(13:10):
built it, they will come, and that time is gone.
Just because you have impressive credits does not mean that
you know how to sell your services. The business side
of this, especially for those people that came up through
a big studio system and they got connected with like
a big producer and they have billions of streams on
their Muzo dot Ai screenshot. Just because you have those

(13:33):
credits doesn't mean that clients are going to come to you,
And a lot of times it's actually kind of backwards
where people won't even consider them because they think, oh, well,
they work with Metallica, they work with Inndell. They work
with Rihanna, so why would they work with me? I
think the issue is that if you want to raise
your race and you want people to even know that
you're available, you need to be approachable. So then you

(13:56):
have people that have huge, huge, shuge, huge shares portfolio
charging less for mixes than I charge, and I'm kind
of a nobody, you know what I mean relative to
my students stuff. To be fair, I'm not teaching them
how to mix. I'm teaching them, like you know, the
branding and marketing and client acquisition stuff. But the fact
that I have students that have worked on some of

(14:18):
the most important albums in the past thirty years and
I'm charging more than they are and getting paid it
It shows that it's not just about the credits. In
the end, if you can leave with one little nugget here,
it is that your value, the value that you can
provide to the clients that you can really, really do
a great job with it is not going to be

(14:40):
based on your portfolio. It's not going to be based
on your credits. It's not going to be based on
what Mike you have. It's not going to be based
on how perfectly flat your mastering spaces. It's going to
be based on how deeply you understand what they need
and what they're afraid of and what they're aiming for,
and your ability to effectively communicate to them that you'll

(15:01):
understand that and that you want to be a part
of that. Thank you so much for watching. I hope
this was insightful and helpful, and I hope that you
take the leap and raise your rates, because I'm going
to make a pretty safe assumption that maybe you're a
little overdue for that. But in any case, like to
subscribe do the things that YouTubers tell you to do.

(15:23):
I appreciate it. Let us know in the comments if
you think I'm totally full of crap, or if you
agree with me. I'd like to have a conversation either way.
So thanks again for watching and I'll see you next time.

Speaker 1 (15:35):
We hope you enjoyed this conversation as much as we did.
If anything here resonated with you, please share this or
your favorite episode with a friend.

Speaker 2 (15:42):
And as always, we'd love to hear from our listeners,
so find us on social media at Secret Sonics.

Speaker 1 (15:47):
At Ben Wallach Music, and at.

Speaker 2 (15:49):
Carl Bonner until next time.

Speaker 1 (15:52):
Bye Ben, Bye Carl. That's good. I think the octro
is great.

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#245 - Why You’re Afraid to Charge More (And What To Do About It)

Episode Transcript

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