How much can I charge for
Advisory Services?
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How long is a piece of string?!
As an accountant or bookkeeper, you’ve probably been asked the age-old question: “How much do you charge?” It’s a question that can leave many of us scratching our heads, especially when it comes to advisory and unstructured services. Just like the enigmatic nature of the string’s length, the pricing for your services ultimately depends on the value, insight, knowledge, and wisdom that your clients can extract from your services.
Let’s unravel this mystery and discover how to determine the right price for your expertise.
Simpler Structured Advisory
When it comes to structured advisory services like management reporting, cash flow forecasting, budget creation, and strategy sessions, pricing becomes somewhat simpler. However, even within these categories, there’s a wide range of pricing based on the value you provide to your clients. We’ll get back to pricing for these services shortly, but first, let’s dive into the more challenging territory – unstructured advisory.
Complex Unstructured Advisory
Conversations, hand-holding, advice, suggestions, feedback, and holding your client accountable can be much more difficult to quantify the price for. To address this, you might consider offering clients the option to book meetings with you or your team. By providing different meeting durations (20 minutes, 30 minutes, 45 minutes, an hour, half a day, or a whole day), you can tailor your services to meet your clients’ needs and charge accordingly.
Don’t undermine your value
For advisory services, it’s essential never to undervalue your time. Charging less than £150 per hour undermines the insight, wisdom, support, and impact you bring to your clients. In fact, offering your expertise at this price point is an absolute bargain. Remember, you hold the power to shape businesses and make a significant difference in their success.
Always remember your shoes
On the other hand, if you’re providing more ad-hoc support, you may want to consider increasing your pricing for bookkeeping and accounting services. This adjustment allows you to allocate more resources to providing your clients with the personalised attention they deserve. Business owners are often willing to pay a premium for exceptional service when they recognise the value compared to a budget alternative – just think about how you shop.. Would you purchase the cheapest pair of shoes you can find or are you happy to pay a premium for quality, comfort and trust?!
Pricing Threshold
Interestingly, £150 emerges as quite the magic number. This price point applies not only to an hour’s meeting, but also to the more tangible offerings mentioned earlier like cash flow forecasts and management reports. Even the most basic and automated of these services should not be priced lower than £150 per month. This price applies to those clients with a turnover below £50k – any greater, then your price should be greater.
Price increases with complexity
However, for clients requiring more complex reports, forecasts, or extensive assistance, the sky’s the limit in terms of pricing. You can literally charge thousands per month for each of these services, tailoring the cost to match the level of support and value you provide.
For instance, a client with a £24k turnover likely only requires basic management reporting and short-term cashflow forecasting and so would be happy to pay £350 per month. Whereas a client with £2m turnover will require more in-depth reporting, longer term forecasting that is 3-way (cash, P&L and balance sheet), scenario planning, variance analysis and bespoke KPI monitoring etc and so would be more than satisfied paying even £8k per month, knowing they receive significantly more value from your expertise.
If you still need help…
The question of “How much can I charge?” no longer needs to create confusion or uncertainty. By considering the value you bring, tailoring your pricing based on service type and complexity, and recognising the transformative impact you have on your clients’ businesses, you can confidently set fair and lucrative prices for your advisory services. Embrace the string’s infinite possibilities and unlock the true value of your expertise.
If you still need a helping hand with pricing however, register for my next Pricing Webinar here: https://calendly.com/more-than-bookkeeping/pricing-webinar
Join the accounting revolution
Are you ready to embrace the potential of advisory in your practice and become a catalyst for growth?
If you haven’t fully explored these services yet, it’s time to consider the immense value they can bring to your clients and your practice; this is before we even consider the additional revenue and profit it can generate for both you and your clients!
By integrating advisory into the services you provide, you position yourself as a forward-thinking, proactive professional, capable of delivering holistic support that goes far beyond the numbers. Advisory allows you to guide business owners, shape their success and help them achieve their aspirations.
So, embrace the power of advisory, and unlock the full potential of your profession as a trusted advisor.
Need Support?
Click on the “Schedule Time With Me” button where you can book a (free!) virtual cuppa with me; register for my next Advisory webinar or book a 1:1 Superhero session (power hour) depending on the help you need to take your advisory offering to the next level.
To celebrate the launch of my blog, I’d love to thank you for taking the time to read by offering you a significant discount on my Superhero (Power Hour) sessions – Book here before the 31st August to take advantage of the £51 saving!
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