skip to content

← back to the plays

independence6 unconnected · 1 more author in those circles
standing

contested · 19 claims against 4

applies to

b2b, no audience needed

assumes $100 and up

outcome not stated

confidence

high

evidence

23 claims · 11 articles · 4 receipts

window

2012-03-18 → 2024-10-01

6 builders who never spoke to each other · contested

Charge for the result, not the hours

Quoting an hourly rate drops you into a comparison set with data entry and legal work, caps your income at the hours in a week, and penalises you for getting faster. Consultants across several unrelated practices describe the same replacement: establish what the work is worth to the client's business in their own numbers, then quote a fee against that outcome, anchoring with a range when the payoff cannot be pinned down. The dissent is practical rather than philosophical, since hourly genuinely suits a scope that is still moving.

Where this splits

Kogan, Zipursky and Swinehart treat hourly billing as a ceiling to escape, while Dunn argues hourly sold on the client's own interest closes better, Riley recommends it outright when scope is uncertain, and Cohen sets price from what the buyer will bear rather than from any share of value.

  1. side 01 · 19 claims

    Quote a fee against the client's business outcome

    Brennan Dunn · Greg Kogan · Michael Zipursky · William Durkin · Zach Swinehart

    1. 1Set the price from the effect the work has on the client's business, not from what the market pays for the type of deliverable you produce.
    2. 2Tie the quoted rate explicitly to the money the project will make them, because a weekly rate presented without that link is just a rate.
    3. 3Use value pricing when you can name the result: a fixed fee for a forecast outcome, which becomes an easy decision once the forecast payoff is at least double the fee.
    4. 4Use value anchoring when scope will move: quote a weekly rate times an estimated number of weeks, but only after the buyer has understood what the project earns them.
    5. 5Anchor rather than fix the price when the payoff itself cannot be pinned down, and put a range or a best guess early in the proposal.

  2. side 02 · 4 claims

    Bill hourly or price to what buyers bear

    Brennan Dunn · Dru Riley · Jason Cohen

    1. 1Sell hourly billing on the buyer's benefit: it lets you change direction with them as requirements move, instead of you resisting every small change to protect a fixed price.
    2. 2Bill by the hour when scope is uncertain, and publish a rate band by seniority so the price is not a negotiation.
    3. 3Compete on perceived risk rather than skill: the consultant charging ten times your rate is usually not ten times better, they simply look like the safer bet.
    4. 4Set price from what the buyer is able and willing to pay and from the model you want to run, not as a share of the value you calculate you deliver.

What it returned

  • $20,000

    Brennan's own proposals present something like four weeks at a weekly rate of $20,000, reaching $80,000, after the client has already heard the project is worth hundreds of thousands to them.

  • 40

    His example: 40 hours at $600 is a $24,000 fight to win, but if the client expects the work to unlock $10 million in revenue then $24,000 - or even $50,000 - needs no justification.

  • 30

    He puts the ceiling on selling time at roughly 30 to 40 hours a week.

  • $240k

    He points out that a $240k target turns into defending a $240 hourly rate in every pitch, and that moving from San Francisco to Idaho would not halve the value of the work.

Sources

the second source

Three plays a week, for the phase you are in

No roundup of links, no news. Three tactics more than one builder arrived at separately, with the numbers each one returned and the disagreements left in.

One email a week. Unsubscribe in one click, and the address is used for this and nothing else.

More in pricing

all pricing plays

the second source

Three plays a week, for the phase you are in

No roundup of links, no news. Three tactics more than one builder arrived at separately, with the numbers each one returned and the disagreements left in.

963 corroborated plays to draw from · 3 a week

One email a week. Unsubscribe in one click, and the address is used for this and nothing else.