Business revolves around the exchange of money.
And yet, it can be hard to talk about, especially when you’re talking big numbers.
The reality is, you can’t succeed without talking money. But you can feel more comfortable talking about it by keeping two things in mind.
1. Your job is to advocate for your clients
Remember you’re there to be an advocate for your clients, which means you need to understand their goals and the value of those goals in order propose something that makes their investment worthwhile.
Knowing the outcome they want and the value of that outcome to their business allows you to create a scope (and price) that works in their best interest.
Which brings us to the next point.
2. You also need to advocate for yourself
Once you know what success looks like and what value will be generated for your client, your next job is to ensure the engagement will be worthwhile for you, too.
After all, you can only work with some many clients and you need to be profitable with each one.
Not “cost-covering”, but actually profitable.
If you advocate for your clients while seeking to create a clear win-win, money shouldn’t be hard to talk about.
Be frank and honest about money up front. Ask questions about outcomes, value, and scope. Figure out what job you’re really doing.
You want a clear win-win scenario, after all. Which means you can and should talk about money plainly.
If you can’t talk about money, you might be thinking of the transaction as being a fixed-sum game where one person loses and another person gains.
The opposite is true if you come from a place of advocacy for yourself and your clients.
If you do it right, value gets created for both parties.
That’s one of the beautiful aspects of business.