Something I have wrestled with since the day I launched the 5 Day Website Challenge is how much I’m giving away for free.
The 5 Day Website Challenge is like, my whole entire web design process from start to finish. It’s the same process that clients pay me thousands of dollars to do for them, broken down into over five training videos.
When I first launched it back in January of 2015, it was completely free with a Facebook group for support, and I earned affiliate commissions from those people that chose to purchase my recommended products.
In the first 6 months the challenge grew from 0 to about 600 people – but what I realized is that most people are joining the Challenge after they already have web hosting, which is where I make the bulk of my affiliate commissions, so I wasn’t making as much money as I had expected based on typical conversion rates.
Then about halfway through 2015, I decided to make the Facebook group a premium feature because it was there that I was spending a couple of hours a day answering questions that people had whenever they’d get stuck.
I put this weird pressure on myself that I had to be in there constantly, letting no question go unanswered for more than a couple of hours, which was a super tall order considering I still had a day job and everything else I was doing for my company, WP+BFF.
Guess what happened after I did that? Everything slowed. People stopped sharing the 5 Day Website Challenge. They weren’t upgrading to get access to the Facebook group. My email list growth stalled and my affiliate commissions stalled.
I realized that I had removed a key part of the Challenge that helped me build the know, like, and trust factor that’s required for selling online – me, in the group, showing up, providing value and getting to know people – so I made the Facebook group free again, but set the expectation that I’d be in there answering questions just a couple times a week instead of 24/7.
In my quest to further monetize what people would tell me, wow, I can’t believe you give all of that away for free, I joined a premium priced sales coaching training boot camp.
My intention was to learn how to better sell my extended WordPress training. When I had my one-on-one call with the course creator, she swiftly told me that I should make Days 1 and 2 free, but make people pay to continue the Challenge. Her reasoning was that most people were dropping off at Day 3 anyway, so why not get the people that are fully invested to pay.
And I get it. I understand what she meant by getting those people who were already bought in to by in further and giving them a chance to pay me, but I actually never tried that… It just didn’t sit right with me. It felt like a bait and switch. I mean, I’m sure I could have made it work so it felt authentic, but at the time I just couldn’t see how. My gut told me not to do it.
So I continued doing what I was doing for a while until it was time to update my videos, which I do about every 6-9 months.
At that time, I also decided to upgrade my online course platform. I was using OptimizePress, which at $99 a year is a steal over other online course platforms, although sometimes it feels like you have to be a rocket scientist to get all the options just right for it to work the way you intend (which is why I created a course on it, but that’s another story).
My mentor-from-afar Nathalie Lussier had just released her AccessAlly plugin and I had just moved from Mailchimp to Infusionsoft for my email marketing platform, so I was totally able to use her plugin – and I was pumped because it really is like the cream of the crop when it comes to online course plugins. It’s so intuitive and it’s really built with the entrepreneur in mind.
So instead, I decided to offer an instant access upgrade. I got the idea from Nathalie Lussier’s 30 Day List Building Challenge – it’s a totally free training that is dripped out over 30 days, but if you want to unlock all 30 Days at once, you can pay like $27 and get it all.
So I decided that instead of taking part of the Challenge away after a couple of days and putting it behind a paywall, I’d make an offer to the people that really were serious and major action takers and give them an opportunity to get access to all 5 days of the Challenge at once plus some bonus content for just $17.
But to be totally honest, I wrestled with it. Sometimes it felt like I was totally devaluing myself. If I really wanted to quit my day job, I did need to make actual money to pay the bills, right?
So last fall, I was at a conference in my hometown called Women in Digital, and I can’t even remember what the session was about, but I could feel this internal struggle building up in me during the presentation, so when it was time for Q&A I raised my hand and I said, “I’m a web designer, and I provide 1:1 web design services but also teach entrepreneurs how to build their own websites with WordPress, and I have this tutorial series that I give away totally for free. But I struggle with this all the time – why would anyone hire me when I’m giving away my entire process for free? I feel like I’m shooting myself in the foot sometimes.”
And the presenter told me to go buy this book called Getting Naked and it would give me some perspective on why I should keep doing what I’m doing.
So being the good student that I am, I promptly ordered it on Amazon Prime and it arrived at my door the next day. I cracked it open, and read the first few pages and I was like, “Okay, this is SO BORING, I don’t see what it has to do with my question at all, I don’t have time for this, I’ll read some other time.” And I put it on my bookshelf and there it sat, for a year.
And in the meantime, I relaunched my 5 Day Website Challenge again, this time testing a new monetization strategy: free for 30 days, upgrade for $29 any time for lifetime access.
A few weeks ago, something inspired me to pick it back up. Who knows what. So it’s a story about this guy who works at a management consulting firm that acquires their nemesis consulting firm who like, wins every single contract and has raving fans for clients and gets all their business on referrals and has like no sales team. And it’s this guy’s job to go in, figure out what’s going on with all of their clients and absorb them all into this monster firm.
And he’s shocked one day when he goes out on a pitch meeting with this firm because they didn’t have a sales presentation or big partners with them, they literally went into this meeting and got straight to work on figuring out what the problems were and providing solutions.
And the mean guy is like “You’re working for free? Aren’t you going to bill them for that? You weren’t even prepared with a sales presentation.” And the other guy is like “We don’t do that, we’re partners with our clients, we don’t care if they go and use one of our ideas from that free meeting and go make $10 million dollars, we know who they are going to call or refer when they need someone.”
And that’s exactly what I have experienced. People who built websites with me three years ago with my free Challenge are now at a point in their business where they are ready to take it to the next level and too busy to DIY, or they just need something more robust that they want my team to build for them.
People that built a website with me that will probably never buy a single thing from me send referrals my way constantly which result in revenue.
The word of mouth marketing I get is awesome. Would I make more money if I put everything behind a paywall? Maybe in the short term, but I think I’d have to spend a lot more on marketing to get people in the door.
And my $29 for lifetime access test? Some people are going to tell me that price is way too low and that I’m making it seem like it's not worth it to pay for. Others will tell me it’s too expensive. Others think it’s a bargain, and others think it’s the right price. It’s all relative.
But in looking at my stats – if people are going to upgrade, they do it in the first 5 days because they are super motivated to get their site done. And those people that upgrade are likely to become customers of my other products – and it’s because they are the type of target customer I’m trying to attract, not because my training isn’t any good and no one will pay for it – which is a thought I’ve been guilty of thinking even in the face of hundreds of testimonials that say otherwise.
If people don’t upgrade then, what my data shows me is that the majority – not everyone, there are always exceptions – but the majority are unlikely to complete the challenge at all, let alone pay for lifetime access.
So I tell you all of this today to tell you two things:
Don’t be afraid to give away your best stuff for free. Not your TIME, but your best information, tips, and strategies. It shows your expertise, builds your credibility and it builds trust and the value comes back to you in other ways besides money. Referrals. Customers who have been waiting for the right time to work with you. Word of mouth.
And two: test different pricing strategies and be willing to accept whatever outcome the data shows you. Try not to get your self-worth all tied up in it. Test different things, find what feels right for YOU. As you gain confidence, you’ll increase your price. And everyone if going to have a different opinion of your price. Try not to have making money be the only factor in your pricing strategy. I know that sounds weird because it’s business, and we’re in business to make money, but I’m also in business to make an impact AND make money. What about you?
Today’s pep talk is brought to you by Bluehost. Go to www.shannonmattern.com/bluehost and get 36 months of web hosting for just $2.95 a month. That’s less than one trip to Starbucks a month – and if you’re anything like me, you’re at Starbucks more than that!
Then you can sign up for my Free 5 Day Website Challenge at www.shannonmattern.com/5day and I’ll show you step by step how to get started building your new website for your side hustle.
