Had a 5 minute chat with a freelancer at Starbucks that wrecked my whole pricing model

I was grabbing coffee last Thursday and this freelancer told me she charges $150 an hour for basic social media management. She works from home, no overhead, and clients pay it without blinking. Are we really that afraid to raise our rates or do we just enjoy working for scraps?

3 comments

3 Comments

the_lisa1mo ago

Most people just copy what everyone else charges and never test their own limits. That $150 freelancer figured out confidence is worth more than credentials. Your pricing model isn't broken, your belief in your own value is.

wadew511mo ago

Man I had a buddy who did graphic design on the side for years. He was charging 50 bucks for logos while people who did worse work were getting 300. One day he just snapped and told me he was gonna ask for 500 on the next project no matter what. Client said yes immediately and he said he actually felt kind of stupid for not doing it sooner. He bumped everything up after that and lost maybe one or two cheap clients but made way more money overall.

jade5171mo ago

Ugh this hit me right in the gut lol. I've been the person charging $15 thinking that's all I'm worth and watching other people charge way more for the same work. It's honestly exhausting to constantly second guess yourself when you know you deliver good stuff but your brain keeps telling you that you're not good enough for more. The crazy part is when I finally just said screw it and raised my rates by a lot, nobody even blinked. They just paid it. Still working on believing I deserve it though lol.