Business and Economics

I Set My Prices and Always Throw in My Own Time for Free - How to Price Services with Preparation, Revisions, and Overhead in Mind, and Build a Clear Offer Without Letting Awkwardness Set Your Rates

By Max Paradox

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Length6h 33m

About this audiobook

Your client is delighted. Your invoice looks impressive. You've delivered everything you promised, plus a few little extras that somehow required three additional meetings, two evenings, and a growing suspicion that you've accidentally started a charity. Congratulations. Your business is thriving. Unfortunately, nobody has informed your bank account. I Set My Prices and Always Throw in My Own Time for Free is a sharp, funny, and practical guide to one of the most expensive habits in service businesses: charging for the visible work while quietly providing everything surrounding it for free. Whether you're a freelancer, consultant, creative professional, independent specialist, or small business owner, you've probably encountered the mysterious economics of an assignment that looked profitable until you actually completed it. The original job was straightforward. Then came preparation, correspondence, unexpected complications, customer questions, revisions, and that innocent little request beginning with "Could you just..." Apparently, "just" is a unit of measurement that means absolutely nothing. Max Paradox takes you behind the attractive numbers on your quotations and into the financial reality of delivering professional services. With intelligent observational humour, relatable situations, and useful explanations, this book shows how to recognize the costs and commitments that routinely escape your calculations. You'll discover how to estimate the real work involved in an assignment, account for preparation and business overhead, and distinguish revenue from actual economic return. You'll learn why the number of hours available in your calendar is very different from the number you can realistically sell. But pricing isn't simply arithmetic. The book also explores the uncomfortable conversations that begin when customers question your fees, ask for discounts, change their requirements, or announce that something complicated should be easy because it will "only take a minute." You'll learn how to build clear offers, define what's included, manage reasonable revisions, and respond to additional requests without turning every customer interaction into a confrontation. You'll also examine when hourly billing makes sense, when fixed project prices work better, and how recurring agreements can become expensive promises of unlimited availability if their terms aren't properly defined. There are practical insights into rush assignments, subcontractors, loss-making projects, payment schedules, overdue invoices, and the surprisingly important difference between having revenue on paper and having money available to pay your bills. And because a sensible price today can become an unsustainable one tomorrow, you'll learn to recognize when costs, workloads, and customer expectations have changed. This isn't a book about squeezing every possible dollar from customers or becoming the kind of entrepreneur who treats ordinary negotiation as an extreme sport. It's about developing a business that can be generous without being financially careless, approachable without being endlessly available, and professional without apologizing for charging money. You don't need perfect estimates, fearless negotiation skills, or a spreadsheet complicated enough to require its own technical support department. You need clearer decisions, better commercial boundaries, and a price that reflects what you're actually agreeing to deliver. Your time can be valuable, your service can be excellent, and your customers can be happy. It's even possible for you to get paid properly. What a revolutionary business concept. This publication was prepared using tools that support the creative process, including artificial intelligence solutions. The final concept, structure and editing are the responsibility of the author.