Give Yourself a Raise: The Mindset and Math You Need to Get to Your First Million

By Erin B Haag

"How much should I charge?!" It's the question that confuses so many self-employed women. Millions of women do not understand how to price their services correctly-and end up undercharging and earning less than they deserve.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Pricing Overhaul, LLC
• Release date: May 3, 2023
• ISBN: 9781956989236

Erin B Haag

Erin B. Haag is the founder of Pricing Overhaul™, a company that teaches self-employed women how to overhaul their pricing and make more money than they ever dreamed possible.Prior to starting the Pricing Overhaul™, Erin founded a successful Pilates and yoga studio in Palm Beach, Florida-which she ran for several years before selling the company for 40x her original investment.Erin brings 20 years of experience to her clients. From calculating your revenue, expenses, owner's salary, profit margin, and beyond, Erin loves crunching the numbers to determine exactly what you need to charge. Her motto is "trust the math," because the numbers never lie.Before becoming an entrepreneur, Erin worked for several top businesses in the health, wellness, spa, and beauty industries. Her resume includes area supervisor for LA Weight Loss, call center manager for Ideal Image, corporate sales trainer for SLEEK Medspa & Surgical, QVC spokeswoman for Britesmile, and regional director and teacher trainer for Power Pilates. Working for these multimillion-dollar brands taught Erin what to do (and what not to do) if you want to run a profitable business, and she passes along her knowledge to each client she serves.When she's not working, Erin loves soaking in her bathtub, attending French lessons, and planning her next family vacation. She lives in Florida with her husband, two daughters, and golden retriever, Lulu.Erin is available for speaking engagements, media appearances, and margaritas. Visit www.PricingOverhaul.com to stay connected with Erin and explore her courses and services.

Book preview

INTRODUCTION

It was June 17, 2015. I woke up at 5 a.m. to the sound of my crying infant. It was feeding time. I dragged myself out of bed, stumbled into her room, and began the usual routine. But something wasn’t right. My neck was incredibly stiff, and I had a pounding headache. I thought maybe I had slept wrong and pinched a nerve in my neck. I rocked the baby and hoped the pain would disappear on its own.

After returning my daughter to her crib with a full belly, I crawled back into bed, hoping to capture an extra hour of sleep. Sleep eluded me. I couldn’t relax because my mind kept racing through everything I had to get done that day. Take the girls to daycare. Rush into the studio. Teach clients. Manage the business. Answer a million emails. Pick up the girls and whisk them to their swim lesson. Whip together something edible for dinner. Bath. Storytime. Then bed. My head throbbed violently. If this pain persists, I wondered, how will I get everything done?

Persist, it did! I tried to ignore the pain and push through the day—something I’d done time and time again in the past—but this time was different. I could not do it. Within a few hours, the hospital admitted me, and the diagnosis came quickly: viral meningitis.

Suppose you’ve never had the pleasure of experiencing meningitis. In that case, it’s an inflammation of the brain and spinal cord that can lead to fever, chills, vomiting, a horrendous headache, and the kind of fatigue that makes you feel flattened by a truck. Not my idea of a good time! Your brain becomes so swollen that it actually touches the inside of your skull. The pain is so intense that no painkiller, not even morphine, can reduce it. Despite hearing all this from the hospital staff, I was still in denial. I felt certain I could spring back to my feet in no time.

Your immune system is pretty low. Considering your stress level... the neurologist informed me.

Stressed? I’m not stressed, I interjected.

Almost immediately, the neurologist said, You own a business, you have two babies under the age of two, and you’re still recovering from the kidney infection you had two months ago.

Oh right. I neglected to mention that I had been admitted to this same hospital two months prior with a kidney stone that turned into an agonizing infection.

The neurologist finished: Considering your stress level, it’s no wonder the viral infection crossed the blood/brain barrier.

I remained silent as the cocktail of antiviral meds continued to drip into my veins.

Okay. So maybe I was a little stressed.

I was the owner and founder of a well-established Pilates studio—and full-time teacher trainer and regional director for an internationally recognized Pilates certification program. Despite increasing revenue at my studio year after year, payroll was always tight, profits were non-existent, cash flow was unpredictable, and I was working more and more (sometimes even 50 hours per week) while paying myself less and less. And did I mention the two babies at home?

I laid in that hospital bed for four days—followed by two weeks recovering on the couch at home. Even though my body was screaming for rest, the studio never left my mind.

I was convinced, If I am not there, the business will suffer. I need to get back into the studio. But my suffering body wasn’t well enough to tend to my suffering business. My doctor insisted that I recuperate and stay away from work.

Sprawled out on my back, all I could think was, How did I get into this situation? I’m smart. I work hard. So, how come I never have enough money—and why do I feel so exhausted? What have I been doing wrong?

Here’s the thing about being forced to do bed rest. It gives you a lot of time to think. I reviewed the last several years in my head, trying to identify what, exactly, had caused my business (and life) to get into such an extreme state of distress.

Was the issue my branding, my marketing plan, my leadership style, my team? No. None of that. So then, what? As I evaluated my business, everything ultimately came back to one glaring issue: pricing.

The simple fact was that my prices were too low, and my pricing model set me up for failure. There was no way around it. The math does not lie. I was not charging enough to cover my business expenses, pay myself, and generate a profit, and I had zero predictable revenue. Most months, even when clients would pack into the studio, I was barely breaking even. That was the moment I realized that something needed to change—and that something was my pricing.

I had enough humility to recognize, I need help, so I enlisted the help of a business consultant and began the process of restructuring my pricing model.

Seeking help was profoundly uncomfortable. I had to confront so many of my business-killing decisions and quickly realized, My business is not set up for sustainability. The way I’ve been doing things is not working. I can’t go on this way.

I felt guilt, shame, anger, frustration—every emotion imaginable—including fear. I kept thinking, If I raise my prices, my clients will quit and go to another studio. People will be so upset. They won’t like these changes that I need to make. I was afraid to change my business, even though I knew the current model was not working. I had to remind myself daily, Set your emotions aside and trust the process. Ultimately, I rolled out a new pricing model, increased my prices, and announced the news to my clientele. It was a complete overhaul!

Once the pricing overhaul was complete, the business I once owned was no longer. What revealed itself in its place was a studio that operated seamlessly, generated predictable revenue, provided my staff and me with steady income, and turned a significant profit.

Three years later, almost to the day of my hospital stay, I sold my business for 40 times my original investment, debt free, with 100% of the sale proceeds going directly into my pocket.

All thanks to one (unwelcome) comment by a neurologist and the absolute power of math.

After selling the Pilates studio, it was time for a new chapter. I knew, I want to help other women do what I did—overhaul their pricing and change their life.

I saw so many self-employed women suffering needlessly—caught in a cycle of undercharging and overworking. Smart, accomplished women barely making ends meet, earning just enough to survive or getting deeper into debt. In almost every scenario, the root issue wasn’t the quality of their services. It was their pricing.

Over the next several years, I fine-tuned a specific process on how to evaluate your current business model and pricing, calculate the new pricing you need to start charging, and roll it out to your clients successfully. I call my approach: Pricing Overhaul®.

I made it my mission to end the madness and give women the tools they need to generate a profit—and have the life they want and deserve.

Pricing Overhaul®

Today, I run a coaching business called Pricing Overhaul®. The majority of my clients are self-employed women in service professions—think massage therapist, yoga teacher, dermatologist, gym owner, spa owner, numerologist, designer, copywriter, bookkeeper, coach, attorney—and here’s what these women share in common.

They’re excellent at what they do.

They are passionate about helping their clients achieve results, but they are working too many hours per week and not making enough money.

I work with each client to do a complete pricing overhaul. Upon finishing the process, my client has not only raised her prices (significantly), but she also has an upgraded business model—new premium offers with a premium price tag, new recurring revenue flowing in every month, and a whole new attitude about business.

Like I said. Complete overhaul.

The Weird Girl Who Loves Math

While I never intended to become a pricing advisor, looking back, it all makes sense that I ended up in this career. Math has always come easily to me. One of my earliest memories from childhood was being the weird girl who loves math at my elementary school. There I was, sitting in my first-grade classroom, boiling over in frustration because my fellow classmates could not understand the simple math problem on the chalkboard—and I couldn’t comprehend what was so difficult.

It wasn’t until I stepped into the real world that I realized that most people don’t think the way I do. I see the world in numbers. I solve problems very mathematically. It took me decades to recognize that I could use this natural ability to help women overhaul their businesses.

Lay Off to Entrepreneur

Since graduating from college, I’ve spent 20 years working intimately with numbers, metrics, and pricing for large corporations and small privately owned businesses—not just with my Pilates studio.

Before starting my Pilates business in 2009, I held some significant roles in corporate America. Area supervisor, corporate sales trainer, call center manager, and even a QVC spokesperson. This gave me a deep understanding of business math and metrics. So it was no surprise when, in 2008, my corporate job laid me off due to the recession, and I decided to go into business for myself.

But here’s the thing. Despite my natural aptitude for math and years of experience in corporate America, I made terrible decisions when it came to running my own business.

My emotional investment in my Pilates studio encouraged pricing decisions based on feelings, hopes, wishes, or fear—not based on math. This decision-making method led to a business in very poor shape, extremely high stress levels, and that fun bout of viral meningitis.

My point is that even if you’re a brilliant woman, you can make very dumb pricing and business decisions. It happened to me. It can happen to anyone. But once you have a process to follow and you understand how to do the math, you start making vastly better decisions. That’s what I will teach you to do in this book.

What You’ll Find In This Book

I understand that just mentioning the words math and numbers might have you ready to run screaming into the night. But I am here to tell you that this journey will be easier than you think. This is my zone of genius. I make this process so easy to understand that even the most math-averse lady can walk away feeling like a badass math ninja—and with a profitable pricing strategy to prove it!

Here’s what we’re going to cover.

In Part One: Shift Your Mindset, we will address the mindset issues that keep women trapped in a cycle of undercharging and underearning.

Why do you undervalue your services? Why do you undercut your prices? Why do you base pricing decisions on emotion, guessing, or copying a competitor—rather than actual math?

Why do you ask your husband, dad, or another male figure to make financial decisions on your behalf—rather than handling the numbers yourself? All of these choices stem from a particular belief system: that you are not good at math, that you are terrible with money, and that you cannot handle these matters successfully. All of this is false. To overhaul your pricing and business, we must first overhaul your mind.

We’ll discuss where these damaging beliefs about money and pricing come from—and why they’re so prevalent in our society. I’ll teach you how to tell your inner critic to shut the fuck up, a phrase my clients and I adore and use all the time. (It’s cathartic to say shut the fuck up to that inner negative voice. Say it quietly—or loudly if the kids aren’t around. Shut the fuck up!!! Doesn’t it feel so good?)

In Part Two: Overhaul Your Pricing, we will DO SOME MATH! This is the fun part. I can sense you rolling your eyes at me right now, but trust me. The math is so exciting—especially when the numbers reveal your dream life and business.

I’ll teach you how to plug numbers into simple spreadsheets (which I’ll provide for you) to evaluate your current profit margin, calculate your monthly break-even, your monthly revenue needed (with profit baked in), your capacity for clients, your monthly client usage, your monthly client value, and other numbers you need to know. If you have no idea what those phrases mean, fear not—I will explain everything in plain English.

By the end of Part Two: Overhaul Your Pricing, you will have a new, upgraded menu of services that you’re excited to roll out to your clients—with new, upgraded pricing to match. You’ll have a new pricing model that enables you to run a high-profit business, work less, and earn more—while providing a premium experience to the people you serve. It’s like a business makeover. Major improvement. This overhaul is a win not just for you but for your clients too.

And if you are wondering, But how do I announce these business changes and higher pricing to my clients—without upsetting them? Don’t worry, because I cover how to do this too.

To become a premium service provider with premium pricing, you must step into a new chapter of life. You are becoming a new and better version of yourself—not just at work but in all areas of life. In Part Three: Change Your Life, we’ll discuss how to embody this new version of you fully. Old behaviors you may have done in the past (paying an invoice late, haggling to get a discount, ordering the cheapest wine on the menu) is over and done, and you’re not living that way anymore!

If you want to attract dream clients who respect you as a business owner, then you need to carry yourself differently through the world. Through your thoughts, actions, purchasing decisions, attire, and even your posture, you need to show the world, I am a woman who delivers excellence to my clients. I get paid well. I hold unwavering and firm in my decisions. And I inspire others to do the same.

By the end of this book, you will know exactly how much you need to charge. You will feel more than worthy of the money you desire. And you will be unstoppable in all of your business endeavors.

It’s Time for a Major Overhaul

In the United States, women entrepreneurs typically earn 28% less than their male colleagues. Over the full span of your career, this adds up to millions in lost earnings that could have been yours. In addition to the economic and social structures that favor men, one of the main reasons women underearn is that we undercharge. Plain and simple. Change your pricing, and you change your life.

Once you overhaul your pricing, this is what happens…

You find yourself in a position where you can work 40 weeks a year instead of 52—and earn the same amount (or more) as before.

You can stop working five to seven days a week and shift to a four-day workweek—a reasonable schedule where you can breathe again.

You can become known as the premium provider in your industry—the top service professional, the go-to expert to hire, the best of the best.

Instead of earning just enough to eke by into the next month, you have surplus cash to invest back into your family, your health, and the things that bring you the most joy.

This is all within your grasp. You can have this kind of life. But you have to be willing to overhaul your prices. This is a step you must take. There is no getting around it. Doing this is not optional. And I’m going to help you do it.

By reading this book, you’re taking a powerful step toward the income and life you truly want.

It’s time to give yourself a raise—and get the mindset and math you need to get to your first million.

Let the overhaul begin.

PART 1

SHIFT YOUR MINDSET

1

YOU ARE GOOD AT MATH

I want to begin with a very important message. Consider this a public service announcement from one woman to another. If I could put this message on a giant billboard in the center of Times Square in New York City—so millions of women see it daily—I would.

YOU ARE GOOD AT MATH.

I know. I know. You’re reading this right now, shaking your head at me, thinking, I’m sure you say that to everyone, but seriously Erin, you don’t know me. I’m terrible at math.

I’m here to tell you: YOU ARE GOOD AT MATH!

Whenever I start working with a new client, one of the first things she says to me is, I suck at numbers. Math stresses me out. I’ve never been good at it.

I look her directly in the eyes and say, Can I be blunt with you? and wait for the approval nod before I continue. "Every time there’s a voice in your head

that says, ‘I suck at numbers’, I want you to do one very important thing."

And what’s that?

I want you to tell yourself to shut the fuck up.

Her jaw drops to the floor, and her eyes bug wide open in disbelief as she processes this information.

"Talk back to that voice in your head and say shut the fuck up! Because those four words—‘I suck at numbers’—are no longer allowed inside your head.That statement is a complete lie. And if somebody were lying straight to your face or insulting your intelligence, you would tell them to shut the fuck up…would you not?"

She trepidatiously commits to this assignment and nervously chuckles, Okay, okay, I promise I will tell myself to shut the fuck up.

By the time our work together is finished and about a million shut the fuck ups later, she is a completely different woman.

She’s tracking her numbers daily and updating her spreadsheets weekly. Keeping a close eye on her metrics. Oh, and she’s raking in the money!

Why, then, does every single client initially think she’s bad at math when clearly she is NOT? And why do women allow this false narrative to keep them trapped in terrible financial