Blair Enns - Pricing Creativity: A Guide to Profit Beyond the Billable Hour

RockBench Publishing Corp.
6101 Stillmeadow Drive, Nashville, TN 37211
rockbench.com

2018 Blair Enns
All rights reserved. We encourage you to share the principles of Pricing Creativity. You may share brief quotations from this content with full attribution. Distribution, reproduction, adaptation, derivative works, or transmission of this content in any other form requires the prior written permission of the author.

Liability: the author or publisher shall have no liability to any person or entity with respect to any loss or damage, caused or alleged to be caused, directly or indirectly, by this content.

Printed in the United States of America
Published 2018 | First Printing
Published simultaneously in electronic format

Library of Congress Control Number: 2017963437
ISBN-13: 978-1-60544-053-8

Binder and interior design by Aespire {aespire.com}

To inquire about bulk copies of this book, email info@winwithoutpitching.com or call +1-250-353-2591

As Blair wrote in the Acknowledgments, weve never met, but I feel like weve had a long conversation from reading Pricing Creativity. Blair has distilled the essence of value pricing in this superlative work, full of excellent advice: From having the value conversation, how to handle risk, all the way to centralizing your pricing and replacing timesheets with more meaningful measures. This is another nail in the coffin of hourly billingan idea from the day before yesterday that needs to diefrom one of the industrys major thinkers.
Ronald J. Baker, Radio Host, The Soul of Enterprise: Business in the Knowledge Economy; author of Implementing Value Pricing: A Radical Business Model for Professional Firms, and Pricing on Purpose: Creating and Capturing Value

For every firm faced with the margin pressures created by marketers current obsession with cost cutting, embracing the principles and practices in this book is by far the most effective step they can take toward regaining and maintaining a healthy bottom line. Supported by lots of real-world examples, Blair shows how firms can apply the same creativity they employ solving their clients marketing problems to getting paid for the value they create instead of the hours they work.
Tim Williams, CEO, Ignition Consulting Group; author of Take a Stand for Your Brand: Building a Great Agency Brand from the Inside Out, and Positioning for Professionals: How Professional Knowledge Firms Can Differentiate Their Way to Success

What makes this book remarkable to me are three things. First, it is written to a specific audience of creatives. If thats you, you will see yourself. Second, its written by that fields leading sales training authority. Third, its readily applicable to specific instances. The hard work of building a bridge between theory and practice has already been done, and youll find the principles immediately applicable.
David C. Baker, consultant; author of The Business of Expertise: How Entrepreneurial Experts Convert Insight to Impact + Wealth, and Financial Management of a Marketing Firm

I spent over seven years researching, experimenting and implementing value pricing in my firm. I wish I had Pricing Creativity back then. Its the only value pricing book Ive read that provides a clear explanation of both the theory and the practical application. It should be on the shelf of every designer and design firm.
Jon Lax, Design Director, Facebook; founder of Teehan + Lax

You had me at the Table of Contents. Pricing Creativity is a no-nonsense, bulletproof, mind opening follow up to the game-changing book The Win Without Pitching Manifesto.
Chris Do, founder, Blind and The Futur

Pricing Creativity is a timely, invaluable read for an industry desperately in need of pricing reform.
Gerry Preece, partner, External View Consulting; former Procter & Gamble Global Director of Marketing and Media Procurement; author of Buying Less for Less: How to avoid the Marketing Procurement dilemma

If you want to secure the successful future of your creative business, read Pricing Creativity from cover to cover and then act on Blairs extraordinary advice; its always invaluable.
Shan Preddy, partner, PREDDY&CO; author of How to Run a Successful Design Business, and How to Market Design Consultancy Services

Blair has given us a treasure map to unlocking a better future by helping us understand the value of what we create, as well as why we struggle to see it.
Carl Smith, founder, Bureau of Digital

By the end of the first section I had highlighted so many brilliant insights that I gave up and just read the damn thing. Make space on your desk because youre never going to put this book away.
Jonathan Stark, author of Hourly Billing is Nuts: Essays on The Insanity of Trading Time for Money

The timeless issues of how to price and sell a design project are Blair Enns domain. Hes spent a career coaching hundreds of creative firms on how they can improve their finances. Now, thankfully, hes put that coaching into a book. And its excellent.
David Airey, designer; author of Logo Design Love: A Guide to Designing Iconic Brand Identities, and Work for Money, Design for Love: Answers to the Most Frequently Asked Questions About Starting and Running a Successful Design Business

Anyone managing clients or business in the creative profession needs to read this book. Understanding the commercial value you add, and how to do value-based pricing, will be the key to unlocking your future growth and profit potential.
Andrew Hoyne, founder and CEO, Hoyne; author of The Place Economy

Whats the value of this book? Somewhere between the retail price and a few million dollars. It depends on you, and whether you have the discipline and courage to put Blairs concepts into action. You can read the book, apply the ideas, and winor you can spend the rest of your life working nights and weekends and chasing profits. Which are you going to choose?
Dave Gray, founder, XPLANE; author of Gamestorming: A Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers, and Liminal Thinking: Create the Change You Want by Changing the Way You Think

Blairs advice on pricing and positioning was invaluable while we were growing MetaLab from a tiny studio to a global brand. I wish this book had existed when I was getting started.
Andrew Wilkinson, founder, MetaLab

This isnt a book. Its the solution to one of the most vexing problems facing experts from any fieldhow to price their expertise.
Carl Richards, founder, The Behavior Gap; creator of The New York Times Sketch Guy Column

Creative agency owners looking to escape the tyranny of hourly billing will find the myths of value pricing unlocked, and a clear roadmap for financial success.