Aug
24
Johnny Says Stop With The Martyr Shit Already
I wrote this post. Me, Johnny. The last time Naomi ran a post of mine that didn’t have “Johnny” in the title, her mother was tricked into liking me because she thought Naomi wrote it — and probably because I talked about punching Ashton Kutcher repeatedly in the face. I can’t have that happening again. If we’re going to start assaulting celebrities, I want it clear to everyone’s mother that it was my idea.
I wrote this post. Me, Johnny. And I wrote it because I embarked on this effort throughout June and into July to get my readers off their asses, and I realized even as many got off of their asses that there’s one troubling issue that, if left unaddressed, will doom any GOYA effort. And it’s this:
Most people think that earning money is bad.
I’ll give you a second to clean up that coffee you just spilled down the front of your shirt., and when you’re all tidy and ready to listen to more of my stupid, nonsensical, unfounded bullshit, we’ll continue.
You may think it sounds ridiculous to claim that people think earning money is bad, but it’s true. If you don’t believe me, then ask yourself a few questions… and if you pass this little quiz with flying colors, try to put yourself in the shoes of Joe Average and ask them again:
1. Have you ever secretly resented a friend’s raise or good fortune?
2. Have you ever seen a rich person and thought, “He probably inherited it rather than earning it.”
3. Have you ever extolled the virtue and simple dignity of modest living, or thought of manual labor as a special kind of “good, honest work”?
4. Have you ever made a lot of money and stopped yourself from telling anyone, or else played it down?
5. Have you ever been buying something for a price that seemed reasonable — and then, discovering that the profit margin was huge or that the seller “wasn’t actually doing much,” gotten mad and suddenly resented that same price?
Now think about your answers, and think about the little justification game that’s probably going on inside your head right now. At the root of every “yes” response is the belief that earning a lot of money is somehow gratuitous, or ignoble, or the work of corruption.
Listen to that battle carefully, because whichever voice is winning will determine how successful your business can ever be.
Look, I’m not telling anyone how to think. If you feel that having a lot of money is gratuitous or ignoble, that’s your business. But don’t try to Get Off Your Ass, start a new venture. and then wonder why you’re not making any money if you do.
If you think that modest living is noble, you’ll never charge enough to prosper because that would mean that you’re unprincipled.
If you resent people who charge a lot of money for a small amount of work, you’ll always find a way to work long hours for low wages.
If you think that sales is about getting people to let go of hard-earned money rather than about exchanging value, you’ll never be able to sell a fucking thing.
This topic may seem to be a real tangent coming from me, but it’s been on my mind recently because in June, I debuted my coaching/consulting service. Then on July 15th, I launched my “Make the Internet Your Bitch” course (which will get a new title soon, by the way; I misjudged my branding). It took me a while to decide on prices for those things because it meant putting a dollar value on my knowledge and ability in a very fixed and tangible way for the first time.
Honestly, I thought. What is my knowledge worth? Because knowledge is not a bundle of shingles or three pounds of diamonds. It’s intangible, with a value that is up to speculation.
If I priced too low, I would devalue that knowledge. I would be saying that what was in my head wasn’t more valuable than a bowling ball or a loaf of bread, or maybe a small TV.
But? But… if I priced too high, part of me still protested that I’d be perceived as “asking too much for not ‘doing’ much.”
If you aren’t screaming right now that I should be paid for my knowledge and that I am not doing nothing just because I’m not hauling heavy rocks, then you’re guaranteeing yourself a future of hauling heavy rocks. The minute you try to make a profit without breaking your back to do it, your mind will remind you how loathsome that is. Your mind will doom you to failure because it’ll remind you that knowledge should be free and that hauling fewer rocks makes you a louse who expects money for nothing.
I’ve got a story to go with this. It’s an adaptation of a famous parable:
A man discovers that his very valuable and specialized computer is broken. He tries everything he can think of to fix it, but is unable to. He calls everyone he knows, and nobody can help. He takes it to various repairmen, but none of them can solve his problem. Then he hears about a technician who specializes in this type of repair, so he calls him. The technician comes in, turns one screw a quarter turn, and then says, “That’ll be five hundred dollars.” The customer hits the roof and says, “Five hundred dollars? That’s ridiculous! All you did was turn one tiny screw!”
And the technician says, “The charge isn’t for turning the screw. It’s for knowing which screw to turn, in which direction, and how far.”
If you think that the technician’s charge is ludicrous, think carefully about why you feel that way. Then ask yourself if, feeling that way, you could ever double your rate even if people were willing to pay it. Ask yourself how much luck you’ll have trying to find ways to do less and earn more. Think about the connection you’ve made between hard labor and money, and how tightly the two are tied in your mind. Ask yourself if you’ll ever truly prosper with that work-money link in place.
Now put yourself in the customer’s shoes in that little parable. You’re allowed to be shocked at the technician’s price, but ask yourself if in the end, you’d gladly pay it. Ask yourself if you’d shell out for results and valuable information regardless of how much “work” was required by the seller. Ask yourself if you’re truly going to refuse to let go of the notion that large amounts of money are only earned through hard and long work.
Think about it: Was the customer paying for a certain kind of performance from the technician? Or was he, in reality, paying for the end result of restoring his computer to working order?
Would the fee somehow have been more reasonable if the technician had spent ten or twenty hours working on the problem… but the result was the same in the end?
And given that nobody else could fix the computer, would the customer have preferred that it remain broken? If not, was the service in fact worth the charge?
If you still feel that what the technician did amounts to exploitation, ask yourself if he’s selling water in the desert or oxygen in outer space. Exploition occurs when the customer has no choice but to buy.
For 99.99% of sellers, you cannot exploit your customers because if your service is not worth what you’re asking, the market will naturally move away from you. In other words, your customers have the option not to buy.
You cannot believe that high prices are exploitation. You must believe that they are justified charges paid in exchange for products or services of equal or greater value. You need to believe that your customers are damn lucky to have you and your expertise. You need to believe that you deserve to be paid well. If someone knocks your value, it should make your blood boil.
Traditional belief says that vendors should be thankful for customers. But if you don’t believe the inverse is true as well, you’ll never truly prosper. Sales isn’t just about receiving money. It’s also about the customer receiving value, and you’d better fucking know that deep in your gut. The income you receive isn’t charity. You fucking earned it.
One final story, and then I’ll let you get back to that coffee you keep spilling on yourself.
I belong to a forum, and it’s full of really cool guys. When I self-published my book, I let them know, and many of them bought it. I thanked them. They thanked me for the books. We had a tight community, and these guys were like my brothers. But while this was going on, this one guy writes the following:
“Where are the profits going? I’ll buy if they’re going to a worthy cause, like maybe to help run this site, but why should I otherwise? I asked once earlier about this and he made some flip response about buying hookers.”
And I replied:
“You know, I’m getting really tired of this Robin Hood shit. I wrote the book. Me. Therefore, the profits are going to ME, the person whose intellectual fucking property it is. Maybe if you want to work for nothing, you could spend months creating something and then give it away, or maybe just go to work and do your job for free because God forbid your boss should have to pay you for it.
I gave you a flip response earlier because I thought you must be joking, implying that I should do anything with the money other than what I deserve to do with it: WHATEVER THE FUCK I WANT.”
He was implying that what I was offering was of so little value that I should be paid nothing for it. He was implying that I should do all the work, but that the profits should go to people who did nothing.
Put yourself in my shoes. If that wouldn’t make you rage, your dreams of prosperity die here and now.
You earn more when you believe that what you’re giving in exchange is incredibly valuable. Feel it. Know it.
Consider a consultant who charges $500 per hour. Who the hell decided she was worth that much?
She did.
It was ultimately up to the market to either agree with her or not — but she had to believe it first.
There is nothing wrong with making money. There is nothing wrong with charging whatever the market will pay for services of value, regardless of how much “work” appears to be involved.
Believe that. Believe it with all your heart and soul.
If you can’t, if you don’t, or if you won’t, then you frankly should stop reading about marketing and get the fuck out of business.
JOHNNY’S NOTE: I actually wrote this post back in June, before Naomi went and got all Canadian for the summer. So, updating it now, I realize I have a TON of new interesting experiences as a neophyte online businessman to relate, all of which will hopefully make you all tingle with excitement (not excrement) because you’ll be flush with new ideas for your own business.
AMEN brotha.
Freelancers are embarrased to mention money, this space is full of talented people that think it’s noble to struggle…with the goddam ruby slippers that you need to KILL IT on their feet.
Let’s bounce.
This is a really amazing post, and one that I – and I think a lot of other people – have needed to read for a while.
Money is NOT bad — it’s what people are willing to do to get it that can be.
If you LOVE what you do and you make lots of money doing it, kudos.
But if you aren’t living, if you think your reason to exist is to make money and get stuff and there’s no joy, no deep relationship, well…you’ve got some thinkin’ to do.
Johnny, I’m probably not the only one to notice it, but I’ll be the one to ask. Did you say we’d be “flush” with new ideas because of what you said four words back? I’m getting a really uncomfortable mental image of what’s happening with all those ideas.
This value-free comment brought to you be the wonderful people who decided to run a trash truck under my bedroom window starting at 6 a.m., rendering my loopy for the entire morning.
This is the bane of all counselors’ existence. We see our poor defenseless client and want to help them with every fiber of our being. So we drop our rates because they’re hurting, and we don’t want to hurt them more.
Thing is, we’re not water in the desert.But if we specialize in something, we may be that computer repair guy though.
Thanks for this. No flushing, more like jumper cables on my brain. Now I need to go make more valuable stuff that can help people!
Drew, it’s Johnny. Could he possibly NOT have intended it? :)
Drew… I actually did NOT intend it on a conscious level, but when I re-read it, I totally thought I should have made some adolescent parenthetical joke after “flush,” since it was so (in)appropriate.
Great Post, There is one place in town that sells a buffalo chicken calzone and my buddies play a game
How much would you pay, Its a great value at 6 dollars but I would pay upwards of 10 and not feel ripped off at all. Its so worth it.
I sell e-books and keep my costs low but people really seem to enjoy them and we put TONS of free content out there. I could charge more but still just launching the whole thing. Great post though and this mindset is how people win in life.
This is from one of my posts on my buffalo chicken calzone.com website
If I have said this once, then I have said it 1,000 times. It is one of my most passionate stances of anything that exists on this earth.
I would rather pay 8.50 for a delicious wrap where I know that quality is going to be consistently delivered than 5 dollars for some bullshit attempt at a sub just because it is only 4-6 dollars. (im not singling out subway.)
When you find an item like this, you save it for special occasions where a normal lunch will just not satisfy you
Amen man, great post
I agree with your basic premise, that is, that the value of something shouldn’t be equal to the time on task or the financial cost of producing it. That is a wage slave mentality and a recipe for disaster in any business, which relies on healthy profit margins to succeed.
However, I don’t think it’s such a bad thing for someone to feel responsible for providing value WAY past the financial cost of the product they are selling. As Yanik Silver says, we should all be aiming to create 10 to 100 times the value of the cost of our product. And as you stated, usually the market itself will let you know if you’re NOT providing appropriate value for the cost you’re charging.
Just because you want to produce a lot of value for the price you’re charging doesn’t mean that you lack the proper “wealth consciousness” to make it in business. In fact, feeling guilty about charging too much for a crappy product will make you an extremely successful entrepreneur in the long run.
At least that’s the way I see it.
A workman is worthy of his wages… a famous quote from the good ole bible. Its very true and people that resent hard earned wealth are usually too lazy to do it themselves.
Good job!
Reminds me of an old Picasso story someone told (heavily paraphrased from a bad memory).
Picasso was smoking in a Paris cafe, watching it all go by. A woman passing by on the street noticed him and stopped.
“Mr. Picasso, what a pleasure to meet you! Would you be kind enough to draw something for me?”
“Of course Madame, give me just a moment.”
He made a few easy strokes with his pen on a napkin, signed it and handed it to her.
“There you are. That will be $5000.00 please.” [Or Francs, or whatever... he asked for a lot of cash]
“Oh. But how could you ask such a high price for a simple drawing that took you all of one minute to make?!”
“My dear, I ask that price because the ‘simple drawing’ you hold in your hand took me an entire lifetime to create…”
This is excellent — very well said!
Most people (myself included) have hang-ups about money they’re not aware of.
Heh…reminds me of a cartoon I saw recently where a car pulls up to a red light next to a bike rider who is obviously tricked out for a super-long ride. The driver says through the window, “What kind of gall do you have, taking such a long bike ride when it’s NOT for a charitable cause?”
Wow! Bravo. Unequivocally well said. As a yoga and meditation teacher, I get this alot. Some think you should have a begging bowl and do it free because it’s “spiritual.”
Ok, you’re right. I’ve got nothing else to add.
Isn’t it CRAZY how we can sometimes get in our OWN way?
“Money isn’t the root of all evil. The LOVE of money is the root of all evil.”
*Jared
For the record, I still love money. I just don’t love it above everything else. But yeah, it’s pretty damn cool.
Caveat: I may be evil.
Johnny,
“The loudest person in the room is usually the weakest person in the room” (to the guy who questioned whether you should give your money to Tibetan monks and not feed yourself first)
“State your fee confidently and shut up. He who talks next loses.”
Everyone should learn to do just what you have done. Figure out your worth. Learn to attract those who appreciate that value. Fuck everybody else. I wish I had learned this earlier in my small biz career. Fear of rejection, fear of failure, fear, fear, fear. It will keep you small forever if you don’t face it.
(Both qoutes are from http://www.hellomynameisccott.com)
“…I gave you a flip response earlier because I thought you must be joking, implying that I should do anything with the money other than what I deserve to do with it: WHATEVER THE FUCK I WANT.”
And THAT’s the problem. Somehow, we’ve come to believe that money someone has rightfully earned actually belongs to ALL OF US.
We’ve managed to slip into a collectivist mentality that suggests profit is “evil” and that one who generates value is obligated to “give it back.”
WTF!? You nailed it, Johnny. If people didn’t freely decide to pay, you wouldn’t have money. Since they did, you do. And it’s YOURS. Do with it whatever you will. It’s nobody else’s f-ing business.
No sanctimonious twit gets to tell you otherwise. Unless he’s from Inland Revenue, apparently.
So, anyone up for some Ayn Rand?
Dude, The Fountainhead rocked my world at the tender age of 17. I should read it again.
I loved that book. You should read Atlas Shrugged. It’s about “idea people,” sick of being hounded to support the people who aren’t doing anything, deciding to go on strike and vanish from the world.
You can skip most of the like 80-page quote in the middle of the book.
@Johnny – I bought Atlas Shrugged after reading The Fountainhead, but never got to reading it. Good reminder, thanks. I’ll imagine you giving me permission to skip the middle part when I read it. That will probably save me an hour or two.
See, look at all the value you provide. Saving me so much time and all.
That was freaking BEAUTIFUL!!!!!
I loved this post. The bit about “knowing which screw to turn” especially rang true. I often angst about how much I charge people, especially in the current economic climate when there’s so much competition, and can lose sight of what my value is. But you “nailed” it right there (sorry, another dreadful pun!!).
Right on, man.
Holla! Love it. I’m tingling with excitement (not excrement)
I work with wellness practitioners in private practice (and I am one) helping them to grow their thing, and the poverty martyr thing is as widespread there as it is among artists. Maddening. Money is a beautiful thing.
It did make me think of this crappy client I had recently who’s charging $97 for her crappy information product which is full of stupid ideas, but she somehow thinks that because she knows the names of all our favourite gurus and has bought so many of their products she knows a thing or two.
Only stupid people are going to buy this product because she will have succeeded in convincing them to believe that she can help them, but of course she can’t – the product is full of useless information that anyone stupid enough to buy the product will barely understand anyway.
But she’s worked hard on it and put in a lot of effort so she believes it’s worth $97 and people who buy it think so too, but they won’t care either way when a month or 2 passes and they can only barely grasp in a subconscious way that the product hasn’t helped them.
Just thought I’d share and reflect on the fact that in a parallel universe where stupid people sell worthless stuff to other stupid people, what your saying is . . . also true.
The stupid seller makes what she thinks she deserves and the stupid buyer pays what they think it is worth and neither of them ever realize the product is crap.
It’s all relative.
A retiring music teacher in my city phoned me one day saying that she would like to refer her students to me. She knew my reputation in the area and wanted to leave her students with the ‘best options’.
One of the very first questions she asked me was about my fees. When I disclosed what I charged, I heard a shriek on the other end of the phone, quickly followed by a click.
The next day I got one of the most condemning emails I have ever received.
“I thought you were a GOOD teacher. GOOD teachers CARE about their students. You are a charlatan… a thief. All you care about is the MONEY. May you rot in hell!”
I did a little digging and found out that this lady was indeed doing ‘charity work’ in her neighborhood. “Whatever the students could pay, that’s all she would accept.”
Well, it wasn’t long before all the rats, cockroaches and other ‘freebie’ seekers came out of the woodwork. This lady had a full schedule of students paying anywhere from $5-$10 per month! And I imagine she DID have a few freeloaders as she turned nobody away who ‘really wanted to learn’. (At the time, I was charging $80 per month for four 30 minute sessions).
I know exactly the type of students she attracted. I used to get calls from them all the time, too. In addition to my ‘exorbitant’ fees, I also told these blood suckers that they needed to invest in a PROPER piano so they can practice (cheapest starting at $2,000). Most of them thought they could get by on the $30 toy they bought at Walmart! They were also serious when they told me they wanted to learn their favorite song (usually some Beethoven Sonata) by next week. I told them, “You’re not looking for a teacher… you’re looking for a goddam magician! GOODBYE!”
Boggles the mind.
Your article is dead-on Johnny. While my blog is more ‘family style’, I LOVE the way you tell it like it is! You and Naomi are among my favorite reads. Rock on, Dude!
Oh…
Further to my last comment: I had taken music lessons since I was six years old. I went through four years of college to earn a Bachelor of Music Education degree. I had not only invested DECADES of my time, but 10′s of thousands of dollars on instruments and books, for myself personally as well as for my business which I ran for 37 years.
I kick myself today because I really undervalued myself, considering all the blood, sweat and tears I had poured into my chosen profession.
But then to have some freakin’ DING DONG tell me to rot in hell… the world can seem like a crazy place sometimes!
Wow, Russ… I can’t fathom that message you received. Damn. And for daring to quote $40/hour?
I don’t understand the “thief” attitude that people sometimes have. You’re not robbing anyone. Even if you totally suck and are not worth it, can people decide not to hire you?
The fucking martyr mentality out there.
I got to this blog by clicking around an Itty Biz email I got today, and I have to say, between this post, and what I’ve had a chance to read over at Naomi’s… I feel a lot better and more confident about my pursuits.
I have an Etsy shop with jewelry, etc (I know, soooo original) and I undervalue my pieces aaaaalllllll the time. Especially in that arena, the competition can get to you.
It wasn’t until recently, when I started tutoring a couple grade school students over the summer, that I realized how much I’m worth – and how much I’m NOT worth. It took delivering a different service to see what I’m good at and what I suck at, and that, combined with this post, speaks volumes: CHARGE MORE FOR WHAT YOU’RE GOOD AT… and maybe step away from what you suck at.
Thanks, Johnny, for this catalyst. I’m about to get paid more now, for stuff I’m good at and enjoy doing. :) Le woot.