7 Ways to Build Your PR Pricing Confidence (So You Can Get Paid More!)

Whether you’re already a PR agency owner or you’re looking to make the switch to PR, you’d love to be making more money without working more, right? I mean, who wouldn’t?! But no matter your experience with PR, you’ll have to go through a major confidence makeover before you set your PR pricing. 

Maybe you have a gut feeling that you’re not charging enough for your services, or you already know that your rates don’t truly reflect your value. Or maybe you’re tired of the constant grind of hourly or deliverable pricing and want to increase your revenue without increasing your hours. Regardless, it’s time for a change—you deserve to earn what you’re really worth. 

How to Build Your PR Pricing Confidence 

Before you go changing up your PR pricing, you’ve got to improve your mindset and confidence. When you share your new pricing with your clients you need to do it with certainty and poise. Here are 7 steps to building your PR pricing confidence so you can finally charge what you’re worth. 

Switch to a Retainer Model for Your PR Pricing

One of the easiest ways to earn more without working more is to switch to a retainer model for your agency’s pricing structure! Stay away from hourly pricing at all costs.

The goal of the retainer model is to help you generate predictable, consistent, and recurring retainer revenue every single month. You won’t have to scramble for more projects to fill your hours or increase scope on a project. 

Once you implement retainers in your agency, aim for 6-month minimums for all clients. You know that PR is a long game—you need enough runway to actually generate results! And if clients are uneasy with the longer time frame, be sure to educate them on how PR is cumulative. 

Those 6-month retainers give you enough time to convert long-lead pitches and start to really generate momentum for a brand. Plus, your clients will get a strong sense of what it’s like to work with you after having been partners for half a year! 

Establish Value With Your Clients Early On 

While you’re educating your clients on how PR really works, take the time to establish the true power of PR early on in your process. Always talk about your work in terms of value. 

Elaborate on the value you provide with your services instead of just listing the individual tasks you do. This will help you position yourself as a premium provider (who is worthy of a premium fee). 

One super powerful way to establish value immediately is to be genuine and show up to serve in your very first conversation with a potential client. Don’t give away your strategy (obviously!), but do show off your expertise and highlight some of you and your team’s strengths and accomplishments. 

When a prospective client leaves your conversation feeling like they’ve already gotten a ton of value from your chat, they’ll be more inclined to start working with you to get even more of your expertise! 

Related: How to Know Your Worth So You Can Attract High-End Clients and Premium Rates

Don’t Share Your PR Pricing Before (or During!) a Discovery Call 

This is majorly important, everyone: do not share your PR pricing with a potential client before or during a discovery call. No standard pricing, no pricing estimates, nothing! 

Instead, you’ll want to have a conversation with your prospective clients about their budget so you can align your expectations early on in the process. This chat will serve as an immediate way to figure out if the client is a good fit for your agency (and vice-versa) and see if the partnership will work out well. 

But when you’re on a discovery call, don’t fall into the trap of being pressured by a client to share your prices right then and there. You can (and should!) take the time to craft a detailed proposal post-discovery call with clear pricing breakdowns for the client. 

Wondering how to host the perfect discovery call to land your dream clients every single time? All of my secret strategies (that I’ve cultivated over almost two decades running my agency!) are inside The Agency Accelerator, along with SO MUCH MORE. 

Set Your Prices Based on Value

So you’ve got your retainer model in place and you’re putting together a prospective client’s proposal. But how do you quote accurate PR pricing with your new retainer-based structure if you’ve never done it before? 

If you’ve been working off an hourly rate or project-based structure for a while, your instinct might be to price your services based on what you’ll do. But when you price based on deliverables, activities, or hours, you’re turning your work into a commodity, erasing your unique value and driving your fee down. 

With your new retainer model, you need to price your services based on their outcomes and value. When the client talks about what they want you to do, reframe the conversation around the outcomes they’re looking for, and then price your services for that. 

It’s the outcomes that your clients want, not the tasks you’ll be doing, that matter. 

Shift Your PR Pricing Mindset 

A huge part of diving deep into PR (and stepping into your role as a PR agency owner) is shifting your mindset around pricing. 

Remember: you’re offering your services to clients, not asking them to work with you. 

So many entrepreneurs, service providers, and PR pros feel uncomfortable charging what they want and deserve because it feels like they’re asking for something. But you can’t let that mindset stick! You’re not asking your client for anything; instead, you’re offering to bring major value to your client’s brand as a service provider (NOT an employee). 

Practice Confidently Sharing Your Pricing with Clients 

You know what they say: fake it ‘til you make it! 

Practice saying your new prices out loud before you start sharing them with clients. It sounds silly, but it seriously works! Repeat your PR pricing to yourself when you’re on a walk, folding laundry, or in front of the mirror before you start working each morning. 

You’ll build confidence and poise in explaining your rates to potential clients, whether that’s in a proposal or on a call.

Related: How to Develop Confidence in Your PR Skills

Step Into Your Role as an Agency Owner 

Once you’ve got your PR pricing down and you’re building your confidence, it’s time to focus on growing your role as an agency owner. A huge part of the anxiety and discomfort surrounding pricing your services is the employee or freelancer mindset. 

When you step into your role as an agency owner, you need to shed your old ways of thinking and start shifting your mindset towards growing, scaling, and creating predictable, recurring retainer revenue in your business. 

What if you had a roadmap with resources, strategies, and insider, expert guidance on exactly how to start, grow, and scale your dream PR agency? That’s exactly what I’ve created in my signature program, The Agency Accelerator. 

We dive into all things PR pricing, and that’s just one tiny facet of what we cover. Join the waitlist now to secure your spot next time we open the program for enrollment! 

Switching up your PR pricing can be intimidating, but you need to focus on two things: value and confidence. As you build your confidence as an agency owner and shift to the value-based retainer pricing model, you’ll be able to finally charge what you’re worth and earn what you deserve.