Dr. Kimberly Douglass (00:00.608)

In this society, we are often put in a position, and a lot of us are put in this position from childhood, and especially if you're an eldest daughter, where you are expected to, you have obligations to the community that are not reciprocated, then you may not even think to ask people to pay for it in the first place. You know, we are in an environment where we are constantly being

Our attention is being directed towards scarcity. And so we are constantly being told that there's not enough out there for everybody, but especially for us. A lot of black women have been like high performing black women have been excluded from things that we should have had access to. If you've been in that situation and I can give you times throughout kindergarten, elementary, middle school, high school, like I can give you any number of examples where that has happened in my own life.

One of the things we don't like to do is we don't like to exclude people. For any job offer, you always want to do a counter offer. It's important to understand that in most cases, you are being lo-

Erin Braxton (01:15.63)

Hey everyone, welcome to the Coffee No Cream podcast. My name is Erin Braxton and I am the host of Coffee No Cream. Here on Coffee No Cream, we are unapologetically dedicated to black women and we share what I like to call Coffee No Cream moments, those things that happen to us black women in business and in life just because we are black. Now, today we have a really, really, really powerful episode for I think every black woman because we're gonna be talking about

how to price yourself out in the world. We are not mediocre white men. We are not white men period. The rules do not apply to us the same as they do everybody else. So how we navigate these spaces, get what we want, value ourselves in the right way is key. I personally have had lots of problems just mentally, psychologically with

how to price my services. It brings me a lot of anxiety when it's time to put forth an estimate or quote. It's been like that since the beginning, since I started working. And, you know, we talk about why. I have Dr. Kimberly Douglas, our pricing expert, who is going to share with us why it is we Black women have so much anxiety when it comes to

putting forth a quote when it comes to charging what we're worth. You know, I talked about this a little bit in a previous episode, but I'm not an expert in this. And so I knew it was important for me to get one on here to help you figure out your pricing and why we do the things that we do and what we need to do to do better. Okay? So we had a great conversation. We talked about pricing yourselves as an entrepreneur. We talked about how to...

go in and negotiate for your salary when you are hired for a job, what to do when you're looking to get promoted, when you're looking for a raise, pricing, what we are worth. It's all about our value and how we value ourselves. So before we get into all of that, I wanna ask that you please like, please share, please subscribe to the channel. You guys have been super duper supportive. I cannot even believe the growth that we've had in such a short period of time.

Erin Braxton (03:38.552)

Thank you so much for your support. Thank you so much for all of the comments. You guys have asked me some things in the comments and I do read them. I look at all of them and I'm working on it. I'm working on it. If you've left me a comment, asking me a question, asking me to talk about it, asking to have guests and conversations around certain issues, I am working on it. Know that, okay? Somebody asked me, I left my job, now what?

You know, are you gonna talk about being an entrepreneur? This is an episode that you need to watch if that is something that you're interested in. If you are concerned with how you are presenting yourself in the world and asking for a reciprocated payment for what it is that you give, this is the episode for you, okay? Also, guys, before we get into the episode, I wanted to tell you about our free educational resources.

The link for that is coffee no cream.com forward slash free. have over a thousand resources of free courses where you guys can level up, learn new skills, see if maybe there is something, an area that interests you that you might wanna move into as we are in such weird times right now as black women and working and losing our jobs and all of the things. We have a Facebook group where we continue the conversation.

It is a safe space for us to talk about the things we want to talk about. Not a lot of eyeballs on us. We do check and make sure that we are in a safe space to talk in that group. So the link to that is in the description below. And I think that is everything, guys. Thank you so much. And let's get into the episode. Welcome, Kimberly. How are you today?

I'm good, how are you?

Erin Braxton (05:29.352)

I am great. I am super excited about having you on the podcast this week because I believe your content is so needed. Your expertise is so needed with Black women. So before we get into it, why don't you just share with everybody what it is you do, who you are, what it is you do.

I'm Dr. Kimberly Douglas and I am an expert in pricing for small operations. And I came to this along, there's a long route to how I got here. Most recently I was coaching and consulting neurodivergent entrepreneurs and started to notice a number of patterns. But let me back up a little bit. So most of my adult life, I worked in academia where I was a peer review researcher and a data nerd and really appreciated data.

And I had been in business a couple of years before I realized how little I was using my expertise to impact my business. So I was reminded in 2022 when I took this coaching program, how important my data collection skills are. And in that program, I learned how to do interviewing for client development. And it just reminded me, hey, you're a researcher.

And you have some very important skills that need to be part of this conversation. Prior to that, I had been thinking about pricing and sales in a very, a fear-based way in something to, you know, these are things that I ran away from or didn't quite understand. And even when I saw it help with pricing and with sales, it seemed like the conversation always started in the middle. And so what I've done is laid out.

what my methods are, what my skills are in terms of data collection to figure out what we need to know in order to arrive at a price that makes sense for us, that feels right in our bodies. And borrowing from my experience with neurodivergent entrepreneurs, some of which are often rejection sensitive or very sensitive to the sales process, putting that all together and operating in this space of expertise where I show people.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (07:40.77)

This is step one, this is step two, this is step three, and this is how you do this fearlessly.

Okay, that's, I mean, that's a lot. I mean, I struggle from this. have this issue with pricing, as I've told you a little bit, it is definitely something I've had since I first started working and it wouldn't even have to be my money, you know, it was me working in advertising and we would be putting together the prices on how to, how much it's going to cost to do a TV spot or anything. And I just would be

my God, what are they gonna say? So it's, I'm so excited to hear about what you have to say. But first, before we get into your coffee no cream moment, explain to everyone what neurodivergent means.

Sure. And so when we talk about people being neurodivergent, it is this idea that the best way I can explain it is that there's this idea that there's a typical way of which people function in their brains and in their bodies and in their nervous system. We keep going to a whole other conversation about how there's no such things typical, but that's a starting place. We'll start there. And that people who function in ways outside of that are considered to be neurodivergent. So for example,

If you're looking for a label, it might be somebody who is autistic or someone who is ADHD or has dyslexia or has some kind of need that they may require support for or a different perspective, a different way of approaching processing, a different way to process. We often call these, we call these neural types. So I comment information in a different way than somebody else might come at it. So there's a whole other conversation we could have about

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (09:20.342)

You know, what's typical, what's not typical, but for a frame of reference, we'll start.

Okay, okay, great. Okay, guys. So for those of you who are joining me for the first time on the podcast here on Coffee No Cream, we share what I like to call coffee no cream moments, those things that happen to black women in business and in life, just because we are black women. Now today, Dr. Kimberly Douglas is going to share with us just one of her coffee no cream moments. And then we'll get into the conversation and how it affects us as black women, this whole pricing thing, which I'm super excited about. So.

Dr. Kimberly Douglas, what is your coffee no cream moment?

Okay, so it is a combination of moments and I'll try to bring it together into one thing. So starting out in business, seeing the expectation that I should just serve, that I should just provide, it's like people dropping the DMs, hey, I just wanna ask you this quick question or I wanna pick your brain or you're really smart, you know a lot about, can you just tell me, and so at the time when I started out,

I was working with parents of kids who have ADHD or autism. And so that's a soft spot, right? And so it's really easy to be like, okay, well, I'll just jump on real quick and I'll tell you. So that's one part of it. This, this, perception of this expectation that I was supposed to be able to just give information. And then it became clear to me, no, this is unsustainable. This is not how it's going to work. I can't make a living from this. So then.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (10:58.132)

seeking support, seeking coaching, seeking consulting, where I'm looking for guidance for people to tell me how to price. And so when I go to them, they're giving me advice like, well, you know, just move with the audacity of a mediocre white man. That's not helpful to me. When I seek advice, I need something that is actionable, something that is going to help me take the next steps. And that was not helping me take next steps.

And quite frankly, what was happening, the combination of those things actually created confusion and chaos in my brain, just confusion in my brain. And then I was, I found a coaching program, consulting program that finally helped me really value the research skills I already had. But initially just this expectation of service, unlimited service, uncompensated service, that expectation, like that extreme way over here.

in the other extreme of where, just behave, but I'm not a, I mean, I'm not a medium of a white man. I'm not operating in space. don't, I'm not positioned how they are in society. So I don't think that way. And so what I needed was real guidance on how to get out of my own way, but how to do it in a way that is sustainable and that I could replicate. I could teach somebody else to do.

or I could ask them to do so that I could take a vacation or take some days off, but they weren't giving me anything that was actionable. So those were big moments for me.

So when people would come at you and your DMs, you know, because I've had people they love to the brain Was it all types of people was it just black people was it white people was it everybody just expecting you to Provide them free information or just curious like the who this

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (12:53.752)

So it was a range of people. What I ran into a lot was people who were just coming to terms with them or their children having autism or ADHD or an entrepreneur coming to terms with that. So was a range of people. The problem, I'll say the problem, but the real challenge was I had no way to filter that. Like you can't stop people from coming in. I mean, you can technically stop people from coming to your DMs, but people gonna try it regardless.

Right, right,

The thing is I had no filter for when they showed up in my DMs. where to go, you know, if you want to talk about this, you go here next. If you want to talk about this, go here next. Like I didn't have a system that knew how to filter what their requests were because I could blame it on, okay, well I'm advertising myself as this person who offers this sort of thing. That's fine. That's okay. But the thing is once...

So there were some things that could change about the way I was presenting myself online, which I have changed. But even if they still come into my DMs, there should be a system in place where it makes it very clear to both of us whether or not we belong in conversation together.

So as a black woman, as a woman who's seen as one to provide services and support and all of the things you feel like that gave them, what is my word? That just gave them, well, they just felt like they could just come to you and ask you for nothing. Yeah.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (14:32.78)

And I had this person even recently who I had talked to a few times over the past couple of years. We hadn't talked in a while and I saw them on TikTok. Had not seen them in a while. And they do a lot of work around decolonization and liberation. And I said, hey, good to see you. Great, you know, back on the platform. I understand that you're not having been. And they messaged me right back. like, hey, I need for you to look at something. I said, okay. I said, so you do understand that that is the kind of work that I do for compensation.

is there an amount of money that you are able to pay right now for the, so in that case, I didn't mind them suggesting an amount. It was totally okay. Cause it wasn't necessarily within the scope of what I'm doing currently. So name an amount, but the thing is you have to name an amount. can't just pop up in my DMS and I'm saying, hello, good to see you. And it is, I believe it's because I'm a black woman who used to do a certain kind of work that they.

thought, I can't imagine that they would just pop up in other people's DMs doing that. And I stopped them immediately and said, no, you need to, we need to talk about an amount here because this is work that I'm compensated for. And they said, okay, so they came back with an amount, but then the conversation went away. I never heard from them again. So, which means, you know what? Now we're clear. We're very clear that that's not a

was a response.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (16:00.462)

It's not a conversation I should have been engaged in in the first place.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. And that, yeah, and I, that's absolutely right. And, and, and, and, know, that response in a whole lot of situations is your answer.

I was just having this with a friend. Somebody approached her to do some work. It was like a friend approached her to do some contracting work. it's, know, local municipality contracting work. She put forward her proposal was met with, that's not what we can do. And this was last week. I don't know if she's talked to the person since, right? It was just kind of like crickets.

And I kept telling her, don't keep calling that girl back. Don't keep contacting her. Do not keep contacting her. Right? Because she's looking at it like, I know she would like to have this project and have this money. I'm like, don't keep doing that. I said, and if you do do something with her, because she's asking you to come down because you gave her a reign of the price could be anywhere from this amount per hour to that amount per hour. And I was like,

No.

Erin Braxton (17:14.05)

she's looking for this amount per hour. She's looking for the low end because you gave her that range. And if you do go and end up working with her, I think it's a bad idea because it's starting bad. Even though sometimes we want it so bad, we will put ourselves into these situations when you need money. But I think it's a bad idea. But I said, if she does come back and you do do something, you better take something out.

I was like, you need to be like, okay, this is what I do. Don't just do that. Right. So I think it's

It's sort of like the thing with the salaries, like going in. know, if they, going in, you need to negotiate. You made me think about something with this scenario or this situation. Sometimes...

you and the other person are not showing up in the same negotiations. going back to this person who was in my DMs and they were trying to get me to do work, they assumed that I would just do some work for free. Sometimes the intention is to never negotiate with you, to never offer you anything of substance. And we are going back and forth with them negotiating about something that they, in a negotiating that they never really are showing up for.

Like it really never is a negotiation for them because they don't value it in the first place. And that's where you have to value it enough to bow out. So a lot of us are leaving industry and coming into coaching, consulting, providing services. And what's happening is we're bringing the things that we were running away from. We're bringing those things into our service, into our products, into our pricing. We can talk about.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (19:05.782)

what it means to attach a price to something, especially as black woman. So what was my experience with pricing as an academic? So if we think about my experience with thinking about what value is and the amount that should be attached to something. So the way I calculated value as an academic was through salaries, through status and through grant payments, honorariums, things like that. And so for a lot of people coming from academia, coming from industry,

That's the way we think of value. So we think of a salary that's been told and dictated to us, or a social status that's been given to us, or a grant amount, a specific grant amount that's allotted to us. And so what we have to do out here is we have to back up and think about what the system is for determining that value. And we don't always get really good instruction on that. And so for me, the shift came when I started to recognize

that I could move the conversation away from me to start with and move the conversation to, wait a minute, actually, this is a conversation about somebody else. This is actually a conversation about the client or the customer. And so that took some burden and responsibility off me that I have been placing on myself.

Okay, explain what you mean. the conversation.

So I shifted the conversation. before, and this speaks to coaching that I had received, I had taken this sales coaching, which is directly related to pricing. And the person was saying, well, you should be pricing according to your worth. Okay. Well, tell me what you have a PhD. So, you you should be charging a lot. Okay. But tell me, so the way my brain works, I need for you to help.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (20:55.742)

map neural connections. I need for you to give me a mental map to how to get there. Or I need for you to give me a formula for how to get to what that price is. I can't just pull it out of the sky and like, that's great. Or even if you tell me that everybody else is charging this amount, I need to understand why I'm charging this amount. What was happening is nobody could give me a mental map for how to get there. And when they tried to give me instruction, they just made it about me.

And me saying what my worth is. So those were not good directions for me. So what I started to focus on is the client because they are determining what the price and what the value is, what they're going to pay. So I have this thing called, this infographic called the founders five core questions. And rather than focus on me and my worth and how many degrees I have and what experience I have, I didn't find that to be relevant.

So now I ask five questions, which is what problem am I solving? Who am I solving the problem for? Do they see it as a problem? Do they see it as a problem they want solved? And do they want to solve with the solution that I'm offering? The data that I come up with to answer those questions help me decide what the price should be. Because the follow-up question then that I find out by researching, by talking to prospective clients, the follow-up question is,

What would they be willing to exchange for the solution I'm offering? But I have to ask those first, those first five questions. I'll tell you this. I don't like feeling confused and I felt confused by the whole process. and I was never sure if I was undercharging or over or asking too much. I didn't have a good frame of reference for that. And I didn't have a mentor or somebody like that who could.

help me with that other than somebody that I would have to pay and I had paid people and that didn't help me. And so they were able to help me in other ways, but not in this particular way. And this particular way matters quite a bit because the way you price things says a lot about other decisions you make in your business. And so it wasn't one particular thing. was just, I didn't like the constant state of confusion about where I stood with people and what the value, because here's the thing, like if you don't,

Erin Braxton (22:59.64)

Right.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (23:22.914)

have a system for making this kind of decision, it's really hard to build out something that is sustainable and that can grow. And so once I started, I just didn't have a way to give me any kind of frame of reference of where even to start. The best thing that I had was to try to price the way that competitors price. But here's the problem with that. You don't know what the basis of their price is. You don't know if they did their research. You don't know if they did their homework.

You don't know if it's based on them starting with $20,000 in their business or $100,000 in their business and you're starting with zero. Like you don't know where they started and you don't know where they are. So to just look at a competitor's price is not enough data to tell you what to do next. So I did not like the perpetual confusion and I didn't like not having a formula and knowing where to go and what to do.

We had a little conversation before we started recording about black women and where anxiety comes from pricing. Can you talk about that a little bit? Because you can obviously articulate this way better than I can, since this is your expertise. I know what I feel. But can you articulate what you've determined and researched and what your research has shown you and your experience when it comes to black women and pricing?

And so I think that I guess the simplest thing for me to do is just talk about some of my personal experiences with coaching black women and how many of us just don't even know where to start, first of all. And a lot of us, for whatever reason, give things away. Like we feel this urge to give things away. Now that can be

part of the strategy if done, as I say, strategically, but just giving things away because we don't even know what the value should be. It undermines us from the very beginning. And I hear a lot of people, especially on social media, black women talking on social media about family and friends. And there are some coaches who get on and they say, you know, don't worry about your family and friends. That's not, or

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (25:45.262)

certain people are going to be there for you and not, I don't even think, I don't even know if that's really part of the conversation because your family and your friends may not fit your client demographic in the first place. so one of the things we're not guided to do is to focus on the client demographic and the client psychographic. And so for most of us, if we took the time, so we talk about research or talk about our methods, we

take time to do that work, that is going to lead us away from our family and friends in the first place. And the thing is, talking to our family and friends is a comfortable place for a lot of us to exist, or seems like it's comfortable, but it can also be very misleading. So if our family and our friends are not in that demographic and they're not in that psychographic, then we're getting misleading data to start with. That data is going to take us, because the thing is, when you're collecting data,

for your pricing, the important part is to, one of the most important parts is to talk to the people who would actually purchase from you. And if you're not talking to the people who would actually purchase from you, who probably won't be your family and friends, like them supporting you, giving you money, seed money, that's a different kind of conversation. But when you're talking about doing your research to really support your pricing for sustainable pricing, then you...

have to talk to the people who would actually purchase from you.

All right. Can you talk more about you were talking about black women being so used to serving and what have you seen with your coaching when it comes to that?

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (27:28.43)

And so in this society, we are often put in a position, and a lot of us are put in this position from childhood, and especially if you're an eldest daughter, where you are expected to, you have obligations to the community that are not reciprocated. And I'm a person who believes strongly in community. Community is very important, but there has to be reciprocation there. So if you are constantly put in a position,

where you have no idea what the value of what you're bringing to the situation is, then you may not even think to ask people to pay for it in the first place, or think to, or you may not even think to ask people to pay for it in the first place, or you may not even think about what that price should be. Just pay me whatever, know, just whatever you got. It's not based on whatever.

.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (28:22.574)

they're offering because the thing is you're constantly trying to align your price with a sustainable business or sustainable model. So every time you charge some $5 for example, and somebody pays that $5 that is a validation that that $5 is probably what you should be charging. So

If you're in a position where you imagine that you have to serve all the time, then you are actually losing out on data that will sustain your business and that will grow your business. So not only are you losing the money, but you're also losing the data that would validate what your offer is and validate what your amount is because you're in this position where you think you should just give things away.

And I think a lot of times, even when we and people can get mad if they want to, because I've had people get mad. I think as a community, a lot of times when we are working with each other, there's a level of familiarity and entitled favor that comes with working with each other that we need to get past because

It's just not beneficial. I don't know if you've seen that with your clients. It's definitely something I've experienced. I would love for it not to be that way, but...

Yeah, I think there is, I I tend to believe the adage that familiarity breeds contempt. It can, it absolutely can, and it can breed abuse as well. And I'm not going to say it's just male-female relationships, but I can say with working with certain men, I've had this situation come up where they just expect their free labor. So I'll tell you a story, which I think is funny and I can laugh about it.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (30:26.446)

I was providing support to this man. Like I just wanted to work with him and get the experience of working with him. And, but I did want some protections in the situation. So this isn't necessarily about pricing, but about just the experience of offering services to people. And so I just wanted to work with him and his operation looked really interesting to me, but I did want some protections for the work that I was doing and making sure that I got credit for things. So I sent him,

a little write up of what it was and how we could use things, you know, just a basic agreement. And he messaged me back and he said, Oh, this is a lot of words. Wow. Okay. That was our last conversation. That was our last conversation. But yeah, to your point, uh, the familiarity. So it's just the expectation that, um, that I was supposed to serve even with no agreement in return. Like I wasn't even asking for money.

but just nothing in return, any kind of agreement or understanding in return.

I used to be, even when I started this podcast, anybody who comes on, I ask you to sign a release. I put a lot of time and effort into each recording and episode and I don't want you to come after me later, even though we're not exchanging money or anything like that. It's valuable for everybody. And I would have, you get a little nervous.

I would at first and I shouldn't because I've been giving people contracts for years. But you know, in this kind of situation, it's a service to the community. You know, it's we're working with each other, helping each other. And I would have a little trepidation about, okay, I need you to sign this release, you know, because it's it's is business at the end of the day. And we do need to handle our business. And I learned that from the first one of the first people that I ever

Erin Braxton (32:24.14)

worked with when I started the Rebel Geek and I did have an agreement in place. And you know, with each experience, if something goes wrong in that interaction, it helps you to firm up your agreement. But I definitely had some, gosh, okay, I, know, like it's almost like I'm apologizing, I'm asking you to sign this thing. Don't take it personal, like.

you know, getting way too emotional about it, right? And it's really just there to, to be very clear and direct about what it is that we're trying to do here. And so I think people get lax about it because they feel like it's almost like you're saying, I don't trust you. Right. Even when you're dealing with family and people. So I canceled a recording yesterday because I was waiting on the, agreement. didn't get signed. I'm like, I'm not gonna, I'm not, I'm not gonna waste my time, you know? So.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, so as a former administrator, used, so there was a staff person who would come into my office and she would slide stuff under my nose, like while I was on the phone. And so I would put my hand down on the paper and slide it to the side. And I tell her, I will get back with you by the end of the day. And then at the end of the day, I would explain like when I plan to sign whatever it was she had put in front of me.

The reason why I did it that way is because two to three, I always think about something about what you're saying and signing things and just asking people for agreement, just some basic agreements. I always think about two to three years from now, how does this look like today? It feels funny. It may feel awkward, but how will this feel two to three years from now? And so that staff person who was doing that, she wouldn't have any responsibility to two to three years from now. Like she wouldn't even remember that she came and slid it.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (34:20.974)

under my nose while I was on the phone. But two to three years from now, my name would be, my signature would be on that paper. So the same thing you're saying that, you know, these things just like feel funny, they feel weird. But the way I encourage people to project out two to three years and say two to three years from now, how will this feel? How will this look? And it's funny because, you know, just going back to our experience with working and being expected to serve.

We find ourselves in these normal everyday situations that feel really weird to us. And this is one of the reasons why I talk about pricing because when you step into this space where you know what kind of homework you need to do or data you need to collect to understand what the value is, it shifts the way you think about things. So just some basic agreements, basic understanding of what pricing is, basic understanding of what data you need to collect.

It makes things matter of factly. It makes it part of your routine. makes it part of your system. And so as you pointed out with the person in the agreement, they don't fit into your system because they did not sign the agreement. And if they don't fit into your system, then that it's a non-issue really. They don't fit into your system. so you move on.

Yeah. And I think sometimes, especially when you're new and you're getting started and you think you have somebody on the hook, like, okay, okay, this is, we're just, we're so close. Right. And, you know, they just, and I talk about this in my story, like my, my coffee, no cream moment, because the one that I shared, I've so many, but the one that I shared when I first started the podcast about this client that I worked with for 11 years and,

we were working and we were under a small-ish retainer. It was like $3,000 a month or something like this. And we got to the point where we were working so much that I had overages. This retainer included a certain amount of hours that we were gonna look at quarterly. And if we are way out of scope, I'm gonna bill you overages, right? It was just way out of line.

Erin Braxton (36:34.176)

So I presented a new agreement to this woman's husband. Mind you, their son was a corporate attorney, okay? Corporate attorney. And he said to me, I was demanding that they pay me this new retainer. I'm like, I'm not demanding anything. First of all, the retainer was set up so we wouldn't have any more overages. We would just be at this price. I wouldn't charge you any overages. You would know.

what it is I'm gonna charge you each and every month. Then he didn't sign it. That's when he told me he felt like I was charging Lexus prices but giving him Toyota level work, whatever. So he didn't sign it. And then COVID happened, okay? And it became even more, you know? So we were like, some months we were like $14,000, $15,000. If you would have just signed the retainer, we would have been back at 10, you know, but he didn't sign it. And they never signed it. And we had signed one agreement.

over the 11 years that I worked with them, but they kept not signing the agreement. And I kept working, right? Because they were paying me what the agreement said, but they weren't, they didn't, they wouldn't sign the agreement. There was always some bullshit reason why they wouldn't sign the agreement. And then when we ultimately parted ways, they terminated me and said they were gonna honor the 90 day transition in the agreement. They didn't. And then at day 60, when they were ready to pay me my last payment, they didn't wanna pay me.

because we need to protect ourselves and we're not gonna pay you until the end to make sure we get everything we need. Well, know, obviously I cut everything off. I'm your web girl. Do you think that's smart? Right? I cut everything off. I didn't cut off their website. I could have, but it belonged to them. I, know, karma's real and I don't do stuff like that, but I cut them off completely.

but we never had a signed agreement. I, you know, that's a regret and a mistake on my part. Like I could have stopped working at any time because we didn't have a signed agreement. We didn't have anything in place. So, you know, it's interesting that we're talking about it and I'm always hesitant. And even this guy who had a son who they put in charge of me in the end to come in and handle Aaron, you know, because they were afraid to handle me, you know, and they thought he was handling me, the corporate attorney.

Erin Braxton (38:55.534)

couldn't look at the agreement. You can't give the agreement to your son to look at, you know, but they just bullshitted around and didn't sign it. But when you say that the guy that you were working with, you tried to give him something and he said it was too many words. That's, you know, that's like, I don't know what you would call that, like gaslighting, it's BS or whatever, because people try to act like that. And it's just like, yeah, it's a legal document, which is intimidating.

for them and they're like, whoa, what am I getting into? But I mean, if you could talk about that too, because it's so important when people are hesitant or people like push back against your price, you know, these are the things that I know black women are dealing with. It's just like, well, cause they came to you and they're familiar, not even if they don't know you, they're just familiar cause you're black, you know? And your price is that like, you know, like,

you know, or trying to get you down.

If it is understood by society that you are supposed to be in a position of servitude, then pretty much everybody's familiar. It's supposed to come to them at a deeply discounted price. I mean, we see this with salaries all the time. The evidence is out there. The evidence is very clear. I'm just thinking about the scenario that you're describing and what I hear in that or situations like that. don't know specifically about your situation, but

What I hear in it is they want a certain type of access without any boundaries around it. So even if they ended up going over, it's not the money, it's the power. So they're willing to pay the money, but they want it to retain the power in the situation and the control in the situation. And so, you know, a lot of times it feels, people say all the time, know, people don't understand anything but green. I don't think that that's true.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (40:55.59)

what they understand is power and they understand the desire to manage and to control people and to not put any firm agreement or boundaries in place that always creates an advantage for them when they operate in that space. Because it's almost like, dare you ask for an agreement from me? How dare you? But related to what you're, the scenario that you're talking about, the situation you found yourself in,

And just talking with Black women and you know, we are in an environment where we are constantly being, our attention is being directed towards scarcity. And so we are constantly being told that there's not enough out there for everybody, but especially for us. You know, like with all the Black women getting laid off from the federal government and just challenges with being hired, scarcity is being put front and center.

and really screaming for our attention. And I want to say to Black women that, you know, hold the line with the agreements. And if you want something out of situation, you want some type of reciprocation, it's very important that you seek it. And I think part, one of the things that people play on is this idea that there will never be another opportunity.

This will never, this is a once in a lifetime opportunity. will never happen again. And so I have to jump on it. Now I have to accept whatever they give me. I have to take whatever they say to me, whatever they do to me. And that's just not the case. There will be, if you got one opportunity, you'll get another opportunity. It doesn't have to go away now. And that may mean that you have to rework the situation or you have to reframe something or you have to try a different approach, but you have to pivot. All of those things can be true, but it.

Just because a person is taking their ball and going home, it doesn't mean that that's the only opportunity that you'll ever get.

Erin Braxton (42:51.118)

Yeah. What do you say? I'm going to just ask some questions like kind of with what I struggle with whenever I put forward a cost. I have this tendency to try to project what I think they're going to think is a suitable price. Like I have a tendency to project, oh, they're going to think it's valued at this. So what do you say for when

And I know it's part of your strategy, but working out of the mindset of doing that, like, you know, cause sometimes it's the cost of things and the prices I seem to, you know, they're relative. It depends on who you talk to because sometimes you can go to somebody and you can be like, my price for this is, you know, $5,000. And they'll be like, my God, that's, that's way too much. Like I told somebody this, with what I do, do you really think it's worth that? This now.

Yeah, I really do. You think so. I'm like, dude, you don't do what I do. Right. Right. And then some people you'll you'll give them the price and they'll say, yeah, so fast, probably because in the back of their mind, they were thinking it was going to be 10. Yes. So how do you talk about that? You know, because I also want to get into it a minute once maybe you can weave this in.

but how this plays a role with going in and asking for your salary and your raises and things like that, because I'm sure you have some knowledge on that. You know, we talked about everybody's not going to be out here starting some company, being an entrepreneur. It's just not even realistic. So what about when you work for somebody? So first, the idea of how do you stop doing that and pricing on value and get your mind around that, like away from the fear of what they think.

you know, because you have no way of knowing. So it's wasted effort to even worry about it. But and then, you know, how do you transfer that or use that in corporate America?

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (44:54.924)

make an offer to someone or as I'm making an offer to someone and if it pops in my head that I might be asking for too much or the price is too much, that is an indicator to me that I'm unsure if I'm talking to the right person. So that's the starting place. I like to the right person? There may not, it could be any amount. It could be a certain large amount.

But if I'm not talking to the right person, it doesn't matter what the amount is. So if there are any doubts, that's the first place. So that's why my second question is, who am I solving for? Then the next thought is, have I collected enough data when I arrived to this conversation? So talking to that one person that is validating my price in that moment.

but I should have done lots of validation before I got to that moment and validating that I'm solving the problem that I think I'm solving, solving it for the person I think I'm solving it for. And then asking people who are similarly situated, is this, what amount would you be willing to pay for this? Like I literally ask people, if I put an offer together that says it's A, B, D, and E, what would you pay for that? And they tell me. And so this has to be part of

And this is why I took a break from social media and trying to present in the digital space because I've been doing a lot of homework behind the scenes where I have a system where I am regularly interviewing and talking to people to make sure that I am situated in the right place, that I'm talking to the right people, talking to them about the right things, asking them the right questions so that when I arrive at that offer,

I've asked a hundred people already, so I should know what that person, how that person is going to answer. And they should be a hundred people who have similar demographics and psychographics. And when I say psychographics, what I mean is attitudes, beliefs, behaviors, wants, needs, desires, ambitions that are similar to this person that I am now making this offer to. I should know without a doubt based upon those 10 interviews or 15 interviews or a hundred interviews,

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (47:18.946)

that I am talking to the right person, I'm making the right offer, and I'm making it at the right price. So to answer your question, if I arrive at this conversation and it's like, my God, this might be too much, that means I have some other questions I need to ask myself. So it's not even about the price at that point. The point is, am I talking to the right person? Am I talking to them about the right thing? And then am I at the right price? But all of that,

You know, all that other information, all that other data precedes the conversation with this one person because I should have been validating the whole way. I should have been validating the problem that I'm solving and and what my solution is and at what price.

So what if there's not, I mean, because you're a researcher, like you know, you're doing this. So for the regular business owner, obviously over a period of time, that is clearly a smart way to go about figuring out your pricing. But say you're just getting started and somebody has given you the opportunity to maybe pivot or do something that you can do.

but you don't have a lot of experience doing, right? How do you handle that then? Because you're just getting started. You haven't conducted a bunch of research. What would you say?

So in a crunch, first of all, pause, number one, and evaluate the offer and make sure that it is an offer that you can fulfill and that you're equipped to fulfill. Because if you're having difficulty pricing it or knowing who to consult to price it, then that might be an indicator that this is a one-off. But if you're just trying to get a job, which I understand that, like you're trying to get a contract,

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (49:11.106)

You know, who are your mentors in a crunch? Can someone who has expertise in that field, is that something that they can help you with? Of course, always looking at competitive pricing if you have access to that, but some people don't have access to that. So look around you and look around people who already providing those services. So that's something that can help you in a crunch. But if you find yourself in that situation over and over again,

that means you may need to pause and start to build out a system where you can evaluate more clearly who it is you're serving. Because a lot of what I was doing, what I've seen other people do, is you're trying to do a lot of different things. And so it's difficult to put a system in place where you can really start to understand who it is you're serving. Because I talk about the difference between,

Capability and capacity. So you have the capability to serve lots of different people. The U Collective have capability to serve a lot of different people, do a lot of different things. But if you don't, you have to check and see if you have the capacity to do it. And one of the ways that you build capacity is really honing it and figuring out who you can serve without killing yourself over time. Yeah.

I guess that goes back to what we were talking about just before we started this interview and about figuring out your niche. And that's just like kind of business one-on-one. Just because you can do something doesn't mean that's what your business is. For me, this has been a struggle in the past because I'm one of those people where I'm sort of like a jack of all trades.

utilized and used to do a lot of things, which doesn't allow me to, I guess, expand in certain directions that I can expand in and grow in and actually just be way more profitable in my own business. And that client that I'm talking about was an example of that because I

Erin Braxton (51:18.786)

Yeah, I know how to edit videos and yeah, I know how to do graphic design and yeah, I know how to, I've done voiceover and I can do, I can do so many things that it just really get in the way of you really doing your thing. So now we, with reference to people who are working for someone, you know, when they're going in and they're looking for a job,

and they're going in or they're asking for a raise, how do you approach pricing with that?

I want to answer that. Can I back up just a little bit to what we talking about before? Something else I wanted to add to that. So you were talking about being able to do a lot of different things. And so we're talking about capability versus capacity. So in really focusing on with neurodivergent entrepreneurs, I coach a lot of people who identify as what we call multi hyphenates. So multi hyphenates are people who have lots of skills, have lots of interests, but also lots of skills. Like we can be, and I consider myself to be a multi hyphenate.

I can be good at so many, like I can pull it off. And bringing the conversation back to black women, a lot of us are multi-hypnates because we had to be. So we had to to be generalists because we had to run a household. A lot of us were parentified and adultified. And so we had to learn to take care in a certain way. But here's the thing, the...

The number of things that you have going, it's important to look at what resources you have to devote to each of those different things you have going. And if you are resource strapped and you're not starting with a lot of money, you have to find that niche. And I know a lot of people say they don't like the niche down, but your ability to take on all these different projects and do all of these things, there's going to be a cost. There's gonna be a cost.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (53:18.08)

And so either, so if you don't have a lot of resources and you're multi-hyphenating, you want to do all these things, there's going to be a cost to your body and to your mind to do, to try to do all those things. Now, if you have unlimited resources or if you have a lot of resources and you can pay people to support you, you know, if you are a certain tech dude or whatever, and you can just point and tell people to go just do it.

then that's a different thing. Like you can be a multi-hyphenate all day, but if you are limited in the resources that you have to devote to your business, to your operation, then you have to think carefully about where you're going to devote your attention because your attention.

is a finite resource, even if you are a multi-hyphenate and it may be that those multiple projects are towards a hobby or some sort of activity is not necessarily the thing you convert into your business. And here's the other thing with being a multi-hyphenate, it can get in the way of understanding how to price things because in the back of this conversation about pricing is this idea that

your pricing is helping you grow as an expert. And so it's not that you can't be an expert in multiple different things, multiple projects and tasks and responsibilities. It's not that you can't be an expert, but your knowledge needs to deepen, your expertise needs to deepen. And the more your expertise deepens, the more aligned with your pricing, the more in touch with your pricing you will become.

I like that. I like that. It has, I feel like it's been hard for me to niche down. I mean, I have this business and I know this is what I do, but then people will ask you, maybe you can help us with that. Sure. Maybe you can help us. And you don't want to say no to the money, you know? then you find yourself in a situation where you just

Erin Braxton (55:25.664)

You can't even do what it is you were originally brought on to do or overwork.

And I also feel like, and I'm speaking from personal experience, but also the experience of people that I've worked with. I think when you spread yourself in a lot of places, when some of us spread ourselves in a lot of places, we never really know how good we could actually be because there's a level at which we do things and we can do them well. But then there's another level of creativity and innovation that we could take on. The more

we operate in that space, the deeper we operate in that space, I think the more creative we can become. And there's the opportunity that you can offer many different variations of the same product and get really innovative about that product or really innovative about how you offer that product. But we are often cut off from that avenue.

because we're trying to do the other things. We never get a chance to see who we could be inside that deeper, much deeper experience.

Even with me doing this podcast, know, choosing, you know, because there's so many different ways you could go, I could get up here and talk about all sorts of things, you know, but even choosing to niche down on this particular podcast, I think has had a lot to do with the growth of it.

Erin Braxton (56:59.404)

because I've seen other people and, and, know, and I'm, and it's not like I'm trying to compare, but who you, you came in and you were behind and then you, kind of pass them by because they're all over the place. It's just like, what are you really on here talking about? Right. And, know, what, what kind of longevity do you have just talking about everything instead of figuring out who it is you're talking to. And

and you think you're gonna run out like you said, but you just won't. There's just so many nuances and sometimes it appeals to more people that nuanced topic than other people. But yeah, there's a lot of creativity within the niche that you can really drill down on. I've never thought about it like that until you said it, but.

I add something else to this, which you're talking about just reminded me, cause I need for us to be really honest with ourselves. So sometimes you were asking me earlier about, know, how do you get the pricing? If it's kind of a, if it's a thing where somebody say, Hey, can you do this for me? You need to figure out what the pricing is. Sometimes those opportunities keep cropping up or, those types of opportunities keep cropping up.

because we need the money or we need help with the pricing. But some of us simply have a hard time saying no or not people pleasing or afraid to. So let me back up and say, if you've been put in a situation where you've been excluded from things and a lot of black women have been like high performing black women have been excluded from things that we should have had access to.

If you've been in that situation and I can give you times throughout kindergarten, elementary, middle school, high school, college, like I can give you any number of examples where that has happened in my own life. One of the things we don't like to do is we don't like to exclude people. If you've been excluded, you don't like excluding people. And so what happens when we start talking about niching, people get real itchy because it feels like

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (59:15.624)

my auntie can't come, my cousin can't come, my friend from third grade can't come. It's not that they can't be part of your product or your service offering. It's not that you're just not talking to them in your marketing because you can't talk to everybody. So you were talking about like with the podcast and people saying different things to all these different stuff. They don't really have an audience. They have a conversation that they're having and they're throwing out. It's like they're casting this really wide net.

and they're just trying to see who comes in. But what that does is it puts you in a position where you're waiting on the people to decide that they should be caught in that net. You're waiting on other people to validate instead of you going out and you saying, this is my audience. These are the people that I'm talking to. This is the problem that I'm solving. This is what I'm doing. This is the fence that I'm putting around what I'm offering.

Yes, some people will be standing outside that fence, but you can't be responsible for providing everything to everybody. And that's a feeling that I had to get up.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. I have a group training trainer I go to and it's like small group training like four to six people every day and we go at 6 30 in the morning and they're the same people and there's a girl in there and she's Pakistani and me and her have really good banter and other people, black people, are like you should have her on your podcast. like and I just say it very like no she's not black I can't have her on my podcast. Well but she's brown.

I know that's great. Brown people are not the same. They are not created equal, you know, so, you know, you really have to stick to your niche. I've had men contact me to be on the podcast. I've had white women contact me. I've had white women tell me, well, maybe you should have a white person come on and tell their perspective. I'm not here to platform white women. You know, that's. Yeah, not at all. Never going to never going to happen. So,

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (01:01:13.166)

That's not what your show is about.

Erin Braxton (01:01:20.322)

And this is the first time I've really taken a stance to niche down on something with this particular podcast, which in turn has given me, I think it's opened up my mind to really niching down in my business, the Rebel Geek. It really has because I see how successful, not as as I want it to ultimately go, but I'm having success because I know who I'm talking to. There's no question. It's very easy for me to say no.

because that's not.

This is the pathway though. This is the pathway to the success that you want because you're getting clear and clarity is so important and it's very kind to yourself. And it just, for a lot of us as black women, it just feels funny to a lot of us to say, no, this is not about you. This is just about us. There are so many messages. There's so much reinforcement that we get.

Yeah.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (01:02:21.214)

from society that tells us that we can't have a space that just talks about us, that that is not permitted because we are here for service. The belief is that we are here for service. That's why we have a hard time excluding people or defining who our audience is. That's why we have a hard time charging things that would exclude people. We want to give things away for free, but the fact of the matter is some people would not take our stuff even if it were free.

And I find when you do go down on your prices and you do bend and you decide, okay, I'm going to do it for that. They are the worst clients that you could have ever asked for. The ones who are like, okay, sure. No problem. Invoice me, whatever. is I, yep. I'm fine with it. And they don't give you all that pushback and problem. Lovely. It's like you can work in a less stressful environment. You can get your best work done. Right. You know, I'd rather have

five really, really, really great clients than, you know, 20 crappy clients. That's just me, you know. And that's where we go back to. No, no, you go.

I'm sorry. That's where we go back to the process. So when I talk about having a method where you're constantly talking to people and assessing, making sure that you're talking to the right people, because if you're not talking to the right people, it doesn't matter what your price is, making sure that you're talking to the right people. Because here's the thing that I didn't say earlier. Yes, you're validating that you're solving a certain problem. You're validating that you're talking to the right people. But what you're also doing is something that is

that we as black women need, you're also validating something for yourself. You're validating to yourself that you're in the right space, that this is the amount that you should be paid. So if you've talked to 10 people, if you've talked to hundred people, or if you, you may just start with five people interview, like if you need to do it in a short turnaround, just talk to five people, talk to three people, get the validation.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (01:04:21.48)

for yourself so you can see where you are, you know, orienting yourself in this space so that you know you have a frame of reference that you can go to and say, that doesn't sound right. Let me go back to the drawing board. We have to validate for ourselves that we can come up with good offers. We can solve problems and that those opportunities will continue to be there. We don't have to operate from a scarcity point of view or a

scarcity perspective, but we just have to run and do the thing. We can take the time to do the research. And when I say research, don't want to just like this big thing where you have to do peer review. That's not what I'm talking about. I have a client where I said to them, set up coffee dates, set up coffee dates, go talk to them, ask them the same three questions on those coffee dates. Now let them know on the coffee dates that you are collecting data.

so that you can understand what they need inside this job. She's about to sell a subscription. So let them know that you're using this conversation as data to set up the subscription. Call it a coffee date, call it a walk in the park, whatever it is, just ask them the same three to five questions so that you're able to compare from person to person. But the thing is you have to always be talking to your clients. If you're not talking to them, you are not validating that you're talking to the right people or that you're even aiming in the right direction.

But more important, like anything else, is because we are in this headspace, then we've been directed to think about how to serve other people free, for free of charge, that we have to think about what the reciprocation is. We have to think about what the exchange is. So we're validating for ourselves as much as we're validating anything else.

love that. Is that your?

Erin Braxton (01:06:13.55)

Because that's like a tool. That's something that we really, really need to learn how to do. Like, I'm speaking for myself, right? So validating that this is an exchange, there's a reciprocal action that needs to take place, meaning you're just not there to do things for free, right? And that's in all relationships, I think, for Black women.

Absolutely.

Give away our time, give away our advice, our expertise, all of that. yeah, so do you have any tips? I know you said a lot, you've given us some, but just like quick tips, exercises that we can do to start working on doing that for ourselves. I mean, aside from working with you, which we're gonna get to that in a minute, but just tips on how to get past this, cause this is deep.

You know, it's just in us. very deep. It's very deep.

It requires a level of trusting yourself and respecting yourself as a professional and as an expert, but trusting that you can give yourself the right tools. it isn't about, see, that's the thing about pricing. I think where a lot of us get hung up is that we think we have to show up with the right answer in the right amount. Your amount is a hypothesis. It is a hypothesis that you have to confirm.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (01:07:46.574)

constantly keep testing to make sure you're in the right place. And that's the thing. A lot of coaching, like things I see on social media, they often talk about decisions that we make is kind of one and done. It's not a one and done. It's an ongoing learning process. So the one tip that I would have, if I have to like wrap it, like summing up in one tip, get to know your client, get to know, spend time getting to know your client because that's

where it starts and that's where it ends. Because it really is about, and I wouldn't even say it's what they need, it's what they want. If you don't understand what they want, then you do not, you really can't arrive at that price that is a very, what people will call an aligned price, but spend time understanding who your client is and what they want.

Yeah, whether they're small business owners, whether they're mid-sized business owners, corporate business owners, that's a big difference. You you want all the money, but sometimes dealing with small people isn't going to get it for you. know, so no, right.

So that's where I go back to those five questions. And I know for people just starting out, it sounds like a lot, but the thing is either you're going to pay on this end or you're going to pay on the back end. Because if you don't take time to understand what I'm saying here, then you will pay in failed launches. You will put out products that nobody will ever buy. So you have to know what problem you're solving, who you're solving it for. If they see it as a problem,

if they see it as a problem they won't solve and whether or not they see it as a problem they won't solve with your solution. If you cannot answer those questions, you do not have data to answer those questions, then it's going to cost you something on the other end.

Erin Braxton (01:09:36.842)

Now, those five questions, just circling back to that one question I said, and I don't think we finished this out. When you're employed and you're going in for money, do you apply those questions in the same way?

So let me shift away from those questions. I have some general advice about salaries and negotiation. So I'm going to answer this question in two parts. So the first part is from the perspective of someone who is seeking a job and they've just been sent a job offer. For any job offer, you always want to do a counter offer. It's important to understand that in most cases you are being low balled. So I've been an administrator, I've been on the other side where it's like,

They give you a range of salaries that you could hire at. And there's like the low, low, mid, mid. It's like all these confusing categories or, or, or layers that which you could hire. But all of it is to be able to low ball you and to hire people in at the rate that they want to hire them in. So for most people, if not all people, you are probably being low ball. So go in with that understanding that you need to counter. And I think.

I would say for me as a professional, I would expect people to counter offer. And I think it is understood across many industries that you would do a counter offer. And in fact, it could be somewhat disappointing if someone is hiring you and you don't advocate for yourself. So you're not just applying for a job.

You are also lobbying for a job. You're lobbying for an opportunity at a certain rate. So you have to continue to lobby for yourself throughout the process. And so they expect you to lobby for yourself. The other thing is you will never get a kind of pay raise that would match, probably match your counter offer. So once you accept the position, we've talked about agreements throughout this, this whole conversation.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (01:11:39.118)

The agreement is that you're willing to be there if it's $120,000 or if it's $60,000. The agreement is that you won't budge a lot from that position. Most employers are portraying these as very lean times, and so they're not willing to make that big, huge bump. We haven't seen that for most industries in years anyway. So the level that you negotiate going in the door, the level you negotiate at is

Probably the level you're going to stay at with incremental changes if they offer raises at all. So going in the door is the best time you have to negotiate because you are lobbying for a job at a particular rate. So make sure you do a counter offer, maybe even a little bit above what you want so that that gives them room to come back and say, no, I can't do 2000, but I can do 1000. So you have to

Go into this with mindset that you're not just applying for a job, but you're actually lobbying for a job at a certain rate and with certain, and also don't forget, not just for salary, but making sure you have administrative support, your desk, your computer, make sure you lobby for the whole package and not just the pricing. So that's when you're first coming in the door. Now, if you're already in the door and you've worked there, so you've been at it for two years, you are killing it,

You are rocking it. You're like, hey, you know, so and so got a promotion, got a raise. It wasn't necessarily tied to promotion, but the only way that you can get a raise is through promotion. There are no promotions available. So you put together your proposal. So one of the first things you want to do is think about, am I on the production side or am on the revenue side? Revenue and sales side. If you are, so companies tend to retain people in

promote people or retain if there's a layoff or like some sort of reduction in force. They're going to, they're most likely to retain the side that is doing sales and bringing in money and bringing in revenue, even if they have to let go of some of the production side. So if you're on the production side, what you need to do is show that you contributed to sales. And of course, if you're on the sales side, you need to really demonstrate how you, you know, what you have done have contributed to increase in sales.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (01:14:02.71)

So that's the frame that you can use in this conversation. Put that together, ask for a little bit more than you expect and see what they say. so, and so if you're already there, you've been working there, you're contributing, you're adding value, value that you can track. So I'm big on metrics. have the metrics to show that the work that you're doing specifically has enhanced the bottom line or the organizational goals and there's nothing, they come back.

No, we'll keep this in mind, but we don't have any money. And especially if you see other people around you getting things, just put it aside and just know that you probably should be looking for another or just know you should be looking for another position. Not probably. You should be looking for another position. You should be looking for another opportunity because if it's the additional money you want, they've made it clear that that's not on the table. That's not part of the agreement.

You put it together, you've made the strongest argument that you can make. You need to look around and that does multiple things. Number one, it reinvigorates you, that's number one. Number two, the other thing that it does is you get to see your relative value in other situations and you get to understand how it compares in different situations. And then number three, if you need to use it as leverage, you can then use it for leverage if you get an offer or something that looks like an offer.

Okay, this is really, really good. My mind is clicking about everything. But a couple of things. Would you, let's first, let me just go back to the initial offer. So you were saying a lot of times they have all these complicated tiers and stuff like this. And I know this just from talking to people. know, oh, I'm on tier J, you know, but tier K.

gets paid more, all right? How does that play a role when you're coming into the job as far as payment goes? Does that even matter? Or do they assign that after they've hired you? because it can get complicated and it sounds like a lot of BS to me, but I guess it's a way to keep people categorized and decide what they're gonna do or willing to do. So does that, and you don't know.

Erin Braxton (01:16:26.338)

I don't know if you know that when you go into corporate, like, we're bringing you on as a management level tier K2 or whatever crap it is they have. Does that matter in the negotiation process from your experience when you're trying to get money?

My context is universities and government. You should know what that tier is, number one. And you should know what prices are, what price ranges are attached to those tiers.

fair question to ask or you should just know this from your own research.

so I can't really speak to corporate, that that's probably somebody else could probably answer that question better than me, but like in government, those tiers are usually public information. And so that's just helpful to know because you know what the range is. So here's the thing, let me back up and say this with government and universities, there's a lot of appearance of transparency. And so with you having access to the tiers and knowing what they are, it gives the illusion.

that they're being transparent about how people are being treated. But the fact of the matter is those ranges are so large that the differences in the pay ranges, even within a single tier, could situate people very differently. It's like two different people hired in at the same tier. It'd be making anywhere from $10,000 to $20,000 a difference in range, or more, in more. So it's important to understand what those tiers are.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (01:18:00.81)

So from a public agency standpoint, it's important to understand what those tiers are because a lot of times in the job description, it'll tell you what tiers they're hiring at. So you have an idea of how much you can ask.

What if they just change your job title? You know, is that, is that worth any more money? You know, these are things that have happened to people that I know where it's just like, we're just going to give you the title of this, but they're not going to give you the money to go with it. I mean,

Changing your job title depends on you and what you think the value is. And I've heard of people in private spaces and also within university and state government where they went through and they relabeled something or gave the person leverage to decide what the title would be. I think that can be a very useful tool.

People may negotiate that because it's understood that they are looking for something somewhere else. Or there may be some pay attached to it later. I do think that's a useful process, but not a substitute for money. I think it is a useful strategy. Whether you value that or not depends upon whether you're looking inward and planning on staying there, or if you're trying to leverage that title to go somewhere else.

I mean, I think this has been a great conversation. I mean, you've given us a lot to think about and not just for entrepreneurs, but also for people who are in spaces where they can utilize a lot of what you're saying. When we, as we close out, do you want to just repeat the, the five questions that you, you need to know or ask yourself when you're figuring out your pricing?

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (01:19:57.326)

Absolutely. So these are called the founders five core questions and they're very simple for any project useful for any project So what problem do you solve you have to get really clear about that? Who do you solve this problem for do they see it as a problem? Do they see it as a problem? They won't solve does every problem It's not necessarily something people want to solve and then do they see your solution as the solution they want to solve their problem and once you have answers to those questions

Then you can ask another question, is, what are they willing to exchange? What are they willing to pay for the solution?

Kimberly, tell us how you work with people like your service and how you can work with people and how you work with people who want to work with you and have this need. I think it's everybody, but all black women, but tell us your problem.

Yeah. And,

So I, of course, offer one-to-one services, but the offer that I'm really focused on now is what I call the Price Lab. And it is a monthly offer. It is both coaching and consulting. So it is in a coaching group. sort of hang out, like this is also a consulting group where we talk about the basics of pricing. We talk about the specific challenges and problems you're facing with pricing, the dilemmas you have.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (01:21:26.794)

how to structure your offer. And so in this group, you you have group support, but then you also have access to one-to-one time with me as well, or you kind of get in the hot seat and we talk about your pricing. But that's where I have, and of course we could always do one-to-one off to the side, but I've really focused my attention on providing a quality service. And this, you know, I've provided many different services and trying to

support entrepreneurs in many different ways, but I've streamlined it into this one thing called the Price Lab. The service that I provide through the Price Lab is the kind of service I wish I had when I first started. And there were people who offered me lots of information that had lots of value, but it always felt like they were starting in the middle of the conversation. And the way my brain works, I talked earlier about neurodivergence and having a certain neural type.

I need for you to build the bridges along the way. Like I need for you to make those mental connections for me, which means sometimes I need for you to start at the beginning for me and just make it clear to me what the connections are. So, another thing related to that with the coaching industry in general, a lot of the conversation is about inspiration. I'm not looking for inspiration.

And I know that may come out a certain way, may sound a certain way, but that's not what I'm looking for. If I'm hiring you as a cultural consultant, I need for you to tell me what to do. And that's what I do in the personal app. You start here, you go here, you do that. There's some inspiration that comes along with it, but, I will inspire you. I'm a very inspirational person, but I'm not soaring like Eagles inspirational. I am.

Here's how I empower you by telling you the next thing to do and the next thing to do and the next thing to do. So I'm not trying to make you feel good enough to go ask for a certain amount. I am helping you build the bridges and the mental connections to make you understand what that amount should be and stick to that amount or stand on that or research it if you want to take it higher. Because what this does is this builds your confidence.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (01:23:50.19)

It roots you in your price. I don't have to do inspirational words. I can help you with the processes that make you feel grounded and make you feel rooted and regulated in what this exchange is between you and your client, then I don't have to help you soar like an eagle and fly above the clouds. I don't have to do that because I'm showing you how to validate what it is you

are offering. And quite frankly, I believe that a lot of people who coach in that way are actually well intended. But what ends up happening, and we've talked a little bit about industry and people leaving industry, what ends up happening is the very things that they're running away from, from industry that they don't like, they transplant that and transfer that into this environment where we're out here working as founders and solopreneurs. They unintentionally

bring that same mindset to this space. And so then they do the things that people in middle management try to do with the inspiration, kind of vague information. No, I'm saying I want clear information. I need for you to tell me exactly what to do so that I know where I'm standing. I know how I'm positioned. I know what my leverage is. I know what my negotiation, negotiation and bargaining position is. That makes me feel empowered. That makes me feel inspired.

And also, just based on what, know, just, you know, because I've done videos on, you know, how you build your confidence. This is a way to build your confidence and the confidence that you're going to grow within yourself by addressing this head on and really understanding how you fit into...

the puzzle of providing a service. That's what you need when you're in those rooms, when you're in those conversations. It's like somebody can give you a bunch of fluff like, oh my God, you're worth it. so, you know, all that, you know, all that woo woo. And I'm, I'm okay with some woo, but, you know, I definitely am. And we need a little bit of that, but this learning how to exercise this muscle, which I'm just really getting now in my career, I too,

Erin Braxton (01:26:07.948)

wish I would have had this, because I've been in business for myself since 2004. So we're talking 21 years. you're just kind of winging it. You're just kind of looking at what everybody else does. And then you're looking at these white boys like, how in the hell? Because they have the most confidence of all with their prices, just throwing stuff out there. They haven't even done what Dr. Kimberly is telling us to do.

thrown out a price and people pay it because they're white boys, right? So with what you've said and how we are conditioned to be of service, so we always want to give. This is truly a muscle that we need to exercise so that we can get ourselves elevated and out of these cycles and the situation of undercharging, of not charging, of under...

undervaluing ourselves. So,

And related to what you're saying, I was given advice, behave like a mediaeval white man. That is not helpful to me because I'm not a mediaeval white man. I'm not a mediaeval white man. And so I don't feel comfortable just throwing the price out there. And most of the black women that I've worked with do not feel comfortable making that kind of declaration. So it is a setup for failure for me to be advised to behave that way when I do not exist. That is not my positionality in society.

my mind does not exist in this physical space in this way. that is not useful advice to me. I need for you to tell me how to arrive at that price.

Erin Braxton (01:27:45.708)

Right. Well, we're not white men. No. At all. even if you if you were to go with that advice, it's not going to pan out for you the same. No, it's not. It's not. We're black women. there has to be. Yeah, we need to value ourselves properly, but we can't behave like they do. It just doesn't work. It's the world. It's not it's not right, but it's real. So.

And for me, the most important thing is that doesn't feel right to me. Like I can't move with confidence with that advice. So I'm the worst served by that advice. It's not even the projection and convincing other people. I don't feel good in my skin operating on that advice.

Well, you gave us what to do. I mean, you do the research, you do your background, you do all of the things to inform your pricing decisions. So, right. And I'm with you on that. As someone who has problems pushing forward, know, estimates and costs, this makes complete sense to me because I know if I throw out some, I'm a thousand dollars an hour. Okay. I mean,

And I think, I think this is good for some of the younger generations too, because I think social media has bamboozled people into believing that they should be able to charge these prices. It's not sustainable. Even if you, if you get a couple of people to do it, if you're not producing at a thousand dollars an hour, you're just charging that because somebody told you, you could, and they did. I don't think it's sustainable.

No, it's not sustainable. And it goes back to what I was saying. Your price is a hypothesis that you're constantly studying and trying to make sure you're in the right place. But you know what? But let's say that you're a person who believes that you should just throw out a price. Like you're a black woman and you think that just throwing out a price is the thing that works. So throw it out and walk it backwards. Can you connect? So if I say that

Erin Braxton (01:29:55.054)

Okay, give us an example.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (01:29:59.892)

It's my price is a thousand dollars an hour or something like that. You just for a round number, walk me through how you got to or come back from a thousand dollars an hour. So you can estimate, like look at how much, prep time is required. So how much time did you have to put on the front end? Is there report writing on the back end? What happens during the session? How long is the session? So that might get you up to like,

400 an hour. Do you have to pay other people? So you can try to walk it backwards that way. If you're just throwing out a number. But the surest bit is to construct it as opposed to deconstructing it. Constructing it starting with the problem you're solving, the person you're, or the people you're solving it for. That is the surest bit. Because if you don't have

some idea. If you don't have that input from your prospective client, you're just throwing out, you don't know what the numbers mean. And so when you show up and you have a conversation with a person and then you throw out the price, that's where you get into hemming and hauling after you throw your price out there. So when you name your price, you should just be quiet.

Yeah, that's what we didn't talk about. you know, all that talking and explanation. When you talk too much, you know, I'm digressing right now, but I have a rental property up. And when people call me and they're talking too much, trying to explain, it's just, it's an instant no. Right? Yeah. Just put it, put it out there like you're saying and be quiet.

Don't try to justify it. Yes.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (01:31:55.498)

If you, so we're right back to doing your homework. If you haven't done enough of the background, you haven't gotten the background data and you feel like you have to say all the things you have to justify after you laid it out very clearly for them, told them what's involved, what the price is, and you're still talking after that, you're still selling after that, that means that there's something either that you don't know or you don't accept about your offer.

That's good, that's good, that's good, that's good, yeah. I never articulated it like that, but you know, I just know that when you talk too much, you just talk too much. Just be quiet, but the way you put that, that's good, that's good.

And I'm talking from my own experience because I know, I know what that feels like in my body. I know that something is happening. I'm being activated in a certain way. I am trying to make something happen that may not yet need to happen. Or I've done enough lead work and I don't trust the work that I've done in, and I need to step back and let the work speak for itself. I don't need to try to manage. I don't need to try to regulate the situation anymore.

You don't believe it.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (01:33:09.742)

because I've already done it, can trust. But going back what you were saying, a muscle, this is a muscle. When you have these methods in place and you're constantly learning from your business, you're constantly validating the problem that you're solving, you're validating the way that you solve it, then it does become like a muscle. And it's just a matter of fact, it's like, it's just what I do. And because it's just what I do, just like I trust being able to put my shoes on.

I trust that I know what I'm talking about. I trust that the price lab is set at a price that makes sense. I trust that I can guide other people. I just trust it because I keep exercising this muscle.

Should we, I think we talked about it, but maybe not in this way. Should we be open to negotiation of any sort? The way I'm asking because, you know, I feel like, you know, I've had this happen where people have thrown stuff out you're like, that's just ridiculous. You and I both know it. You just threw that out there because you think I have the money to pay you. And I'm, you know, I'm not going to do it. And these are like small.

little things, you know, and then they'll back themselves down to like 50 % of what they threw out there because it was so ridiculous, which I think is immediately like you're weak, you lose credibility. Absolutely not. So my belief in pricing and negotiating is instead of just saying, okay, I can do that. I would rework the offering. Like I'm going to take away something. You're not going to get everything for this price that you just made up.

because you just want to negotiate with me. Okay, if you want it for that price, then we're going to take off this. This is the way I would do it. You're nodding, so tell me what you think. Okay.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (01:34:56.27)

So, if I have an offer and let's say I have a $5,000 offer and I presented to the person, I've done my homework, I've talked to anywhere from 20 to 30 people, I've come up with a good offer at a price that is aligned with that profile or that persona of a customer or client and I'm good on it. And they say, no, it's just not, I can't afford it. So rather than go down on the price, it's a con,

include some of the things that you just said. You do what is called a front end offer. So a front end offer may be that you take off, you bite off pieces of that bigger offer and you offer them those, those pieces at $1,500 or $2,000. And you say, um, instead of this $5,000 package, here's a $2,000 package or $1,500 package and

this $1,500 or $2,000 package could go towards a $5,000 package later. So instead of doing 180 days, we worked together for 90 days. And at the end of the 90 days, if you decide you want to continue working with me, then this will go towards 180 days. you bite off those essential parts and offer them the essential parts. You don't decrease your price, you just change what the offer is and you do what is called a front end offer.

Yeah, love that. This is so important people. Like this is so key. As somebody who is on her, I guess technically third business. This is so important and it's something that I continue to struggle with. Admittedly, you know, I tell you guys all my business really, it's a struggle. I mean, as a black woman, so, so important. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Tell everyone how they can find you, where we can find you, get in touch with you.

become a member of the Price Lab.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (01:36:54.092)

Okay, all right. Happy to share that information and thank you for bringing me on your podcast. I've really enjoyed this conversation and I'm going to share my contact information. I also want to say that I don't market myself as some type of a spiritualist or anything like that. And I value and respect that work.

This is deeply personal work that I'm doing with pricing because we really get to some serious roadblocks and serious barriers that Black women and other people face coming up in a society where we are expected to serve and we're expected to give out so much. I talk a lot in...

some other work that I do, talk about decolonization and I talk about how people expect to extract from us and they're expect to expect to extract from us at free to low rate. And this is how we get away from that. You get away from that by having a process in place, having a system in place where you can validate your work.

for other people, the world, but also for yourself, and become a student of yourself, become a student of your business. Examine your business, examine your processes, and examine your thoughts behind the decisions that you make. And if you take a moment and you look at how you price things, the decisions you make about pricing mirror the decisions you make about everything else. And you deserve a space.

You are owed a space in your business, in your operation, where you can just say, pause, you know what? I don't have to accept whatever people throw my way or whatever people was scraps. People are willing to give me. I deserve, I can put a process in place for myself where I take time and I really think about how I want to run this business, who I want to run this business for, how I operate. I don't have to serve without limits that we can exist in a whole different reality than that.

Dr. Kimberly Douglass (01:39:14.754)

So having said that, I put a lot of content on TikTok and it's drkemberly, K-I-M-B-E-R-L-Y, underscore Douglas, D-O-U-G-L-E-S-S. So it's drkemberly, underscore Douglas. And the price lab is on Patreon. And so it's patreon.com, Kimberly Douglas, you can reach me there. And then once you're inside my page, you can select the price lab.

But also if you go to TikTok, you can see my link tree. I have a video that tells you more about the price lab and what you will see. And this is an experience, some experiences I'll share with people. And I can't remember if I told Erin about this in this conversation or prior to this conversation, but one of the things that I've done, I've had many websites, different places, and I wiped the slate clean. What can I provide? What can I track? What can I keep metrics on?

How can I research it so that I am constantly validating it? And so what you see with the price lab and anything I put out going forward, it represents me taking time and honoring my operation, honoring my business by taking time to be a student.

Mm, appreciate that. This is awesome. Well, thank you so much for being here. Thank you. This has been really, it's like powerful stuff, key stuff, very important stuff. Stuff I wish I would have had when I started my first business as someone who, I would just say I'm not the money girl in any way. you know, just having these tools and these, conversation.

especially now where black women are going through a transition and a pivot professionally. So many of us, I think is so, so, powerful and useful. thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Kimberly Douglas for being here and thank you guys for watching and we will see you in the next video.