215: The Psychology of Time

somebody else. So I was talking to her, and she was expressing some concerns about her pricing, because all of a sudden, and she had been in business for a long time. But all of a sudden, she was making, you know, the same amount of money that she had been making with in person sales, but she was working a lot less she was spending a lot less time per session. And she was kind of feeling that, like, she was struggling with like, I'm charging the same, but I'm not doing as much is that ethical?

Is that fair? Right. And, and so we were, we were kind of chatting about this. And she said, you know, now this session really only takes me like three or four hours, including driving to and from the session. So does it maybe I should lower my prices? Because it seems like $1,500, or I can't remember exactly what she charged seems like it's a lot. And she was saying, you know, and my clients don't get as much time with me. So they're probably seeing that we're not doing in person sales.

So my question to her was, are your clients getting the same result? Right? Are you lowering your standards? When it comes to the photos that you make? Are you do you feel like your photo editor is not delivering good final products, you know? And for that matter, since you're coming from in person sales? Are your clients still ending up with prints and albums? And you know, those kinds of tangible items that they will enjoy for years? And of course, the answer was yes. Like, of course, she

didn't lower her. Her standards with her camera, like she's been doing this for a bunch of years. She knows what she's doing. She's still getting the same good photos. And her clients are ending up with the same products and prints and all of that sort of stuff. So my question to her was, Why in the world, would you lower your prices, especially since she was still getting hired. And she kind of laughed and and we moved on. But I have

been thinking about it. And I I wanted to share that conversation with you because she walked out of it empowered to serve more clients, right. So she's, she's making those good photos for more people, she's making more money. And she's working more or less the same amount of time, she filled in the time that she was saving per

client and added clients. And by outsourcing her editing, she was actually helping support another small business artists, right her her editor was getting employment based on the fact that she was sort of up leveling her business. So I see that as a total win all the way around. She is making more money, more people are being served by her. And she is bringing income to

her editor. So today, I want to talk a little bit more about the psychology of time, because I think that this comes up in more than just this particular instance. And I think it really can get in our heads and impact the way that we run our businesses. Welcome to this can't be that hard. My name is Annemie Tonken. And I help photographers run profitable, sustainable businesses that they

love. Each week on the podcast, I cover simple, actionable strategies and systems that photographers at every level of experience can use to earn more money in a more sustainable way. Running a photography business doesn't have to be that hard. You can do it. And I can show you how. So time is a funny thing, right? They say it's a construct, but it is definitely something that can get in our heads. I know lots of photographers who are uncomfortable charging for their

time. And the reason that I know that they're uncomfortable charging for their time is that when I suggest that they charge a session fee up front to cover the session and the editing time. They'll say okay, but you know, I feel like I can't really charge that because I'm not including anything, as in I'm suggesting that they charge just the session fee and then afterward people have to purchase images and digital files and products and all that

sort of thing. And the photographer says well, you know nothing is included. Well of course something is included the time that you take, in many cases several hours to go and photograph somebody and edit their photos and all that sort of stuff. That's that's worth something right but then those very same photographers turn around. And when they're crafting an offer, they feel like one of the primary justifications of the price of their offer is to talk about how

much time it takes. I mean, how many times have we been on Facebook forums or, you know, whatever, where somebody talks about, like, oh, this person doesn't want to pay me. And they have no idea how much time goes into this, it takes me you know, 15 hours to work with a client and edit the photos and data that I need to educate them on how much time it takes. The fact of the matter is that when someone spends money for a service, they're not paying for the time it takes, they're

paying for the results. My I was trying to think of like an example outside of the photography world for this. And I thought of my friends who recently had a bathroom renovated. And they hired somebody to do the tiling in their bathroom. And they ended up calling that person the tiled turtle, because even though he did a really great job, he took like three weeks to tile their

bathroom. And every day, he'd come in and do like one row, and it was driving them nuts, because of course, at the point where he you know, the title needed to be installed, everything else had to stop. And so it just kept their bathroom out of commission for all that whole period of time. So it was something that we were talking about a lot. And you know, in the end, I think that somebody like a tailor, or a mechanic or god knows like your dentist,

right? I don't want a dentist, spending extra time cleaning my teeth or drilling or whatever, I want that done well, because obviously I care about my teeth. But I also want it done fast, I in some cases might actually be willing to pay more if it's done quickly. So if you've never heard of them, there's this entrepreneur and business writer named Alex Hermoza, he was actually in the gym space. So he was the founder of a gym, and then a series of gyms. And then he became like a consultant to

other gym owners. And he has written a couple of books. And he created something in one of his books that he calls the value equation, which illustrates this principle of how the service providers time doesn't really factor into the value of an offer. So the equation that he put together, I mean, he built it to look like a math equation. Obviously, it's not these aren't specific numbers. But on the top line, He multiplied this the idea of the

dream outcome. So the thing that someone wants to achieve by the likelihood that they believe they will achieve it if they buy this product or sign up for this service or whatever. So those two things are on the top line, and then on the they divide that by the amount of effort and sacrifice that the person needs to make in order to achieve it. So How hard are they going to have to work for it? And then how long are they going to have to wait for the outcome to

happen. So the idea is that the more you increase the items on the top line, the outcome, like the idealistic version of the outcome and their trust in you that you're going to deliver. And the more you decrease the time and effort that it requires for the person who is purchasing the service are good, the more valuable the service or product. So the more you can charge an easy example there is Netflix right? So Netflix entered the market back when blockbuster was king and said you can have any

movie you want. These days. Of course, it's it's like a whole different thing. But at the time it was we have this huge library of DVDs that we will mail to you quickly and you don't have to leave home. So your effort is really low. And the likelihood of achieving the outcome is pretty high because it comes in the mail. The mail shows up every day. So And over time, Netflix has improved and improved and iterated and

iterated. So now you can get any movie you want, essentially instantaneously unless you've got a bad internet connection, right? And it's very cheap. It's auto build. You don't have to leave home like the friction is very, very low there. And that's how Netflix killed blockbuster like Blockbuster, which was hugely successful for a bunch of years, fully one chapter 11 Because they didn't keep up. So we all know that time is a

limited resource. And we know that time is valuable when we sit and think about like, Oh, I'm editing these photos instead of spending time with my family. or I'm driving to a session instead of, you know, reading a book on a rainy morning or whatever the case may be. We know that our time is valuable, and it's limited. But that value does cut both ways, right? We think that our clients perceive our time is valuable, and therefore are willing to pay

more if we spend more time. And they should, in the case of things like a day in the life session or a wedding, where you're there for a long period of time, that is a situation where you can kind of commodify your time. But more important to our clients than our time is their time. And that's really the crux of what I'm trying to

cover today. I know plenty of people whose reactions to the idea of a day in the life session is like, why would I ever sign up for something like that, who has time for a 12 hour session. So there are people who want that, and they want that experience. And they want the kind of small details that get to be included in something like that. But there are plenty of people who would also sign up for a short session specifically

because it's short. So before you go, adjusting your offers, or your prices based on the value of time, I want you to consider how that time cuts both ways. So if the tiled turtle had been faster at his job, not only could he do more jobs and make more money, he may actually be able to pay him or charge more, because there are people out there who would be willing to pay more for the fact that he does really good work in a short

period of time. So I want to leave you with one final thought about one bit of time that I don't expedite. And I don't encourage you to expedite this either. Because this is where in addition to having some you know, there is like people are worried about time, and they want things fast, and they want things instantly, there is some psychology to delivering too fast in certain parts of the

process. So when it comes to time and effort, I stream I streamline a lot for my clients, we jump on the phone when I first meet with them, because it's easier and faster than going back and forth on email and making them read through paragraphs of like, this is how things work and wonder about stuff that they can't ask instantaneously. For me a phone call solves all those problems.

And within 15 minutes, we have the whole thing, you know, all the questions answered, and usually a date on the calendar. And then I keep my sessions pretty trim. I mean, they're not many sessions, but 60 to 90 minutes, we are done. I you know, point out to people that we can get that done before work in the morning. You know, I'm trying to accommodate the fact that I know that my clients are

busy. And everything that I asked my clients to do everything from booking to learning about how the process works, where I've made them several little informational videos that they can watch in like three minutes to, you know, previewing their images to purchasing, all of that is done from the comfort of their own home on their own time, it's usually you know, in most cases, it's very quick and easy. The one thing that I don't speed up is the delivery of their photos

to them after the session. So first of all, most of my clients don't have any need for faster photos, if I were doing headshots where somebody like, called me because they, you know, need to submit a headshot for a talk that they're giving, and they forgot about it until the day before. That's different. In that case, expediting the editing, and all that makes sense. But for a family session, you know, they don't typically need those

photos right away. So once the session is over, I want them to have a chance to kind of let the details of the sessions go, you know, maybe their kid had a tantrum, and it was stressful for them. Or maybe they got into a fight with their spouse right beforehand. Or maybe, you know, they felt awkward in one of the poses or, you know, any number of things that I want to like have softened in the in the rearview mirror. And then I want

that all to fade. And I want the excitement and the anticipation to build about getting these photos and they can't have that build If I turn around and deliver their photos to them two

days later, right. So at this stage of the game, I actually believe that time is an important component of that perceived value there was that if you're old enough to remember there was an ad once upon a time for rice krispie treats I want to say it was like in the early 90s where this mom, you see a mom, she's in the kitchen, she's reading a book with a plate of rice krispie treats in front of

her. And you can hear on the other side of the like wall or whatever the kids are playing and there's noise and whatever and she's just like relaxing and reading a book and then a timer goes off and she like looks up from the book and she dusts her face with flour, kind of you know, puts it all over herself. And then she walks with the tray of rice krispie treats into the other room where everyone cheers for her. So, so that was a, it was a funny ad. And it was

pretty memorable. But the point there is that, you know, everyone thought she put all this effort in. And actually it's really easy to make rice

krispie treats. If you have a situation where you like get locked out of your house or your car and you call a locksmith, that service call, you know, that takes three minutes because they have the right tools can be a little painful, because they'll charge you, you know, let's say it's overnight, they charge you 250 bucks, and they come and spend three minutes now I know that they have to own all this equipment, and they're on call and all that sort of stuff.

But they're and I do actually want them to get that done fast. It doesn't make it less painful that you know, there's this obvious thing that takes somebody note takes someone no time that you're paying a lot of money for. So in this particular case, I think there's a sweet spot for me, it's two weeks, I usually tell my clients, it's going to take two and a half to three weeks for me to deliver your photos. They're super excited. But they're not like feeling itchy and impatient.

Like I forgot them. And then I deliver them at the two week mark, even though it only takes my editor a couple of days to get those photos back to me. So in theory, I could deliver them same week, like three or four days later. But I put it on my calendar and I schedule it at the two week mark. So they are actually being under promised and over delivered and they get their photos and they feel like great, she really spent some

time with us. So to recap, the amount of time it takes you to complete your work has zero impact on your pricing or the value of your work, except that you have to be sure that your hourly rate is fair to you. In many cases, as long as what you deliver the product is good, less time is better. Not necessarily in the delivery. That's the one place where I wouldn't rush to be the fastest. But everything else you can you can streamline your time, you can definitely streamline their

time. And that's only going to add value to both you and them. Hope you guys have a great week. Well, that's it for this week's episode of This can't be that hard. I'll be back Same time, same place next week. In the meantime, you can find more information about this episode, along with all the relevant links, notes and downloads at this can't be that hard.com/learn If you liked the podcast, be sure to hit the subscribe button. Even better, share the love by leaving a

review on iTunes. And as always, thanks so much for joining me. I hope you have a fantastic week.