May
20
Big Bright Bulb’s Strategic Collaboration And Consulting Services
by Crystal Clayton, filed under In General
Image credit: Funwithfood
[Update: Fees for the collaboration and consulting services have been adjusted below based on reader comments and feedback]
With the positive feedback on the Alexandria Brown/1000 True Fans case study and last week’s Publicity Hound critique, I’d like to introduce Big Bright Bulb’s strategic collaboration and consulting services for doing business online.
How BBB’s Strategic Collaboration Works
Picture this: you and I gabbing our way through ideas and suggestions for your online business presence while you watch live demonstrations of useful tools, and are lead through examples of others’ online success.
Just like with my case studies and Build It Better critiques—but just between you and me, of course—I’ll evaluate your online business and highlight the great and not-so-great bits of your blog, store, or info marketing masterpiece. Then we’ll celebrate what’s working and brainstorm improvements and new direction for the parts that need love.
We’ll use telephone or Skype for talking, Provide Support for web page pushing and chat, and Glance for screen sharing—some of the most effective tools available for high-impact, no-hassle communication.
So if you’d like one-on-one time to explore online business possibilities with someone who can guide you to your big dreams on a small budget, call on me! A one-hour collaboration session is only $65 $97 (that’s less than a car mechanic plumber!).
A New Kind of Consulting
But what if you don’t need a whole hour of talk? What if you’re short on cash?
That’s okay! You can still get online business ideas and advice. Read on for a consulting setup created especially for business owners who want brief answers.
Some consultants charge huge fees to deliver a massive, complicated report of audits, critiques, and ideas. But why pay hundreds of dollars—or even thousands—for a large and elaborate report when just a simple sentence or two would suit you just fine?
Wouldn’t it be great if you could get a tiny, targeted answer at a teeny-tiny price?
Well now you can—
Introducing an espresso-shot of business advice for only $3.95 $9.95!
Yup, you can have masterful microbusiness micro-consulting at a microscopic price.
Just send me your business concern, question, or quandary and I’ll reply with a tailor-made tweet. That’s right! I’ll use the increasingly popular Twitter microblogging service for your diminutive deliverable.
And be assured, you will get every penny’s worth of your $3.95 $9.95, because I promise to use each and every one of Twitter’s allotted 140 characters.
Not on Twitter? Not a problem! You can also receive your answer via text message or email.
Here are some examples (and they’re all true stories!)—
Q: I’m a research consultant. I have a white paper that I would like to sell from my website as a download. Developers have told me it will cost around $5,000 to build a shopping cart solution. I have corporate clients, so whatever I do needs to look and feel polished—but that seems overpriced. What do you think?
A: Too much! Use E-junkie shopping cart to manage digital downloads with PayPal’s high-end Website Pro to process payments. $35/month plus fees
…
Q: I’m an information marketer, and I’m meeting with an editor who publishes for my target audience. I want her to consider me as a permanent contributor to her quarterly newsletter…how do I ‘Wow’ her?
A: Play up the scope of your niche knowledge. Share your bountiful ebook and the best of your ezine. Ask for her ideas. Offer a long-term plan.
…
Q: I’m a web designer. My client’s friends have told her she needs a blog so she can edit the content herself whenever she wants to. My client has a busy medical practice and will update the content only once a month or so. Is a blog the best solution for that?
A: Yes and no. A CMS is required but a blog platform is optional. Balance easy admin for her w/easy dev for you. See Squarespace and Wordpress.
…
It’s just that easy!
Like in the examples above, your bothersome business questions will receive concise, intelligent responses for only $3.95 $9.95. Imagine all the knowledge and insight you can receive for less than 8¢ per character!
How does that sound?
Do these consulting services sound crazy? Or clever?
Do they sound insane? Or inspired?
Lemme know down below! 
Somehow Similar Posts
- 15 Business Lessons From Wile E. Coyote, Super Genius
- The Value of Value: Snippets On Pricing Our Services
- Potluck Pricing: Letting Customers Choose What They Pay
Subscribe and Share
Stay in touch: Subscribe to my full feed RSS
Share this post your favorite way:
Comments
36 Responses to “Big Bright Bulb’s Strategic Collaboration And Consulting Services”
Leave a Reply
Whew! Taking a short break from blogging, folks. More posts coming soon. Thanks for your patience!
Subscribe to full feed
Hey Crystal,
Glad to see you are opening for business! The $3.95 “Tweet Critique” idea is cool– have you thought about doing a press release for that? It might get picked up in the blogosphere or at least the twittersphere.
It will be interesting to watch the growth of your biz. Good luck!
Chris
Howdy Chris,
Many thanks! A press release is a great idea, but I’d like to hash out both of these consulting ideas with you folks before I spread the word any farther.
There are always thought-provoking comments left for building things better, and I’m hoping readers are up for pointing their healthy skepticism and analytic edge at me!
So thanks for your thumbs-up on the micro-consulting…considering Copyblogger’s tweet-story contest, clearly much is possible within 140 characters
Thanks!
Smiling here.
Jan—Smiling back!
Crystal,
See? I *told* you that you are a genius. Very clever idea, you go for it!
You may even get some business out of me, I could use the help…
-Brett
Recent blog post from Brett Legree: the forever people.
Brett—Thank you! Some will consider this “mad genius” at best, but I’m enjoying the idea and I’m glad that you are too.
And you know I’m happy to help anytime! Except at 4am…I’m not at my best at 4am. Anytime but that
Crystal,
Mad genius is the best kind of genius. Much more interesting than just plain old genius.
Mad genius is like Wile E. Coyote, Super Genius…
Recent blog post from Brett Legree: the forever people.
Brett—Nooo, no computer staring at me while in bed! I even mute my cell, so if anything rings at night, it’s my landline…and only family has that number.
Uh oh…Wile E. always got smashed in the end! But I suppose, he always recovered quickly for another go (that was even clever-er)
Thanks again!
Crystal,
Good, you don’t need anything like that outside of the office, even if it is a home office. I turn my alarm clock around so you can’t see the time…
The trick to being Wile E. Coyote is to never look down. He only falls when he looks down…
Inspired ideas! I think your $65 is MUCH too low. $65 if you can then write about it on your blog maybe. If it’s private the way you’re describing then I’d say you need to almost double that price for an hour. They’re gonna get alot from you in that hour.
I suggest you have some sort of agreement they must agree to before you get started. That you can cut them off at any point, if they are simply giving long winded excuses for why what you just pointed out, is the way it is. When really they are embarrassed and trying to cover it up. Basically let them know they’re paying you for that hour to get as much as they can, and to simply let you do what you do best.
I love the $3.95 “Twitter Critique”. What if you made it $6 - they pay $3 up front. If they love your response and it helps them, they pay the other $3. If they don’t totally love it, they just leave it at $3. This way you still get pretty close to what you want anyway - and if they are happy they get a chance to express it again by ‘finishing the payment’. Just a thought…
After say 200 of these micro-consults - you could put together a free compilation of them. I bet there would a lot of outstanding advice in easy to read chunks. Splitting it up into categories. Providing a list at the back that has detailed info about every service you recommended.
Recent blog post from Shawn: Measure Your Success in Thousandths of Seconds.
Brett—This is so a post now. “Lessons for Microbusiness from Wile E. Coyote”
Coming soon! Thanks for the idea!
Shawn— LOL! As always, I do so love your enthusiasm! And particularly for this, I really really appreciate your feedback and ideas.
And boy-oh-boy, my business coach and friend Christine is loving your comment. I read all of these comments to her and when I got to your “$65 is MUCH too low” I got a big fat laughing “I told you so.”
Yes, you’re likely right. Yes, she’s likely right. I would love to find that I am! But looking at it from a potential customer’s perspective, where is the social proof that I’m worth more? Chris (see first comment) has been noted in the New York Times and Naomi at http://ittybiz.com has a great track record for drawing attention to back up her marketing/promotion gig.
A week or two ago, I picked a handful of y’all for feedback on what you see as the “voice” and “tone” of this blog. Your responses directed me to where the blog’s value is, and the aspects you valued are reflected in the services I’m offering. So what’s valuable wasn’t too tricky to sort. But what that value is valued at is kicking my butt, and I don’t mind telling ya’ so.
As for the Twitter micro-consulting, my plan was to adjust the price based on demand, with a cap under $10. But I LOVE your idea of the tip, and think I’ll do that instead. Google Answers used that model back in the day, and it seemed to work. And my jaw dropped with your compilation idea. I love love love that. It reminds me of Zen Habits’ compilation, where he added forms and such to the compiled popular posts. Wow!
Again, a thousand thanks. And buckets of blessings, besides
@Crystal,
Go for it! And Shawn’s idea, awesome!
@Shawn,
You hear that? Awesome!
Recent blog post from Brett Legree: the forever people.
This is a good conversation. I am glad to hear you are open to raising prices. When I first read your price, I also thought that $65 is too low.
Think about it this way — if I am going to hire BBB for consulting, the biggest decision is not the price. The decision is whether to do it or not. $65 vs $130 an hour is somewhat negligible. I mean, you might not be able to charge $500 an hour or something crazy right away, but within reason there is a much higher range than $65.
Also, I continue to believe that the cool thing about the micro-critiques has nothing to do with the price, so $3.95 vs $3.95 x2 or $10 is also kind of irrelevant, but in a different way. In this case, I would do the critique FOR FREE and then if people are happy they can buy you a latte ($3.95) or whatever. The value there is in the p.r.
Anyway, good luck! It is all inspiring to watch.
Recent blog post from Chris Guillebeau: Dear Silent Majority, I Need Your Feedback…
Seriously interesting post =) Gives a whole new perspective on consulting services with micro-advices. Haha! This would allow one to get more wide customers i think. Thanks and cheers.
Thanks Brett and Crystal! I’m flatter it is good - just what popped into my head as I was typing.
@chris - interesting thought on offering it for free. My main hesitation with that is it’s value is then also set at free. No matter how amazing her advice - it’s value is nothing. If it barely worked for Radiohead and NIN (releasing their albums for free and asking for donations) I’m not sure it would work for BBB. Now, I do agree on the publicity front as far as incoming links.
However - if you’re offering it for free, it’s very simple for others to offer it for free as well. To have the chutzpah to offer it at a price - can possibly have more incoming links recommending the service. And like you say, if the price is irrelevant - if even $10 is okay? Then why de-value the service by having it free?
@Crystal - Regarding the desire to qualify your hourly price. I totally understand that - without the ‘proven track record’ how can you ask for much? That’s besides the point - it’s what you are offering and what it’s ‘perceived value’ is.
I personally would only want serious people who seriously want my consulting. Raising the price abit helps qualify that. Next - deliver above an beyond in the beginning.
Remind them of the time as you go through your hour. Let them know you’re at 50 minutes and you’re wrapping up. Then at the hour let them know you still have more to share - more to say. Once you’re at 75 minutes apologize for going over - ask them if they are okay on time and then give them more for another 15 minutes. Let them know they are still only being charged for the hour obviously. But basically over deliver, and they’ll be extremely happy.
You’re the type that would over-deliver anyway! So if you think $65 for an hour is fair, and you’re most likely going to over deliver 30 minutes - then raise you price to $97. You’re being paid for your time, and they feel like they got more than they paid for. Win/Win.
@chris - on second thought - take my comments with a grain of salt. I kind of sound like an idiot there. :-\
Hi Chris!
My coach is so loving your pricing feedback and so am I. She’s loving it because it reinforces her position without her having to nag, and I’m loving it because y’all perceive me as valuable. There will be naysayers, but when are there ever not? Big thanks on many levels, from both of us.
The thing is that for you the price is not the biggest decision, but for others it will be. I had that in the forefront of my mind when I made my rate closer to a mechanic’s than an attorney’s
But a notable thing happened last night…
I got the ball rolling on that press release we’d talked about. It was an affordable, but unplanned, expense…yet I made it happen because I want and need the service to move forward in the direction I’d like to go. This is notable because when I priced my own services, my goal was to be accessible. But when I paid for someone else’s services, I did what I had to do to get what I wanted. Huge lesson. HUGE!
Because when it was my turn to purchase a service, I didn’t shop. I went directly to who I wanted and asked how much…and while price was a concern, it clearly wasn’t my first consideration or I would have shopped around based on price, right?
So yes, alllll you guys are right, and yes, I am raising the rate based on your feedback and my recent experience.
I’m with Shawn on charging for the micro-critiques, though, and for the same reason, which is the same as the reasoning for raising the rate…but I’m gonna address that when I reply to Shawn’s comment.
Thanks again, this was a great help!
Hi Zohai, and welcome!
I do hope this opens the door (or at least cracks a window) for folks who only need a little direction. Thanks for the encouragement
Howdy Shawn!
If any of that was idiotic, then we’re stupid together—it made sense to me. I feel pretty strongly, and not just for my own sake, that free services are bad juju. I’m coming to believe that we lose far more than we give away when we do that. Free promotional products are one thing, but free services…? My Mom warned me about that early on. She said “Watch after yourself. No one’s going to buy the cow when they can get the milk for free.” She wasn’t talking about business consulting, but it’s right on target for the topic, yes?
A couple of examples of giving value to free information: giveaway magazines with a slashed-through price, information marketing products with parenthetically valued free bonuses. We’re getting something for nothing BUT it’s made clear that the freebies do have some monetary value attached.
Also, free isn’t appreciated by many. It’s interesting how many people are belligerent about Twitter’s growing pains, and how entitled they feel to near-perfect service when they haven’t paid a cent. Words like “as members of the Twitter community, we made them what they are today, and we expect…we should get…we demand…” Sheesh! Yah, all 2 million+ of us made them what they are today—struggling to keep up with unexpected exponential growth, the poor dears!
Anyway, just like you said about the collaborative consulting services, it’s all about “perceived value”, and if I give away consulting sound bytes then what’s my collaboration time worth? In the same way 10% of nothing is nothing, so is 10X nothing.
And here’s the thing, I intend to take the microconsulting as seriously as I take everything else. Some answers will require web research, and maybe calling around for opinions, regardless of how brief the answer is. My $10 answer can be as valuable as my $100 answer, it’s just a helluvalot shorter.
So seriousness is a good reason for charging for the microconsulting, and charging more than I originally proposed for both.
As for over-delivering on time, have you been reading my notes?
It won’t always play that way, but I expect there to be topics and answers that won’t fit in a 60 minute window.
Based on y’all’s feedback I decided last night that I’d go just under three digits, so $97 is perfect. Same for the microconsulting…just under $10. We’ll see if the market agrees with us!
@Shawn—You’re right, a long-standing proven track record apparently isn’t required for forward movement. I’ve had a couple of folks contact me this week, and it’s clear that the blog itself is sufficient proof that I have something to offer. More big thanks for your vote of confidence!
Your mom was right Crystal! It’s so true in many instances and applies great here - especially with your collaborative consulting to take into account as well. That’s an amazing service that is certainly de-valued if you had a free service right next to it.
BTW - I forgot to say how much I really liked your wording of everything. The positive approach and “we’ll celebrate what’s working and brainstorm improvements and new direction for the parts that need love.” I really a great way to make them feel safe in knowing anything that is changed or improved is totally okay!
[...] 15. Whatever you do, don’t look down! [thanks Brett!] [...]
Crystal, this is wonderful. Any chance of a “full-service” package where you can provide copywriting & design talent to help implement your suggestions in the initial consultation?
Recent blog post from sterling: Magento - Revolutionary eCommerce for Small Biz
Hi Sterling!
Many thanks
I’m excited about it too. Still working out the details, but looking forward to launch next week.
As for “full-service” packages, you bet. My business coach and I are preparing a “co-consultation” package, and an implementation package would be dandy. We’ve been focusing on the imagining and the planning, and haven’t yet addressed getting things built.
Wow…ideas do get their own momentum, don’t they?
I do so like your big picture thinking!
[...] I introduced my strategic collaboration consulting idea earlier this week, anything could have happened in the comments area. Thankfully, I got the [...]
[...] I introduced the Twitter-inspired idea of microconsulting last week, there have been plenty of thoughtful questions and helpful [...]
Great post. This are a whole new way to see consulting services. Definitely will attract more clients and boost up the services. Great work!
@Shawn—Thanks! Glad to hear that the “positive approach” sounds like it was intended. I wouldn’t gloss over troubled areas, but I wouldn’t bludgeon someone with criticism either.
I mean, the sharply critical approach doesn’t seem like it would encourage most people to fix what needs work? Better to make a version of the No Sandwich: introduce the topic positively, tell the gritty bits, then close with encouragement.
[...] an earlier comment, Shawn of JV Blogger suggested setting a service base price and allowing the customer to set the [...]
I think it’s a interesting post. More new perspective on consulting services with micro-advices. So, don’t waste a time and come to grab this info. Thanks.
From my view this is a great way to attract more potential client. I agree its a new perspective in consulting fields and would be interested in the results.
Hi Marmaris and Sub…welcome and thanks for your comments!
Glad you two liked the consulting ideas. It is a new-ish take on giving advice, but overall it’s been well-received.
I’ll be sure to let you know how it goes…
Sunday I was searching for sites related to Marketing and specifically promotional business giveaway and I found your site.
[...] create something of value that sounds crazy but actually makes sense. Crystal at Big Bright Bulb recently opened a new consulting service with the option of providing mini-critiques through Twitter, the social networking service that [...]
Your idea intrigues me. Wondering how I can apply it to real estate (I’m a Realtor)? Can you share with me how you implemented this feature? Thinking of offering similar service for RE/loan questions. Would donate proceeds to Kiva.org. Thanks!
Recent blog post from Sean Giorgianni: New Murrieta Bank Owned Foreclosure Listing