Pricing is one of the biggest challenges for accounting professionals. Many firms stick to hourly billing because it’s the traditional way, but it often leads to overwork, client dissatisfaction, and limited profitability. Value pricing provides a better alternative, allowing you to price your services based on the value you deliver rather than the time spent. Mark Wickersham, chartered accountant and pricing expert, has spent over 20 years teaching accountants how to master value pricing. In this blog, he shares three simple steps to help you make the transition and unlock higher profits while serving your clients better. 

Pricing services correctly is a fundamental challenge many accountants face. Get it wrong, and you're either undervaluing your expertise or risking client dissatisfaction. Traditional hourly billing, often considered standard practice, frequently leads to confusion and frustration among clients, primarily due to unexpected or unclear costs. Mark Wickersham , a chartered accountant and renowned pricing expert, advocates strongly for value pricing, which is an approach focused on the value clients perceive in your services rather than just costs. What is Value Pricing? Value pricing involves setting your prices based on the value you deliver to clients, rather than simply calculating costs and adding a margin. Hourly billing inherently ignores customer expectations and often leads to "surprise bills." Value pricing, instead, begins with understanding client needs and expectations. Unlike traditional pricing methods that focus on costs and time spent, value pricing considers the outcome and the benefits your service provides. When clients see clear value in your offering, they are more willing to pay a price that reflects that value. 

Most bookkeepers and accountants undercharge for their services. That’s not an opinion—it’s a fact backed by benchmarking studies. The problem isn’t just about charging too little; it’s about pricing the right way and communicating value effectively. Mark Wickersham , a profit improvement expert, has spent decades teaching bookkeepers how to price their services strategically. In a conversation on The Successful Bookkeeper podcast, he broke down the key challenges with pricing and how bookkeepers can move from hourly billing to value-based pricing. Here’s what you need to know. Why Hourly Billing is a Mistake 

Pricing is one of the biggest challenges for accountants and bookkeepers. Many firms still rely on hourly billing, which often leads to frustration, undervaluing services, and pricing pushback from clients. Value pricing provides a better way to set prices that align with the value you deliver rather than the time you spend. In this blog, we’ll cover the five key value pricing principles that will help you achieve better prices for your accounting and bookkeeping services. 

Over the course of 2021, we've added LOADS of exciting new features to Effective Pricing, some of which came from your own great ideas and suggestions. Here are all the new features added to Effective Pricing over 2021 in case you missed any: Updates to Proposals Effective Pricing had some updates which went live at the end of January 2021 relating to proposals. Here is a quick summary of the main changes: Expanding the list of pages In the top left you could only see 3 of your proposal pages at a time which made it cumbersome managing page ordering with lots of pages. There is now a new icon allowing you to expand or contract the list of proposal pages.

This is an inspiring story from one of our new students in the Value Pricing Academy.

Debbie Moulton, one of our Value Pricing Academy students shared this great story that illustrates the power of giving the client options.