June 4, 2026
What if I don’t trust the numbers a prospect gives me?
On today’s Ditcherville LIVE session, I was asked:
How do you handle leads who insist that you give them a price when I don’t really trust their value numbers? Is there anything more comfortable than making sure it’s way above my walk-away number and waiting around for them to say never mind?
If you don’t trust their value numbers, one (or both) of the following is the likely culprit:
- You might have been talking to the wrong person
- You might have ended The Why Conversation too soon
So what do you do?
On the call, I put it this way:
Not trusting their numbers is a problem. And I think the solution is to make sure that you’re talking to the right person and getting far enough into the Why Conversation that you are convinced that they should do this.
It’s not about convincing them to hire you. It’s about THEM convincing YOU that they will be better off after giving you a bunch of money.
You are not there to extract the maximum amount of cash from the client.
You are there to figure out if they can reasonably be expected to get good ROI from your assistance.
If they can’t convince you of that, then it means you DON’T think they’ll get good ROI from hiring you.
In which case... why would you submit a proposal?
Yours,
—J
BTW - This is the kind of question that comes up every two weeks in Ditcherville LIVE, my group Q&A session for independent consultants who are done trading time for money.
If you’ve got questions like this rattling around in your head, come get them answered:
Hope to see you inside!
Yours,
—J