How Natasha Overcame The Fear Of Raising Prices And Stopped Working 100-Hour Weeks | Case Study

The Abundant Accountant: Leads, Sales & Business Growth for Accounting, Tax and Bookkeeping Professionals

Natasha Brown, a solo accounting firm owner with 20 years of experience, shares her transformation from working 100-hour weeks during tax se

Key takeaways

• Raising prices confidently is not just about revenue—it's a tool for creating sustainable work-life balance.
• Setting strict boundaries around scope and payment terms eliminates burnout and attracts high-value clients.

Main topics

• Fear of raising prices
• Setting boundaries with clients

Notable quotes

"I realized that not only was I working too much, but I didn't want to miss out on years with my other children. That was the final straw."

Conclusion

Natasha's journey proves that raising prices, setting boundaries, and strategically selecting clients

Transcript preview

Speaker 1 (0:10) Welcome to the Abundant Accountant Podcast, the show for accounting, tax, and bookkeeping firm owners. Are you ready to build a firm that gives you the freedom, confidence, and consistent revenue without burnout or undercharging? If you've ever felt stuck discounting your fees, chasing clients, or giving away too much advice for free, you're in the right place. Here, we talk about sales mastery, charging premium prices, creating boundaries that stick and learning how to convert high value clients with confidence and ease. Each episode, you will hear real success stories, sales strategies, and guest experts who will help you work less, earn more, and finally create the firm and life you deserve. Speaker 1 (1:01) Welcome to the Abundant Accountant Podcast. Today, we have a very special guest. Our special guest is a solo accounting firm owner. She started her practice in 2008 and has grown it into a thriving accounting and tax firm. She specializes in working with small to mid-sized business owners, providing tax planning, accounting, and advisory services. really designed to support growth and profitability for her clients. And her mission is really to help clients build stronger businesses while keeping more of what they earn through proactive tax strategies and financial guidance. And she comes from a family of entrepreneurs and has a strong appreciation for what it takes to build and grow a business, which really fuels her passion for helping clients get the same results in their businesses. But before we welcome our special guest to the show, if you're a firm owner and you want to stop trading time for dollars and start commanding premium fees without burning out, then make sure to listen up. Here at The Abundant Accountant, I teach firm owners, just like the one you're about to hear from today, only work with the ideal clients who value their time, who value their energy and their expertise. Not those clients that haggle over price or send last minute documents late at midnight or wonder why you can't bend over backwards to get them what they need right away. I'll show you how to increase your revenue without working more hours, without negotiating price or discounting your worth. If you are ready and you're serious to build a firm that gives you your time back and has the financial freedom. that you deserve, then go to theabundantcall.com and book your complimentary strategy session with me and my team. Once again, that's theabundantcall.com. And now let's welcome our very special guest and client here of The Abundant Accountant, Natasha Brown. Welcome, Natasha, to the show. Hi, thanks for having me. Yeah, thanks so much for being here with us on the Abundant Accountant podcast. It is lovely to have you here. And I'm very excited because I always think our case study podcast with clients of the Abundant Accountant are always fun conversations. I know many firm owners love to hear from other firm owners who might be in their shoes, you know, where you were probably about a year ago now. And I am just so grateful for you to take out the time out of your busy day to share how your life has changed and all of the details that we're going to talk about today. But before we get started, Natasha, why don't you share where you're at in the country and what kind of services your firm offers to different clients? Speaker 2 (3:50) We are in the Midwest. We mostly offer tax strategy, tax returns, and then kind of the CFO advisory. We've been heavily taxed, but it seems like the accounting has grown substantially as well. So we've kind of become a full service firm. Speaker 1 (4:08) Yes. Speaker 2 (4:09) Awesome. Cool. Speaker 1 (4:12) Prior to finding the Abundant Accountant and before working together, what do you feel was the most frustrating part of running your firm? I would say Speaker 2 (4:24) the thing that probably brought the most grief was I had a fear around raising prices. I knew that with how long I had been operating that it was time, but I was very scared of raising my prices and also of kind of telling clients, no, those were kind of my two biggest struggles because I generally want to help people, like genuinely want to help people. And sometimes that can kind of overtake. myself and like what, you know, putting myself first in my family. Speaker 1 (4:57) And I think saying no to clients and having the fear of raising prices is probably the number two things we hear as it relates to someone who's having a challenge in their firm as it relates to sales, because you want to help people. You want to do, you know, all the tax strategy you can to help people. reduce their liabilities on their taxes and do things. But then at the cost of it for you, you, you know, I think when we first met, you were really working too much. You know, there, there were a lot of things that you were frustrated with, right? And the cost of our family time too, you don't get that time back. It's not like. oh, hey, let me just borrow a little bit of time and then, you know, I can make up for it later. I think once you see it, it just kind of dwindles away, right? Share with us the story for you, Natasha, that you were thinking, you know, I have this fear of raising prices. I can't say no to clients. I'm not seeing my family enough. Like share with us when was that moment where you said. you know, this is my final straw. Enough's enough. I've got to do something different. Like, can you take us back to that moment and share all the nitty gritty glory details about what was it for you that said enough is enough. I've got to make a change. I've got to do something. Like, how did you even realize you want to do it, make a change? Speaker 2 (6:25) I think the trigger for me was probably, um, I have a, an adult son that is in college and And last year was the time when he had kind of moved out, you know, kind of flown the nest to live on his own. And I think that's when I had that realization that not that I've, you know, they've had obviously great childhoods and I've been there for them, but I kind of realized that I had gotten kind of sucked into the work funnel and I didn't want to miss out on years with my other children. So that was kind of my. I think that was the main trigger was like, Oh, I have one that's kind of flown the nest. And I can see now how quickly it goes. And I just want to make sure I don't miss out on that time at all with the other ones. Not that I missed out on a lot of time with him. But I can tell that the last couple years with the growth of the firm that it just got to where I was just being consumed by work, trying to keep up with all of it. Speaker 1 (7:22) Yeah. And I think you know, you got to see that firsthand and then you're, you said, you know, okay, this, my, my kids flown the nest. I did well, but I don't want to repeat that pattern. And, and I think. I mean, just being an entrepreneur, you get sucked into your work because you love it, right? And you want to help everyone and then all of these things. So what made you say, you know, okay, I have this fear of raising prices. I have a hard time saying no to clients. I don't want the same patterns to happen with my kids that are still at home. How did you figure out, Natasha, that you had a sales challenge? I think a lot of firm owners find that really hard to figure out. Like, oh, you know, I think a lot of people say, well, you know, I need more. I need to do more marketing or I need to do more leads. Like, how did you know that you actually had a sales problem in your firm? How did you diagnose that for yourself? Well, Speaker 2 (8:25) I could kind of tell all of our growth, like all of. We don't do any marketing. So everything's word of mouth from existing clients. And so I could see this demand increasing and the complexity increasing. So it's like we were kind of moving upstream, you know, and which is rightfully so with how long I've been doing this now. But we I think I could see the level of clients coming in. And I just still was kind of stuck in the mindset of kind of the like legacy pricing that we had. you Speaker 1 (8:55) know, from a Speaker 2 (8:55) long Speaker 1 (8:55) time ago that Speaker 2 (8:56) I did kind of when I first started out where you're just hungry. But I think that's when I had the realization that we just had too much work, like too much demand. And I had to find a way to kind of, obviously you don't want to minimize the demand, but you have to harness it. And I think I didn't know how, I honestly didn't even know what fair pricing would be. I just didn't have any indication of what I should be charging, you know, for the services I was providing. Speaker 1 (9:23) And I think a lot of people don't know how much to charge. You know, you look at what you've charged. Like you said in the beginning, you charged whatever. And now people have been around for a long time and you didn't make any drastic changes from when you started. And how long have you had your firm, Natasha, just to put things into perspective for listeners? Speaker 2 (9:45) Oh, it's been, I mean, it's been about 20 years. Um, it, it kind of started off as like a little part-time thing, but, um, it definitely exploded into a full-time firm. Speaker 1 (9:55) And, and I think not understanding how to price or looking at competition or looking at other people in your area, it, that's how many people think they should price. And like you said, you, you knew you had to harness the demand, but you just didn't know how. So you've stumbled upon us. What hesitations or fears did you have before you said, okay, I'm going to get some help and join our eight-week sales mastery course and start to say, okay, enough's enough. I'm going to get over my fear of raising prices. I'm going to learn how to say no to clients. I'm going to figure out how to put myself first and get my time back so I can spend more time with my kids and leave work a little earlier, which I know is really important to