How to Stress-Test Your Pricing

_{[Read time: 1.5 minutes]}

I’ll keep this one short.

Not for lack of time.

I have 6 good hours, you know.

But because brevity forces focus.

Here’s how to stress-test your own pricing.

Three mini tests.

Then overlay them.

(side note: this requires some data + math)

Here we go.

1 — The Courage Test

Price starts inside you.

Pick a number you’d love to charge.

Say it out loud.

If you flinch, nervous-laugh, or feel uneasy, then you’re not ready for that price yet.

Find the price you have the courage to say aloud.

Simple, but revealing.

You have to stand by your price before anyone else will.

2 — The Economics Test

Price also lives inside your economic (business) model.

Start with time.

Jot down the following:

• Hours to deliver your service

• Hours to close a sale

• Hours for business development

• Hours for everything else

Do the math (with those hours).

What’s the maximum number of projects you can handle (at 100% conversion)?

Now list from 1 to that max.

Divide your revenue target across the range.

You’ll see the range of prices your business can sustain.

An objective, non-market test.

3 — The Market Acceptance Test

This is the obvious one.

The external one.

Conversions.

Gather the data.

The yeses and the nos.

Put on your analyst hat.

Crunch the numbers.

If you’re good with spreadsheets (Excel or Google Sheets) build a mini price sensitivity model to toggle up/down conversion scenarios.

Super revealing.

Now, stack the three together.

Where courage meets economics meets acceptance.

That overlap is a defendable range.

And a good place to start feeling good about your price.

Thank you for reading.

See you next week.

— Peter

P.S. If you want an outside perspective — or if Excel isn’t your love language — let’s stress test your pricing together.

This is one of the four tests inside my pricing diagnostic.

Reserve some time on my calendar.

Or if you’d rather read more stuff first, start here.