Client Case Study · President & CEO, Influens
The Gap Between What You Charge and What You're Worth.
A leadership development CEO closed it - and raised his rates 300%.
By the numbers · his story, his words
The challenge
Fortune 500 Credentials. Inherited Pricing.
Dr. Robert Hernandez first walked into Influens in 2005 - and not by choice. He was a clinical psychologist being set up on a blind date. The date didn't work out, but on his way out the door he was invited to audition as a coach-facilitator for the company. They told him he was "too much of a shrink" and needed to bring more energy to the room. He did, and they brought him on the team.
Fast forward to 2017. The owner of Influens took Robert to lunch and told him he was retiring - and asked Robert to buy the company before it went on the open market. By September 2018, Robert was the President and CEO.
On paper, his resume was as strong as it gets. A Psy.D in clinical psychology. More than 20 years of leadership-development facilitation. A client roster that included TripAdvisor, HSBC Bank, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Sargent Aerospace, and Dover Corporation - the kind of logos most consultants would mortgage their house to land.
And yet Robert's pricing didn't reflect any of it.
When he bought Influens, he inherited the company's rate card along with everything else. And he inherited the story that came with it: That he couldn't raise his rates any further, because the previous owner - who didn't have clinical psychology training - had priced the business a certain way and that was the ceiling. Robert bumped the numbers up a little. But deep down, he'd bought into the limit.
"I really thought I could not raise my rates any further - until I had this amazing conversation with someone named John Nemo."
Dr. Robert HernandezPresident & CEO, Influens
Robert had talked to other people about pricing in the months before we met. They'd all told him similar things - raise your rates. But none of them had given him anything concrete to work with. No data. No specific numbers. No language to actually hand to a client.
Which meant, for all the outside input he'd gotten, Robert was still exactly where he'd started: A Fortune-500-caliber psychologist, running a 15-year-old leadership firm, quietly leaving real money on the table every single engagement.
What we did
Close the Gap Between Price and Value.
Robert didn't need a pep talk. He needed three specific things: Real market data, a new pricing structure that gave existing clients a graceful on-ramp, and the exact language to put inside a proposal. We built him all three.
We Showed Him What the Market Actually Pays
After working with hundreds of coaches and consultants, we know what the space pays - and we know how dramatically underpriced most senior operators are. We walked Robert through concrete numbers from comparable firms: Credentials like his, client rosters like his, delivery models like his. The gap was impossible to unsee. People with less credibility than Robert were charging multiples of what he was charging.
The moment the numbers were in front of him, the whole thing clicked:
"It was like the universe was giving me a message. You're absolutely right - when I started my private practice in 2005, I called every other psychologist in a five-mile radius and priced myself between average and the most expensive. I never did that for the consulting side. That's what changed."
Dr. Robert HernandezPresident & CEO, Influens
We Shifted Him From Time-Based to Value-Based Pricing
Robert had been pricing on time - half-days, full-days, per-session - a framework that completely ignores what his clients were actually buying. They weren't buying a workshop. They were buying 15+ years of refined curriculum, a clinical psychology pedigree, and a program custom-built to the exact company receiving it. Robert himself put it best when he said clients routinely assume his team is part of their own company - that's how deeply he tailors every engagement.
"A lot of the time we think we're charging just for the small amount of time that we're with the client face to face," Robert told us. "But we don't take into account everything that falls behind that. All the research, the customization, the heart and love we put in - that's what they're paying for."
We Gave Him the Exact Words to Put in a Proposal
A rate increase without supporting language falls flat - and Robert had already experienced that. Other advisors had told him to raise rates but never handed him the words to justify it. So we wrote him the script. Direct, confident, anchored in value. A sample he could adapt to real clients:
"We've spent more than 15 years developing, refining and improving our virtual and in-person workshops for clients like TripAdvisor, HSBC, Dover Corp, and Sargent Aerospace. Based on everything we've learned - direct feedback from clients, industry-specific and human-psychology research - we're bringing an even more dynamic, even more interactive workshop experience to our clients. Here's what the new investment looks like."
Robert didn't have to use those exact words - but having them in hand changed everything. As he put it, reading it "strengthened something I already knew deep inside."
We Built a "Former Client" Tier So Nobody Got Shocked
The trickiest part of a 300% rate increase is the clients who've been paying the old rate for years. So we built Robert a tiered structure: A loyalty rate for returning clients that was still two-to-three times his previous pricing, and a full market rate for new prospects. Returning clients felt valued. New prospects paid the real number. Every engagement moved closer to where it should have been in the first place.
In his own words
Watch The Full Case Study.
Discover how Dr. Robert Hernandez raised his rates 300% - and what every underpriced coach, consultant and expert can learn from it.
Why it worked
The Principles Behind the Results.
Market awareness gave him permission. Robert wasn't being stubborn. He simply hadn't seen the data. Once he understood what the market actually pays for his caliber of work, the decision to raise rates stopped feeling risky and started feeling obvious. He told us it felt like the universe was giving him a message.
Value-based thinking replaced time-based pricing. When you stop pricing on hours and start pricing on outcomes - 20+ years of clinical expertise, a Fortune 500 track record, fully custom delivery - the math changes. Robert's clients weren't buying a half-day. They were buying a transformation Robert had spent two decades learning how to deliver.
Specific language did the heavy lifting. Every rate-increase consultant in the world can tell you to "charge more." Very few hand you the actual script. Robert finally had messaging he could drop into a proposal with a straight face. That's what made the increase stick.
The tiered structure protected his existing book. A "Former Client" rate that was still 2-3x his old pricing kept longtime clients loyal while moving the economics of the business decisively forward. Nobody got blindsided. Nobody walked. Everybody moved up.
Better pricing attracted better clients. The hidden benefit of raising rates is that the prospects who say yes at the new price are fundamentally different - more engaged, more committed, more likely to implement. Robert didn't just raise his revenue. He raised the quality of every conversation he was having.
"These guys are great at stretching you. When I say stretched, I mean stretched beyond your belief in yourself and in your services. These are the folks you want to have on your side."
Dr. Robert HernandezPresident & CEO, Influens
The result
He Was Worth More. Now He Charges It.
"Working with Nemo Media Group, I was able to IMMEDIATELY raise my rates by 300% - securing a high-ticket, half-day workshop client as a result. The pricing strategy John and his team provided - complete with pre-written copy to share with new and former clients - as part of our engagement yielded immediate ROI."
Dr. Robert HernandezPresident & CEO, Influens
The math
Run His Story Against Your Numbers.
Robert's gap wasn't leads. It was pricing - and closing it didn't require a single new client.
Now run both questions against your own business: If I put 100 of your ideal prospects in front of you this year, how many would you close? And are the ones you already close paying what you're actually worth?
Multiply the two answers together. That's the size of the gap this page is about.
Your next step
Ready To Fill Your Pipeline?
Are you a consultant tired of being underpriced? Here's how we work with consultants like Robert.
John Nemo · Founder, LinkedIn Riches
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