Ask Me Anything: Listener Questions Answered

Shannon Mattern: Welcome to the Profitable Web Designer, a podcast for web designers who want to work less and make more money. I'm your host Shannon Mattern, founder of the Web Designer Academy, where we've helped hundreds of web designers stop under charging, overworking and create profitable sustainable web design businesses.

Shannon Mattern: Well, hey there, welcome back to the podcast. And I'm so excited because I just realized we have been doing this podcast for an entire year, like a couple episodes ago was episode number 52 and it doesn't quite count because I launched with three episodes and we launched like the first week of September of 2022. But this episode, even though it's episode 54, it makes one entire year of the profitable web designer podcast. And I am just so honored to have gotten to talk to you for an entire year about all of the different parts of running a profitable, sustainable web design business. All the incredible guests that we've had come on the show. And it truly has been my absolute favorite, favorite thing to do. When I think about all the different ways that you can market a business and talk about what you do and get your message out there and connect with other people, a podcast is my absolute favorite way to do that.

Shannon Mattern: It's such a good excuse to just like reach out to cool people that you wanna meet and get to know better and have them come on the show. And the podcast has really evolved over the past year where at the beginning I was like, I don't wanna have guests, I just wanna talk about concepts myself to really circling back to like my old school way of thinking of where like having other people's stories and perspectives and experience and just them sharing those things on the show is super helpful too. So it's been so fun to like try different things and do a mix of solo episodes and guest episodes and just all of the things and it's so, so fun. So I want to thank you if you have been listening to this podcast, if this is your first episode or your 54th episode, thank you so much for being on this journey with me.

Shannon Mattern: I hear from you guys all the time in my inbox and just people reach out to me with telling me that like something I said was what they needed to hear that day or that that their mindset shifted or they implemented something and it worked for them. And it's so lovely to hear from you when you have breakthroughs like that. And I'm excited for many, many, many more years and many more episodes of this podcast to come. It only is going to get better from here. So I can't thank you enough for being a listener. And I also want to invite you, if you haven't left us a rating or review on Apple Podcasts and a comment, I would love to ask you to do that, you can just go to https://webdesigneracademy.com/review. It's gonna take you directly to the Apple Podcasts review page for this show.

Shannon Mattern: And if you could leave us a rating and review and just let me know like what mindset shifts have you had? Like how has this podcast helped you? That would be amazing. I would be so, so grateful because ratings and reviews help us be like shown in the podcast app to people who might like want to listen to our show and could benefit from our show. So it helps the algorithm when you do that and it helps me get in front of more web designers and it helps them, helps them transform their mindset and their life and their business. And that's my mission to help as many web designers as possible completely transform their self-concept about themselves and what's possible for them and truly create a life and a business that supports them and sustains them and that they love. So https://webdesigneracademy.com/review, that'll take you to the podcast review page so you can leave us a a rating review.

Shannon Mattern: And today I have a special episode for you. I recently, well not recently, it's been a few months, I did Instagram live. I was testing out, do I want to be on social media, is really the question that I've been asking myself. And if I am going to be there, how can I be there in a way that delivers the most value? And so I think I have made a decision on that question and I'm sure I'll be talking about that like in my newsletter and stuff like that. But I did this Instagram live, ask me anything at the end of May where I answered people's questions like how do I find investment minded clients? The age old question of of should I put my pricing on my website and really just kind of talking through like some of the most frequently asked questions that I get anytime I'm doing a training or a talk or talking to web designers.

Shannon Mattern: So I am putting that on the podcast for you guys this week. I hope you love it. If you have any questions that you would love for me to answer on an AMA-style episode, you can send those to me via email shannon@webdesigneracademy.com and I will answer your questions on the podcast. So if you've listened to the show and you're like, man, I have something going on in my business that I'd really love to get Shannon's perspective on, just email it to me and maybe I'll answer your question on a future episode of the profitable web designer. So let's go ahead and dive in to this recording of the Ask Me anything that I did on IG Live a couple months ago. Oh my gosh. Hello everyone. I'm trying something totally new today, so bear with me if it's a little bit janky because I have not done this before.

Shannon Mattern: So I'm super excited to test out with you guys live. Ask me anything on Instagram. So one of the things we always talk about in the Web Designer Academy is like making your first pancake. And this is something that our client success coordinator Eric and Nash talks about. She's always like, you know how your first pancake is like a little messed up, right? It's always a little burnt or it's undercooked or it's all like whatever. So this is our first pancake in doing a live Ask Me Anything on Instagram and we're simultaneously recording it for the podcast. So we'll see how it goes. I don't know, but we're just gonna dive in and do the thing, right? So for those of you that are here or joining me, go ahead and ask me your questions in the chat. So I'll tell you a little bit about who I am and what I coach on and and what kind of questions.

Shannon Mattern: But we are here to talk about your web design business and all of the challenges and bottlenecks. And I'm here to answer as many questions as you guys have for me to help you overcome those issues. And I'll also answer questions that I commonly get for, you know, just so that if you don't have a question, maybe there's something that you are like, oh yeah, I didn't know that I needed support on that, but like, thank you so much for that. So if you don't know me, my name is Shannon Madden and I am a former freelance web designer. I got my start as a freelance web designer back in 2014 now. Wow. And I started just doing like web design on the side of my day job for friends and family. And then that branched out to referrals and it was a hot mess.

Shannon Mattern: It was like probably . One of the hardest things that I have ever done was to try to figure out how to run my web design business. And I knew how to build websites and I knew how to like create solutions for clients and I knew how to ask them all the right questions to get them what they wanted. But I did not know how to run a business. I didn't know how to charge appropriately. I didn't know how to manage my time. I didn't know how to say no, I didn't know how to set boundaries. My projects would drag on and on and on and on forever. Like I got stuck in like the never ending cycle of revisions. I would have zombie projects like , we call them zombie projects, where they're just like never, like they just never quite get off the ground.

Shannon Mattern: And I just didn't know how to navigate any of it. And I got to the point where I was just about to burn my whole entire web design business down and I ended up, I, I just had a really strong desire to be my own boss and to work for myself and be able to like make my own money and not have somebody telling me what to do and where to be and all of those things. And I know it's a little bit different now for a lot of people because like they have remote work and flexible schedules and things like that. But like when I was , when I was like commuting to work and you know, sitting in rush hour traffic and going to pointless meetings and having, it was just, it was, I wanted freedom. And so my web design business did not feel like freedom.

Shannon Mattern: That was like the biggest thing that I was like, oh my gosh, my web design business feels worse than my day job at this point, so I am just gonna like burn it all down and like figure out something else to do. And so I had a business coach that had like been in my world at that time and she was like, if your car breaks down , she said this to me, like, if your car breaks down you don't just like leave it on the side of the road and abandon it, right? You fix the car. And so what she was trying to help me understand is that my web design business just needed like had just broken down and it just needed a few repairs. And if I repaired those things that were causing me so many challenges and so much hardship and having the business be so hard that like I could actually have this thing of value.

Shannon Mattern: And so that's really what I ended up doing was getting some help, getting some systems and processes, just learning how to not be a people pleaser anymore, learning how to communicate boundaries. And so all of that long story short turned into what we do now is coach and mentor web designers who are about ready to like burn their business down or leave that car on the side of the road and just abandon it. And we're like, we know that you started this because you wanted something more from it and it got hard at some point and we want to help you like get over that and, and get what you really wanted to create in the first place. So for those of you who are here with me live, I would love to answer any questions that you have about your web design business.

Shannon Mattern: Where are you experiencing challenges, what are your bottlenecks? What are you struggling with? Like let's get into it and you can just post that in the comments because that's what we do and that's what I love to do. And you know, when we run things like the Simply Profitable Designer Summit, like the interaction with our attendees is the most fun thing that I do. So that's why we're testing out like hey, let's go live. Let's give people who don't work with us inside of our program a chance to get some of their questions answered and really help you just like overcome whatever that thing is that's standing in your way, that's making your business feel hard, that's making you feel like you wanna burn it down . Because we, we don't want you to burn your web design business down if there is something that we can help you with to like get you over the hump.

Shannon Mattern: So pop any questions that you have in the comments. So like I'm excited to answer all of those. And yeah, so while I'm waiting for any questions to come in, I'm just gonna start answering questions that I commonly hear from web designers all the time. like no matter what I'm doing like a webinar or a training or something like that, I get these questions like pretty often. And one of those is like should I put my pricing on my website? I don't know how many of you are here, but if you've ever had the question, should I put my pricing on my website first? We have a whole podcast episode about this. If you go to https://webdesigneracademy.com/027, we have a whole podcast episode about this. But long story short, our official answer in the Web Designer Academy is no, you should not put your pricing on your website because you take away your opportunity to pre-frame the value of working with you.

Shannon Mattern: Your price is not necessarily about like if you're thinking about like my price is just what I'm charging for my time and deliverables, it's this equation that like I'm gonna put it on my site and people can either take it or leave it. You're missing a huge opportunity to learn more about people and like understand what their problem is under like tell them what your solution is, the whole experience of working with you and then make an offer. And we like talk about like making empowered offers that they can then choose from. But like price is different than value, right? Like when you just like put a number on your website, you're really not able to like lead your potential client through the process of really valuing not only what you're gonna do together but the thing that you're gonna create for them and how that's going to help them reach their goals and support them in their life.

Shannon Mattern: So we always say like your price comes when you've had a qualified conversation with someone, you understand how you can help them and you then make an offer and explain the price. And by that point you've really had the opportunity to help that person understand like what kind of like the value of working with you. So that's just a question that we get asked all of the time that I figured I would answer on this live. Ask me anything. So if you're here live with me, take this opportunity to get some coaching on your web design business so that you can really like move forward with confidence. So I'm so curious, what is your biggest bottleneck right now in your business? Go ahead and leave me a comment. I'm gonna take a sip of water. I would love to know what are you struggling with, what can we help you with? What is your biggest challenge? Oh, I have a list here of things that I'm gonna talk about for sure.

Shannon Mattern: So the other question that I get asked all the time is where do I find premium clients? So one of the things that we teach inside of our program is that like you set your price to be profitable and sustainable for you, right? So you do a calculation and an analysis of like you and your needs and that's how you determine your pricing. You don't go looking at what everybody else is charging or what you think the market will pay for web design or whatever. You look at like for me with what my life looks like, what my business looks like, how much money I want to create, how much time I have, how much time it takes me to actually run my business, right? And we're not selling our time but we need to factor in time 'cause it's a thing. This is how much money I wanna make every single month.

Shannon Mattern: And that is how you determine what your price is. And a lot of times when people do that, like they totally get sticker shock and then they're like, okay Shannon, I understand that you teach about like finding premium clients and working with people who are investment minded and willing to pay those prices, but how do I find those people? Where do I go to find those people? And I hate to break it to you, there's not just like some magical room of investment minded clients like hanging out, waiting for you to walk in and be like, Hey, I'm a web designer, you're all investment minded, right? Can I offer you a website? That's just not how that works. How it does work is that you learn to speak to the values of the things that investment minded clients value, right? So you learn how to speak in the language of like, here's how I can help you get what you ultimately want.

Shannon Mattern: A lot of times one of the biggest mistakes I see web designers making that keep them stuck in undercharging and overdelivering is that they are whole messaging and positioning is based around I'm gonna save you money, I'm gonna save you money, I'm an affordable option, I'm for business owners on a budget. And that comes from the mindset of people can't afford to work with me, people don't value this, I can't charge that much because people, they could just do it themselves. It's so easy. This is a common one that we hear all the time. Like I can't charge that much. I taught myself how to do this on YouTube. It's super easy. Why would anyone pay me that much to do this? So I can't charge that much. So tell me how to find these investment minded clients that are just willing to pay even though it's not worth that much.

Shannon Mattern: And the shift that you get to make is that A, it's not easy for everybody. B, there are people that could do it that just don't wanna do it. And also that your outside eyes on someone else's business is so valuable. We think that business owners know what they need, they don't know what they need. like they're like, oh I just need a website and I want it to have X, Y and Z and I want it to look like this. They don't know what they don't know. And so you get to shift out of saying, oh, I'm the most affordable option. I'm gonna save you so much money. People who are thinking about the future of their business, of course it needs to be like something that they, that they're able to pay for obviously. But what people are decide to figure out how to pay for is totally based on if they value it.

Shannon Mattern: And we all know this to be true, there are things that we will spend way more money on in our lives because we value that thing. And there are other places where we're just like, I don't care about that that much and I'm not even willing to spend, I don't care how cheap it is, I'm not gonna buy it, right? So it's not about the price, it's about the perceived value of the thing. And when you can shift completely how you think about the value of what you do, then you're able to shift about how you talk about the value of what you do. And when you understand why someone would want to pay you that much to work with you, that's when everything changes and you stop talking about like, I'm the cheapest, I'm gonna save you money, I'm the budget option, I'm cost effective, I'm affordable.

Shannon Mattern: Which is not sustainable for you. It's truly not like you can't get enough clients at the low prices that you're charging to make the kind of money that you wanna make. Just the amount of marketing that you have to do to book the clients is a challenge. Then the shift is raising your price to match the value of what you offer and then becoming so sold on that value that you can just communicate it so easily. And when you shift your messaging, the people who were never gonna pay you that much in the first place, they're not looking, you're not gonna like bring them with you, right? You're not, they're not gonna be like, oh well I didn't value it before and now I value it. You're gonna start attracting the people who are looking for what you provide and the value that you provide and the solutions that you provide and the things that you provide.

Shannon Mattern: There are people out there that are truly looking for help and not just looking for the cheapest option. And when you can speak to what they didn't even know that they needed but you know that they needed it, that's when they're like, oh my gosh, they are reading my mind, they are reading my mind. I like this is the person I've been looking for and I didn't even know that I needed it. And that just comes from you making those shifts in your messaging. So that's the how do I find investment minded clients is like when you have to speak the language. And then two, you just need to go out there and meet as many people as you possibly can whether virtually or in person and build relationships and tell them what you do. We teach the simplest marketing strategy inside the Web Designer Academy.

Shannon Mattern: It's like deceptively simple, but it also probably like creates the most mind trash for people because there's a whole like we like to do all this passive marketing, right? Like we like to be behind a computer screen, we want to like we're techie, we wanna build like an email funnel or maybe we're experts in SS e o. This came up in one of our recent calls and we're like, oh I shouldn't have to market myself and put myself out there to get clients because I'm an SS e o expert so therefore my s e o expertise should bring me clients. And I'm like, that's great, that can bring you some clients and you can also like build your network to create clients. So we're actually doing a summer workshop series on June 22nd, July 13th and August 17th. And the very first one we're gonna be teaching our marketing strategy.

Shannon Mattern: We're not only gonna be teaching it, you're going to have time to get coaching on it and you're gonna have the opportunity to implement it during the workshop. So workshop we are doing, the first one is called Marketing Momentum. It's on June 22nd from one to 4:00 PM Eastern. It will be recorded. So if you can't attend live, you can still absolutely like get the replay and then like do the work on your own. And the way it's gonna work is that I'm gonna teach our whole marketing strategy that we teach inside of the Web Designer Academy because one of the things that I hear from so many of you that are interested in working with us, but you are that what we call like the self-taught and savvy stage web designer where you're like, I am brand new to like getting clients. Like I know how to build a website and I know I wanna be a freelance designer, web designer and I know that I want to work with you guys, but I'm like I need a stepping stone, I need a strategy for how to get clients.

Shannon Mattern: We're like okay well what can we do to help these people? Because our strategy is so simple and I've talked about it on the podcast like a million times and I'll say it here. It's like go tell people you're a web designer, ask them if they would like to book a call with you . Like go tell people you're a web designer, ask them if if they have anybody that they know that they need to refer to you. And of course like it is that simple but we give people scripts and stuff. But what happens is they're like, I can't do that. I'd be too pushy, I don't know anyone. I feel weird calling myself a web designer because I haven't actually like had a paying client before. There's all of this stuff that comes up when it's like, okay, I'm gonna actually like put myself out there.

Shannon Mattern: And then all of the worst things that you think about yourself come up in your brain. And if any of you who are here can relate to that, I would love to know like when you think about doing the hard thing, you're like, well I can't do that because what if all of your like deepest, darkest thoughts about yourself , not like ser so serious, but like all of those things and then that stops you. And what we help you do is like, okay, let me see what I'm thinking that's preventing me from taking the action. Let me clean that up. Let me take the action from a really empowered place and let's do it. So that's what we're gonna be doing in the first workshop of our summer workshops. Yours is we're gonna teach you the whole strategy. You're gonna actually implement it right then and there in the workshop.

Shannon Mattern: You're not gonna just come and sit and learn and listen and then go away and not do it. You're gonna come, you're gonna learn, you're gonna like do the strategy while we're there and we'll get to real time coach you on whatever comes up that's standing in your way. We'll get to real time coach you on just your questions about like, okay, here's my unique situation. Can you help me adapt this strategy to me? And then you are going to actually like, we're gonna give you scripts and steps and you're gonna implement and then you'll also have time to get support while you're implementing. You'll be like, okay, I took your script, I adapted it for my situation. Can you take a look at this and give me any feedback and make sure that I did it? And then you'll send it off and you'll actually start implementing or get your next client strategy live in that workshop.

Shannon Mattern: So if you're not on our email list, go to https://webdesigneracademy.com and you can get on our email list by signing up for a profitable pricing framework training. You can actually go right now to click the link in my bio and click on that summer workshop series and you can register for that marketing momentum one and also the other ones. And if you register for all three, we give you a discount on all three. So we are gonna have a lot of fun this summer doing like interactive workshops together to give you the stepping stones to be ready to work with us inside of our program. Because what we know is that like trying to do all of this stuff on your own, it's totally possible, but it's the long , it's the long road and our community is so super fun. So we just wanna invite you to come and hang out with us and work, work with us this summer.

Shannon Mattern: So that's a very long answer to the question of how do I find investment minded clients? You speak their language and then you just go meet as many people as possible and the investment minded clients will resonate with everything that you're talking about. They'll wanna learn more. You all of those things, you'll have expense minded clients that'll tell you that you're too expensive, that's okay, you get to make decisions on do I wanna work with this person or not And you're a grownup and you're allowed to do that , right? You're like, do I wanna lower my price for them or do I not? A lot of times I would just say every , every single web designer we've worked with has absolutely like backed off on their price. Like just instead of making a smaller offer have been like, okay, well here's how I can do all the same work for you for a lower price so that you'll say yes to me.

Shannon Mattern: And then they go through that painful experience of the project dragging on forever. The client asking for even more and getting to the end. I mean like, oh my gosh, I should have charged twice as much as I was originally gonna charge before I lowered my price that wasn't worth it. Feeling like something has gone wrong and wanting to burn their whole business down. And one of the transformations that we help you make, it doesn't happen right away. We don't want you to put the pressure of it happening right away, but one of the transformations we help you make is like when you build the trust in yourself that you know how to get clients, that you know how to do consultations, that you know how to pre-frame the value that you know how to make offers, you know how to follow up, you know how to close meaning you know how to like coach them into working with you at the price that you gave that you will stop valuing the money for the money's sake over your time and your freedom and everything that you do when you end up overdelivering and get and undercharging.

Shannon Mattern: It doesn't happen overnight, it's a transition. But we like hold our client's hands through it when they're like, I don't know, they said they couldn't afford it. Should I offer them a, you know, should I offer to do it for what they said their budget was? And we're like, well you can. Why would you? Why wouldn't you? Your decision to make here are some of the things to look out for. And sometimes if you're anything like me, I call myself a stove toucher. I literally have to touch the stove and find out for myself in order to learn the lesson and then I'll be like, oh that's what they were trying to tell me . So that's what I do and it's cool, it's okay. Like we help our students like some of them won't touch the stove but some of them will touch it anyway and then we'll help them debrief and then they learn like, okay I am not gonna do that again.

Shannon Mattern: Or six months later we're helping them through a similar situation. So for those of you who are just joining live, you can ask me any of your burning web design business questions, let me know what challenges you're having in your web design business currently, let's talk about 'em. Let me give you some coaching and some advice as I would if you were inside our Web Designer Academy program and let's get you over that hump so that you can close the gap. Like if you have a client issue that you wanna talk about, like we can help you with that. If you have just a general strategy question, we can help you with that. So you can go ahead and just pop that in the comments and I would be happy to answer your questions on anything that's coming up for you in your web design business.

Shannon Mattern: So challenges, just something that you're struggling with, mindset stuff, all the things. We're here for a few more minutes talking about that. Kate, thank you so much for popping your question. And Kate, so Kate is says, how do you feel about having a niche? I think that you absolutely can have a niche, but I don't think it's necessary. I think that if it makes sense for you, like if you have a certain expertise, like for example when I was my day job was in nonprofit professional associations, membership associations. So that was my day job and a lot of my clients in the very beginning came from that space. And so like I became like the go-to person for the nonprofit professional membership associations. This work was so boring. I'm sorry for anybody , anybody who's listening, but I'm like building websites for companies like the Asphalt, I guess there's like a professional membership association for asphalt businesses, construction businesses, just so like all of these different types of things.

Shannon Mattern: And so I know what professional membership association websites need and so I became like that person but I wasn't like, it gave me an edge because I knew how to integrate all of the things that that they needed. And had I stayed in that, I could have been like I'm gonna do all of my messaging around that and I'm gonna go all in on that. And you can absolutely do that. So if you have some expertise that makes it a no-brainer for you to do that. If you have the relationships that make it a no-brainer for you to do that, go ahead and do that. But a lot of times people fall into web design because they were like doing something for a hobby or they had someone ask them and they don't have like a specific type of client that they work with. In that case, I don't think you need a niche like you absolutely don't.

Shannon Mattern: You just like your niche is like how about your niche is like I'm just gonna talk to you, learn about your business, find out what your challenges and your bottlenecks are and then like build solutions for you. Try a lot of different things, see if anything narrows down. Sometimes your niche could be like I find solutions for any kind of business. So don't put yourself in a corner with an industry or a type of entrepreneur or a client avatar or something. Think more about who do I love to work with, like the type of person I love to work with. Like what are the qualities, what would make me so happy? Who are the people that I don't wanna work with? It would make me miserable to work with them and think about it like that and then just work like do a lot of different things And if a niche rises to the top, cool.

Shannon Mattern: If it doesn't, that's cool too. Such a good question. Thank you Kate. So let's see, 54th Lane said, I'm just starting the process of launching everything. I just wanted to say I found so much value in your podcast. I finally feel like what I want to do is attainable and I can have boundaries and balance while providing for my family. Thank you so much for sharing that with me. I so appreciate that so much. The podcast is one of my favorite things to do and I love hearing from you guys that it is helpful to you and that you love it because it's helpful to me too, like it's one of my favorite things to do and I will keep doing it. So if you have questions, topics, things you'd like me to cover, let me know because I am here to talk about anything.

Shannon Mattern: So thank you for sharing that with me. That means a lot to me. Oh, fierce Digital Media. I recently listened to your podcast episode with Josh talking about your issue with Stripe . I'm curious to know if you have an update on that. So I am literally supposed to hear back from Stripe's legal department today. I don't know what they're gonna say but we'll see and I'll keep you posted. So after that episode with Josh, so where are we left off is me just like being so like not frustrated, angry at Stripe for how they treated me as a customer and just like appalled at like their business practices. I mean it truly was like this is a thing that can happen and if you guys are like what are you talking about? You can go listen to my episode with Josh Hall recently that's also gonna be dropping on the profitable web designer podcast on Friday.

Shannon Mattern: So we're like simulcasting that. So he was like, Hey Shannon, I have a student inside of my program who's a web web designer and she's a former attorney. I think she's still an attorney but she's also a web designer. And I was like, okay. He's like, let me connect you with her, I think she could help you. So talk about excellent customer service. Her name is Anne Kaza, she's powerhouse legal powerhouse. I think powerhouse strategy is her web design business. Powerhouse Legal is her, her legal practice. And I mean like Powerhouse is like the best description of her. So Josh connected us, got on her schedule, we had a chat, she was like here's my strategy for dealing with this. We sent a cease and desist letter to Stripe. She wrote the whole thing. It was just beautiful. Like I felt like she heard me the whole like I'm telling you all of this too to tell you that the whole experience of working with her made me feel, taken care of, made me feel like I found the right person and it was invaluable.

Shannon Mattern: And when I was like, okay, I would love to work with you, tell me how much this costs, I was like so happy to pay it. And that's what we want your clients to feel when they come to you. We want them to feel seen, heard, relieved and just like I wasn't expecting legal fees but I'm so happy to pay them to you , right? So anyway, she sent a cease and desist letter. We are still waiting, I don't know what the outcome is. They still continue to try to take money out of my bank account. It's just a whole mess. But I will update you on the podcast if I can. You know, if they do the right thing, I'll let you know. If they don't do the right thing, I'll let you know. I really hope that they do. But I don't have not gonna lie, I don't have a whole lot of faith but I I'm supposed to hear back today.

Shannon Mattern: They had till today to get back to me . So just all of my communications up until we brought it to legal made me think not sure this is gonna go the way that that I think it should go. So if you have a Stripe account just f y I make sure that you check the connect tab in your desktop, not your app, you can't see it in your app and make sure there's no fake companies set up by fake people. No netflix.com, nothing like that. Just make sure that there's nothing in there that you don't expect to be in there because that's what happened to me and it was insane and Stripes IT department specifically said, oh well if someone gets your a p i key then they can just do that and you would never even know. And I'm like, that shouldn't be a thing that's possible.

Shannon Mattern: But here we are and I'm like I don't just like have my a p i key just like hanging out there for people to grab. So anyway, I don't wanna like say too much until I'm ready to say all the things till I hear what they're gonna say and, but yeah, so I'm definitely planning to share all of this because I think it's not only important for us as business owners to protect ourselves, but like we're integrating this stuff for our clients and I would have never thought in a million years that a fraud happened on my Stripe account that there wasn't a way for me to like dispute that and get help and instead I'm being told, yeah, no, you're responsible for paying all that back. It would be, I don't know, I'm trying to think of like an analogy to explain like what that would be like.

Shannon Mattern: That's so bizarre that it, you wouldn't even think it could happen in real life, but they're like per our terms and conditions doesn't matter. Someone came in and robbed your whole house, you have to pay the robbers. Like that's kind of what it, what it was like. So I don't know, it's not the best analogy but I'll find one. So yeah, thank you so much for that question. I'm so glad you guys love the podcast and that you love Josh's podcast. I love his podcast too and that it's helping you. So if there are other things that you, other things you want me to cover on the podcast, other topics like oh it's not like I don't have a whole list of things that, that I could talk about, but I'm absolutely happy to talk about anything that you guys wanna talk about.

Shannon Mattern: So any other questions before we wrap up this? Ask me anything First Pancake on IG Live and for those of you that are like, why is she talking about pancakes? Our client success coordinator, Erica always has this great analogy where she's like, the first time you do anything, it's like the first pancake that you make. Like the first pancake never comes out good. It's always like raw on one side or burnt on one side or it's got all those weird like bubbles on it and you have to like make the first pancake to like make the next several pancakes and usually like the third or fourth pancake, you're like, I got it down. Like it's perfectly golden, it's smooth, it looks good on both sides, , right? But those first couple are Ms. I had that in mind when I was like, okay, I'm gonna just go live.

Shannon Mattern: Maybe nobody shows up, that's cool. I can fill time and I'm just gonna like do the thing and see what happens. But I always have so much fun interacting with people and answering questions. So that's why I wanted to do this. So you'll see a lot more of me on Instagram, you can always dmm me. I'm like trying to get better at checking my dms because I wanna connect with people making that part of my routine. And then also like check out the link in my bio. We have our profitable pricing framework training that you can sign up for and watch if you haven't already, summer workshop series, you can get all the details on that. Get registered for that. We're gonna do our marketing one on June 22nd where we'll teach you our whole strategy and coach you on it. You'll have implementation time, all action, no fluff, no pitching.

Shannon Mattern: It's a straight up workshop. And then we also have our podcast. So if you're not following the podcast, you can just get all the links there. And like 54th Lane said like we want you to believe that what you want to create is possible. We know it's possible. I've done it. So many of our students have done it and we wanna help you get there. So we have lots of different ways that we can help you. So stay connected to us and thank you so much for coming to hang out with me for my first pancake live a m a. We'll be doing so many more of these as we are going through the summer 'cause I find it super fun and I hope you guys found it valuable too. So, and we'll ask you to pre-submit questions and stuff like that and it'll be a good time.

Shannon Mattern: So, alright, thank you all so much and I'll see you in my dms. Alright, bye. If you are ready to finally stop undercharging and overdelivering, if you're ready to take back control of your time and book more high paying clients you love and make more money as a web designer than you ever thought possible, then book a zero pressure discovery call with me today. All you gotta do is go to https://webdesigneracademy.com/call, choose one of the available time slots, fill out the intake form, and we'll meet on Zoom to talk about your goals and what's really in the way of you reaching them. And if it looks like I can help you inside the Web Designer Academy, we can talk more about what that looks like. It is super chill. There's zero obligation to say yes to working with us. If you book a call with me, it is simply a chance for you to learn more about how we can specifically help you, you personally, with your unique skills, personality, and experience to create a highly profitable, sustainable web design business and create the freedom, flexibility, financial independence and fulfillment that you started this business for in the first place.

Shannon Mattern: So just go to web designer academy.com/call and I can't wait to talk to you more about your web design business.

Speaker 2: This podcast is part of the sound advice FM network. Sound advice, FM Women's Voices amplified.