Considering a Black Friday discount? Ask yourself this first.

For anyone offering personal, tailored services. Coaches, therapists, mentors and guides. Designers, copywriters, brand strategists and VAs. This blog helps you decide whether a Black Friday discount fits your business.

A client asked me last week whether she should join Black Friday. My answer to her question turned into this blog.

Every November, the circus starts. Countdown timers. Now-or-never. ‘Last chance.’ Another bonus, but only if you buy before midnight. And it’s not just retail. Coaches, therapists, designers, copywriters. All claiming to care about your wellbeing or your business. But miss the deadline, and apparently your half-price brand strategy or ‘cheap healing’ window has expired.

Why I’m not joining

Every year, more service providers feel the pull to join, shouting 60% off everything, as if they’re selling Mars bars at a petrol station. I’m not one of them. No specials here. Call me foolish, but it’s deliberate.

Not because a discount is morally wrong. I offer them to people who genuinely need them. But in work built on trust, care and personal connection, heavy discounting isn’t smart marketing. It builds on fear instead of trust.

Why I get it’s tempting

I get the pull. You’re in business, of course you want to make money. But if you’re considering it, it’s usually for one of two reasons. Everyone else is doing it, and you don’t want to miss out on the biggest sales day of the year. Or you’re still behind on this year’s income goal, and this feels like your last chance to catch up.

That second one stings. I know. But a discount born from panic rarely brings the clients you actually want to work with.

What happens when you discount your work

1. You attract FOMO, not readiness.
Discounts attract buyers who want something cheap, urgent or ‘nice to have’. Not people who are ready to do the work.

2. Cheap investment creates cheap engagement.
A discount makes it easier not to take the investment seriously. So they dip in and out, disengage, quit early, or don’t implement.

3. You work harder than they do.
You try to keep them engaged, and answer questions that were never part of the scope. All to still get them the results they signed up for. And a little more. You end up holding the emotional labour and carrying their responsibility.

4. You end up resenting the work, and maybe even the client.
Because you started off on the wrong foot: pressure, panic and a race to fill spots. Once a working relationship starts like that, it’s hard to turn around.

I’m not against discounts. But mass, urgency-driven discounts like Black Friday create mismatch. For both sides, it’s a lose–lose. And they quietly tell your clients, and yourself, that your work is only worth investing in when it’s cheap.

If you work with people’s wellbeing

For coaches, therapists, mentors and guides, it goes even deeper. Discounting support-based work feeds the exact beliefs your clients come to you to undo. A few examples:

• ‘I’ll invest in myself when it’s on sale.’ Read: I’m only worth it at half price.
• ‘I’ll wait for a better deal.’ Read: my growth can wait. I’m not a priority.
• ‘I can’t justify spending this on myself.’ Read: everyone else’s needs come first.
• ‘I’d better grab it now, or I’ll miss out.’ Read: I can’t trust my own timing.

Underneath all four sits the same belief: I don’t matter. Not enough to invest in. Not without a discount.

That’s exactly what your clients come to you to undo. Black Friday didn’t create this belief. It was shaped by upbringing, culture and the roles we learnt to play. But 60% off ‘healing packages’ doesn’t challenge it. It reinforces it.

So, before you decide, ask yourself

• Am I considering this because it truly fits my business? Or because everyone else is doing it, or I’m trying to rescue an income goal?
• Who do I want to attract, and in what state do I want them to arrive?
• What tone will a discount set for my work with them?
• Is my pricing built on my capacity and the depth of my work, or on fear of empty spots?
• If Black Friday didn’t exist, would I still discount my work?

Find your own way of selling

Black Friday is the ultimate second-hand strategy. It was built for retail, not for work built on connection and trust. If it doesn’t fit you, you don’t have to join. Your pricing can be built on your capacity, the depth of your work, and the change it creates. And your clients’ timing matters more than any buying season.

Not sure which way of selling actually fits you? That’s one of the questions we answer in Unmistakably Yours, my 1:1 identity coaching programme. Apply here, and we’ll start with a free exploration call.