Know-How Exchange : Other

After you meet with them to understand their needs, bundle your various services into one or two packages that make sense for their business, and price the bundle(s) with a flat fee.

Generally, a marketing professional would pitch ideas for which they could deliver the end result. It's uncommon that a business owner would want you to pitch ideas and then tell them how to implement them. If they wanted to do it themselves, they wouldn't spend time listening to you.

Small businesses in this economy are not looking for marketing services, per se. They are looking for results. So it's important that you have a chance to ask them a lot of questions days before you make your presentation. That way, your presentation is about their needs and the results required to satisfy those needs ... not about you and a million ideas you have.

Finally, if you don't want to cheapen yourself, then don't lead with "a ton of cheap solutions." Instead, first frame the problem and its cost or scale; then outline the traditional solution and its cost or scale; and only then lead them to the compromise they need to make with a limited budget. This way, you demonstrate your expertise (your value), and you also set the real-world expectation that with a limited budget, there will be limited results. For example:

"You've told me your problem is getting local awareness quickly. Normally, I would put you into a newspaper and radio campaign for immediate results; but that would cost thousands of dollars -- more than your current marketing budget allows. So, I have devised a Facebook strategy and limited local Google ad campaign that will get you local recognition at a fraction of the cost. Of course the response won't be as strong as a newspaper and radio campaign, but it will start to give you positive results on which you can build."

Whatever you do, however, make sure you're focused on the results that solve the owner's problems. If you focus on anything else, you won't have enough credibility to win the project or support your fee.

Peg nailed it. Listen to the needs and respond. No hourly fees. Results are the only thing that matter, not clever ideas or lots of time/effort. Just results.

Try to figure out how much time you would spend on doing plan mini, medium and maxi - with a detailed list for each plan of what you can provide and especially what they should expect to gain from each plan.
Then ask yourself how much you would want to gain from spending that extra time developing their business $25/H $50/H $145/H or % or combination
Now you can price each package H*$+%
You should present these just below their pain points (even if you don't know them, you often do) but perfectly within what they want to spend/gain.
There will be be an absolute min for you to work that extra time (unless you do it for pleasure) and there might be a max they would be ready to engage. Now it's your job to negotiate between these two points to find a mutually acceptable agreement.

Before you go in on this, take a look at what the other car washes are doing....in terms of advertising and number of cars. This is key because is you just give them the same lo-cost ideas others are using, they're not likely to see your ideas as worthy of payment.

Mgoodman nailed it. Let me expand on his answer a bit. You want to be paid ON A RESULTS BASIS. Ask them what they define as "success."

Now you negotiate a modest up-front committment fee (to prove they are serious), and all the rest of the fees are paid as milestones are reached. You are familiar with real estate agents getting paid for closing the sale, and this kind of billing should also be much more acceptable to the car wash than anything else I can think of.

Furthermore getting a percentage of increased revenues should get your creative juices flowing.

Regards,
JH
P.S. To be sure you get paid, have a binding arbitration clause in your contract.