When should you offer a productized service?
They are not for everyone. But are they for you?
Last week we were trashing products and glorifying services. Today, let’s explore something at the fringe of products and services: Productized Services. It’s been a hot topic recently, especially in the design industry. But the question I’ve been asking myself is, can it be applied to other industries as well?
Paulina Sáez from UpGroves wrote an in-depth article with high-quality resources to help you understand if productized services are for you and how to get started. I’m currently developing a productized offering and her edition has been super helpful for me. So, I thought it’d be awesome to share it with you.
Let’s get into it!
Products + Services = <3
Content
Avoiding failure
What is a productized service?
Is a productized service right for you?
Productized service examples
Crafting your productized services offer
Avoiding Failure
The challenge after deciding what to sell is creating a profitable offer. This involves creating a persuasive message to explain to potential clients what they will get in exchange for their money.
To do this I recurred to inversion, one of the most powerful mental models. Instead of asking "What should I do to make my projects successful?" I asked, "What should I do to prevent project failure?"
Project failure manifests in numerous ways, and one of the most common ones is scope creep. A staggering 34% of projects experienced scope creep, according to a Project Management Institute survey. This illustrative story from a web developer on Reddit shows how a small project turned into a massive project:
What started out as a Greasemonkey injection that loaded a pop-up of some graphs for the tech support department is now an internal systems portal that covers every single business aspect in the company (sales, service, scheduling, phone/call queue, ticketing, marketing, customer interactions, etc.) and replaced our old ERP system entirely.
Does this sound familiar? Have you ever over-delivered?
I know what failing at a project feels like.
I learned my fair share of lessons while working as a freelancer:
I said yes to requests that were outside of the scope document. This led me to feel like sometimes I was taken advantage of by my clients asking for things I didn't originally discuss with them.
I set a broad offer which meant that every project felt like starting over again. Catering to everyone's needs is challenging, especially for people working solo.
I did hourly or project-based billing. I spent a lot of time meeting with the clients, assessing their situation, creating a proposal, and negotiating the agreement.
I understand that the client needs to be happy. But there's a difference between good customer service and doing things out of the scope. Where to draw the line?
Back then, I thought this was just the way freelancing worked.
But I refused to believe that was just the way it was supposed to be. There must be a better way.
So I decided to look for a way to deliver services on my terms, where there's clarity on price and scope, eliminating endless negotiations and revisions. The solution was clear: I had to productize my services.
I limited what I would deliver and moved from an hourly rate to fixed packaged plans.
The result? Services that are straightforward, with aligned expectations for everyone, allowing me to focus more on service fulfillment. I realized I didn't need to spend so much time crafting every proposal. I could focus on my strengths and in services and clients you know that work.
Maybe you've heard about the productized services business model before, and you're playing around with the idea to implement a more productized offer. Or maybe this is the first time you heard the term. Either way, keep reading to see how others are doing it and how you can build your productized offer today.
What is a Productized Service?
A productized service is a business model where you offer a service that's sold as a product, with standardized "packages" with clearly defined scope and deliverables. Unlike traditional services which offer highly customized deliverables, pricing, and scope.
This model lets you run your services in a more scalable manner, resulting in a more straightforward and predictable process for clients and providers.
Simply put: while traditional services run on people, productized services run on systems.
Traditional Services versus Productized Services
Is a Productized Service Right for You?
While this model is great for scalability and predictable revenue, it's not for everyone. You have to analyze if the benefits outweigh the drawbacks before jumping on the productized train.
Benefits
Clarity: Provides clear information on what's included, scope, timing, and pricing. There's no need for quotes and getting into several calls with the clients just to know if you're the right fit.
Scalability: Standardization allows you to serve a larger audience without having to excessively increase your workload. There's less risk of burning out.
Predictable Revenue: Fixed pricing facilitates easier revenue forecasting and financial planning.
Streamlined Sales and Delivery: The standardized approach simplifies the buying process, enables online purchases without having to build customized proposals, and allows for a more consistent and potentially automated delivery process.
Easier Messaging: Services can be marketed like products, with clear features, benefits, and pricing, simplifying the communication of value to potential customers.
Drawbacks
Client Acquisition: You need to be continuously attracting new clients. You can mitigate this by offering retainer packages on the backend. The trust established through the initial delivery can make upselling easier.
Advanced Customer Understanding: Success depends on a deep understanding of your potential customer. This model works best for people with a deep experience in their offering.
Limited Customization: This type of service might not be well suited to clients with specific or complex needs that need more tailored solutions.
Market Saturation: the market for productized services grows more crowded, so differentiating services is becoming a major challenge.
How does this business model look in practice? Let's look at real-life examples.
Productized Services Examples
Types of Services
Web development
Sweet Jam Sites: Done-for-you static websites.
Flowout: Webflow development.
SEO
Marketing
MassCampaigns: Unlimited Paid campaign services.
Trich Socials: Social media management and strategy packages.
Design
YORI: Graphic design subscription services.
Simplicity: Premium product design.
Lead generation
Lead Beacon: Lead generation for agencies.
LeadBites: On-demand lead Generation services.
Content creation
Copy Masters: Unlimited copywriting.
Expert Machine: SEO content writing for B2B, SaaS, and tech companies.
Financial services
Bean Ninjas: bookkeeping, accounting, virtual CFO, and tax services.
Muhammad Khan: Accounting and bookkeeping using Quickbooks.
Operations
SDW Consulting: ClickUp services.
SYSTMS Club: Notion Onboarding.
If you'd like to see more examples, feel free to check out this Notion template I put together. It includes additional resources to help you in building your productized offer: Grab it here.
Packages examples
You don't need to offer recurrent services You can also offer one-time services. Here are two examples to show you how each would look like for the same type of service:
XPack - Wix Website Development Plans: One-time service.
Design Dash - Unlimited Webflow Design Subscription: Recurring service.
How much are other people making?
Manypixels - Unlimited graphic and web design services: making $6.6M/year.
Draftss - Graphic design and coding services: making $180K/year after 3 years of launching.
Smart Yeti - Fractional CMO services: making $96K/year.
Crafting Your Productized Services Offer
Turning your service into a productized offering involves standardizing your deliverables and packaging straightforwardly and attractively.
If you've decided what's going to be your offering, identified your niche, and confirmed there's demand, the next step is to build your offer.
Here's what you should include:
Name: Choose an attractive name that reflects the value and outcome of your service. It should have a structure similar to this: "I help {niche name} to {outcome you're helping your customer achieve} by {what you do with your service}."
Scope of Work: Clearly define what your service includes and, most importantly, what is not included to set the right expectations.
Deliverables: List exactly what the customer will receive upon completion, including any tangible deliverables or outcomes.
Add-Ons: Offer additional services for people who need more than the standard package, such as extra-fast delivery.
Timeline: Establish and communicate the turnaround time for your service.
Trust-Building Items: Add elements that establish credibility and trust with potential clients, like customer testimonials, case studies, or your background (qualifications and experience).
Client Requirements: What are the requirements you need from your client before start working with them
FAQs: Answers to common questions to help overcome objections and clarify any uncertainties.
Terms and Conditions: Legal aspects, including refund policy, service level agreement (SLA), and any guarantees.
Pricing: Opt for fixed pricing, with tiered options to accommodate different client needs.
I'm bullish on productized services. My bet is that we'll see more productized services this year. This business model is great for solopreneurs. A limited scope is more scalable than creating a quote for each project.
Don’t forget to grab her Productized Services Notion template.
If you’ve enjoyed that one, I highly recommend you subscribe to Paulina’s newsletter, UpGroves. She puts a lot of time into producing high-quality content for solopreneurs.
Productized Services have been an interesting topic. What do you think about them? If you’ve been trying it out, how has it been for you?
I've saved this article - so useful. I think this outlines exactly the stepping stone from freelancing to a business, offering packages is the streamlined way to do it, but I think you need some case studies and clients first in order to craft them.