Most creators price their calls by vibes. They pick a number that "feels fair," undercharge for six months, burn out on low-value conversations, and then quit doing calls entirely.
You can skip all of that with about ten minutes of arithmetic. Here's the framework.
Start with your hourly anchor
Forget per-minute rates for a second. Answer one question: what is an hour of your undivided attention worth?
Not what you think people will pay. What it's worth. If you consult, coach, read tarot, or give advice professionally, you probably already have a number — or a day rate you can divide down. If you don't, work backwards from your goal: if you want calls to earn you $500 a week and you can realistically take 4 hours of calls, your hour is worth $125 minimum.
Then divide by 60:
- $60/hour → $1.00/min
- $120/hour → $2.00/min
- $240/hour → $4.00/min
- $360/hour → $6.00/min
That's your anchor. Everything else in this post adjusts around it.
Per-minute vs. flat sessions: pick by conversation shape
You don't have to choose one forever, but each fits a different kind of conversation.
Per-minute works when length is unpredictable. Quick questions, readings, hot takes, "can I get your opinion on this" calls. The buyer isn't committing to an hour they might not need, which lowers the barrier to starting — and the meter means a great conversation can run long and you get paid for every minute of it. Nobody watches the clock resentfully because the clock is the deal.
Flat sessions work when the format is fixed. A 45-minute coaching session, a 60-minute portfolio review, a structured consult with an agenda. The buyer knows exactly what they're paying, you know exactly what you're delivering, and there's no meter anxiety on either side.
A strong default: per-minute for "call me now" access, flat sessions for booked-ahead work. That's the setup most sellers land on, and it maps to how Cheddify's pricing is built — one rate for live availability, separate fixed-price offers for scheduled sessions.
Set a minimum duration (this is where sellers lose money)
Cheddify's fee on calls is 20% plus a flat $2 per call, and the buyer covers the ~3% card processing on top. The percentage scales with the call; the $2 doesn't. On tiny calls, that flat $2 quietly eats your margin.
Run the numbers at $1.50/min:
- 3-minute call: $4.50 gross → 80% is $3.60, minus $2 → you keep $1.60. That's a 36% effective keep. Bad.
- 10-minute minimum: $15.00 gross → $12.00 minus $2 → you keep $10.00. 67% keep.
- 20-minute call: $30.00 gross → $24.00 minus $2 → you keep $22.00. 73% keep.
Same rate, wildly different economics. The fix is a minimum duration: the buyer funds at least N minutes up front, and the meter runs from there. A 10-minute minimum is a sensible floor for most rates; at rates under $2/min, consider 15.
Minimums aren't just fee math, either. They filter out the two-minute drive-by that interrupts your day, and they guarantee every call is worth picking up for.
Your price is a filter, not just a paycheck
Here's the mental shift that matters most: the price is doing a job before any money moves.
If you're a creator with a real audience, your problem isn't demand — it's noise. Hundreds of DMs, pitches, and "quick questions" you could never answer. Price is the filter that surfaces the people who are serious.
That means raising your rate isn't greedy; it's curation. At $1/min you'll get more calls, but more of them will be aimless. At $4/min you'll get fewer calls — and almost every one will be someone who came prepared, values the time, and leaves happy. Fewer, better conversations usually means more revenue per hour of your actual life, not less:
- $1/min, 6 calls averaging 10 min = 60 minutes on calls, $60 gross, $36 kept (6 × $2 flat fees hurt here)
- $4/min, 2 calls averaging 20 min = 40 minutes on calls, $160 gross, $124 kept
Half the call time, three times the take-home. If you're consistently drained after call days, your price is too low.
Test, then iterate — the demand tells you the answer
You will not pick the right price on day one, and that's fine. Prices on Cheddify take effect immediately, so treat it as a dial:
- Start at your anchor (hourly ÷ 60), with a 10-minute minimum.
- Run it for two weeks and watch two signals: how often you're getting calls when you're available, and how the conversations feel.
- If you're getting called constantly and some conversations feel low-value → raise the rate 25–50%. You're underpriced.
- If you're available often and rarely called, don't reflexively cut the price — first check that you're actually sending people to your link. On a seller tool like Cheddify, your audience is the demand; a great rate with zero promotion sells zero minutes. Post that you're live. Then, if traffic is real and calls aren't, test a lower rate or a shorter minimum.
- Revisit quarterly. As your audience grows, your time gets scarcer. Scarcer time costs more.
One more lever: your booked-session price should generally be at or above your per-minute-equivalent, not below it. Scheduled time is a bigger commitment from you — you're reserving a slot — so a 30-minute session from a $3/min seller should be $90+, not $75.
Worked examples with real math
All examples use Cheddify's actual fee structure: seller keeps 80% of gross minus $2 per call; buyer pays ~3% processing on top of the price (so it never comes out of your side).
The advisor: $4/min, 15-minute minimum.
- Typical 25-min call: $100 gross → $80 − $2 = $78 kept (78%). Buyer paid ~$103.
- 5 calls/week ≈ $390/week for about two hours of talking.
The reader: $2/min, 10-minute minimum.
- Typical 15-min reading: $30 gross → $24 − $2 = $22 kept (73%).
- 20 readings/week ≈ $440/week, five hours of calls.
The coach: $6/min live rate, plus a flat 60-minute booked session at $400.
- Booked session: $400 → $320 − $2 = $318 kept (79.5%).
- Impulse 12-min live call: $72 gross → $57.60 − $2 = $55.60 kept.
Notice the pattern: the bigger the call, the closer your keep gets to 80%, because the flat $2 shrinks as a share. Minimums pull small calls up toward that healthy zone.
The short version
- Anchor at hourly value ÷ 60.
- Per-minute for live access, flat sessions for structured work.
- Always set a minimum duration — it protects your margin from the $2 flat fee and your calendar from drive-bys.
- Higher prices filter for better conversations; drained-and-busy means underpriced.
- Iterate every few weeks based on real demand, not nerves.
If you're setting up calls for the first time, the walkthrough at how it works covers the full flow, and there's a deeper dive on charging for video calls as a creator when you're ready to go beyond pricing.