This topic comes up fairly regularly and there have been good answers
given but just to expand on it a bit I thought I would offer this as a
point of reference for those of you who may be struggling with
determining what to charge. I ran across it in my travels and while
it’s similar to what Keith has already suggested it seems to offer
practical and useable info and a couple helpful links too which
someone may find useful. Take it for what it’s worth.
Here’s a quote from the article: “The first thing that you should be aware of is that the discussion of pricing with your competitors is illegal in the US and Canada.”
Yes, but that’s not relevant to design work, is it? It’s a vast international market. I think price fixing applies to commodities and unionized services rather than the subject under discussion.
I’ve seen custom sites advertised for one dollar up to thousands of dollars. Once I asked a designer what she would charge me for a site which resembled one of the least expensive template-constructed eyesores and she quoted me $1400 plus $60 per update. (I’m not a pro designer).
As far as setting your prices, I heard the following from a friend
many years ago when I was first starting my business, “Take whatever
you want to earn per year, divide by 1,000 and that’s your hourly
rate.” Pretty simple, and works for me.
On Mar 13, 2009, at 4:06 PM, JimS wrote:
…related to price fixing
Yes, but that’s not relevant to design work, is it? It’s a vast
international market. I think price fixing applies to commodities
and unionized services rather than the subject under discussion.
I think that if somebody could prove that you tried to fix prices for
a particular service, and cared enough, they could prosecute you.
I’ve seen custom sites advertised for one dollar up to thousands of
dollars. Once I asked a designer what she would charge me for a site
which resembled one of the least expensive template-constructed
eyesores and she quoted me $1400 plus $60 per update. (I’m not a pro
designer).
Comments welcome…
You get what you pay for, and a custom (really, I mean Custom, nobody
else has it) design of any kind will always be more expensive than
something ripped from the virtual pages of the OSWD site or similar.
Where I have been adding value the past few years has been with custom
CMSen and commerce engines. I was just looking over some screenshots
of my work from a few years ago, and thinking “why doesn’t my current
stuff look this good??” Too many cycles devoted to Object Oriented
Programming, I guess…
Sometime around 13/3/09 (at 16:21 -0400) Walter Lee Davis said:
“Take whatever you want to earn per year, divide by 1,000 and that’s
your hourly rate.” Pretty simple, and works for me.
Exactly. All I’d say is be certain that the amount you say you want
to earn is enough to cover everything. An employer-supplied salary
masks a lot of paid-for benefits that have to be covered out of your
income if you’re running your own thing.
Too many cycles devoted to Object Oriented Programming, I guess…
The main problem is the clients. Many don’t understand what they are buying and why they are buying, they only see the cost as the only deciding factor.
I see more and more sites done for £120.00 or so and the client is perfectly happy with this (I suppose if the client is happy then the order is fulfilled successfully). When I ask these clients if we could help and do a better job, a common reply is something like “my nephew is really good with computers” so were happy leaving it with him.
Now everybody should be able to earn a crust, but this nephew is in the black economy, you could never compete with this as a professional. And this situation will only get worse as web tools become easier to use. Especially in the current times.
If you can educate the client in what your are selling then you stand a better chance of charging the rate you need.
On 3/14/09 6:36 AM, “WebWorker” email@hidden wrote:
The main problem is the clients. Many don’t understand what they are buying
and why they are buying, they only see the cost as the only deciding
factor.
I see more and more sites done for £120.00 or so and the client is
perfectly happy with this (I suppose if the client is happy then the order is
fulfilled successfully). When I ask these clients if we could help and do a
better job, a common reply is something like “my nephew is really good with
computers” so were happy leaving it with him.
Now everybody should be able to
earn a crust, but this nephew is in the black economy, you could never compete
with this as a professional. And this situation will only get worse as web
tools become easier to use. Especially in the current times.
If you can
educate the client in what your are selling then you stand a better chance of
charging the rate you
need.
In addition to this I think the type of client that’s targeted also
factors into the mix in a big way. It’s a good bet this so-called
“nephew” isn’t working for companies or individuals who understand and
appreciate what’s involved; he’s a bottom-feeder who targets those
whose only concern is cost, period, and no amount of education or
selling is going to change that. That’s his niche market and it’s one
which I actively avoid.
There will always be people who look for the lowest common denominator
and there will always be someone to do it for cheap…or free (if you
have a nephew). Craigslist is a perfect example of people’s cost
expectations; it’s a sad joke really but then I wouldn’t expect much
from that particular resource. But the good news is that there is a
better caliber of client out there who want quality people with talent
and a solid reputation and are willing to pay a fair price for it but
it takes a lot of work to root them out.
Todd
On Mar 14, 2009, at 5:36 AM, WebWorker wrote:
Now everybody should be able to earn a crust, but this nephew is in
the black economy, you could never compete with this as a
professional. And this situation will only get worse as web tools
become easier to use. Especially in the current times.
If you can educate the client in what your are selling then you
stand a better chance of charging the rate you need.
