I should charge...
Out of context: Reply #36
- Started
- Last post
- 40 Responses
- freshmode0
I have said it once and will say it again. Use the "agency" approach to your clients. Assume that you are the owner of your own agency and calculate what it would cost to have some "employee/contractor" do the work. You will notice that your $500 for something simple will turn out to be much more.
If it takes around 10-15 hours to make it happen. Then about 3 hours of client contact before & after you are finished and in between edits. Then about 5-7 more hours of edits. You will see that it is worth far more then $500. If you give the service an agency would & create the same quality product, their should be no problem.
Clients don't usually have an issue with paying. They have more of an issue with bad customer service, lack of contact, lack of creative process and client management. If they know that you are one person, they are going to try to walk all over you. If they know that you are in desperate need of this project you can kiss all dignity goodbye. On the other hand, if they believe that you are a company with a few team members that are collectively working on the project, then they have more respect & and are willing to pay a bit more. You should be able to get at least $1000.00 for that. It isn't going to take you 5 hours to do it. If they have people above them that are involved in making this happen and have an opinion, it will take up to a week to make it happen. Sure, $500 may be enough to "live" for a week, but you will never win if this is always the case.
All it takes is a DBA, a bit of planning and well worded contracts (international law applies in this case) & a bit more of an "agency" style presence online & in all communications. Chances are, your client in London isn't going to be stopping by your office any time soon. You don't need to take on the full responsibilities of a company. A DBA is just you doing business as something else. You can take care of that as if they were paying you directly. Even better are the benefits from having this lovely piece of paper.
As Castanza once put it. "It isn't a lie, if you don't believe it".
Here we have about 10-15 hours of work time with about an extra 5 hours of bumper time. I usually give myself 10. Totaling 15-20 hours. Then you have 3 hours of client contact & 5-7 hours of edits. If you have someone else doing it at your pay rate, you might want to tac on an extra $15 - $20 an hour. So that might be anywhere from $45 - $60 an hour.
At 23 hours charging $45 an hour you make $1035.00. At 23 hours charging $60 an hour you make $1380.00. At 30 hours charging $45 an hour you make $1350.00. At 30 hours charging $60 an hour you make $1800.00.
You are more then justified to be making this much money. This is a "skilled" profession of "service providers". Their is a reason we are where we are and doing what we are doing. If it was only worth $200.00 then everyone would have the skill needed to create a great piece. But as you can see, people still try to underbid. Those folks will never be able to raise their prices with those clients they close. Maybe in the future things will change with new business. But you want to establish a good rate with clients first time around. Underbidding projects & not estimating an accurate time to do it will always cost you more in headaches & frustration. Not to mention future projects where the client thinks you are a Non-profit org. doing quality work for free.
I know it may sound like you will shoot your self in the foot, but it will come back to you. You win some you lose some. But those you win will create enough business to aggressively follow this process with other clients. You have to start somewhere and if you have the skills & knowhow, you should start now. I know that with this project, you are already tied into a certain price. You can still get good future rates if you send them an invoice for their bill where you break down the hours it took & base a price around it. If you bill them for 10 hours, they will think your time is worth $45 an hour and in the future will keep that in mind when asking you to do more work. They will budget their own projects based off that price. I have 2 good clients that have done that since our first time working together. It's nice to receive a call asking me to do something & then having them tell me that we cannot spend more then 30 hours on this project. I then turn and tell them that I will not bill them more then 30 hours but it might take a bit longer. They like knowing we will do what it takes to make it happen in that budget. It makes it easier on you having to quote everything you do for regular clients.
I hope this actually helped someone and didn't bore you. This doesn't only pertain to this thread or project. These are just things I have come to learn in the past 1 & 1/2 years of running my own company. I just wanted to share things I have learned so others don't make that mistake. Also, consider the words "retainer fee" when working on big budget projects. It will save your life. A company is not going to give you a check for $10k for a project that is going to cost $20k - $30k.
cheers!