I have noticed that most clients gravitate towards the lowest number, so you set yourself up to do the work for 4000. If you had only quoted 5000, you set yourself up at that price.

Eg: I went with 4000-5000, but would a straight 5K have been better?

Agree with the anchoring, will keep it in mind! Wasn’t there a post about that here somewhere…

Rule of thumb: If you’re forced to ballpark, go way high. If they choke, you can always say, “Let me look at this more closely, and I’ll have a better idea.” Plus, the ‘high’ figure makes your more carefully figured number look better. It’s the ‘anchoring effect.’ The $499 iPad looks like a bargain, compared to the $999 one.

Keep plugging.

I did meet guys who’d want a unique wordpress design for 50 and a lot of agencies that have no issues charging their clients HUGE prices, but would expect me to do all the work for 100 USD.

So it’s debatable. I lost jobs for being the highest bidder, I lost in front of higher bidders. Clients do look closely to prices, but the ratings and an excellent portfolio can convince better. At least this is the type of clients I want to get, those who can tell a good design from a bad one.

Thank you, WaltKania, for clarifying this.

Almost two months in, my current pricing strategy is “what feels right” with a slight lean towards “I need to pay the bills”.

I have a rate, but I knead it into what it has to be. The other day I took a punt at how much pain I could fix with a couple hours work, and added a little more – the client was still happy with the price, I made an hour or two more money and the stuff I fixed really helped.

In a meeting for a new project they wanted a ballpark figure on the spot, after a quick mental panic and a few “about 3 weeks sums” I came up with a comfy number and then created an accurate quote that floated tentatively below it and above it if they wanted additional features.

I think I read it here, but I do find that at the moment pricing is just designing nice looking numbers.

1. They’re rather large
2. They use a lot of stuff. Lot of content, projects, products, marketing.
3. And it’s well done.

The ‘pay what it’s worth’ idea is ONLY for clients where you have solid, long-term relationships. Where they stand to gain if the project comes out stunningly well. And only certain types of projects. It’s a option.

And thanks for reading.

The challenge is to identify such clients before meeting them.

When you have two different pricing models: the riskiest pricing model and this one. When to use which?

Thank you for the awesome articles.