What you quote for an assignment will send strong signals to a new client.  Or a potential client.

Your fee gives off subtle clues about the quality of your work, where you fit among other freelancers. It will even color how much the client likes what you deliver.

Most of us, most of the [...]

You’ve been talking to a new client about a project. The client has been disappointed with other freelancers, seems to like you. Has lots of work. The client asks for a quote.

You want this project, you want this client. So you think very carefully about the fee.

After a lot of head-scratching and [...]

Boy, this post apparently touched a sensitive nerve:  The scariest pricing idea ever.  That works.

The notion (even the possibility) of allowing clients to decide how much to pay got a lot of people commenting, retweeting, forwarding and linking. Very intriguing.

Some 100 or so readers offered perceptive comments here (thank you for chiming in).

The post also prompted this discussion at yCombinator’s Hacker News. Lots of pro and con, back and forth, including some perspectives that I hadn’t heard before, which will be woven into this section in the upcoming Talking Money.

Oh, and notice that the highest-rated comment in the Hacker News thread was this first-hand story. Purely human, and not about money at all.

The grossly oversimpified summary:

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[This is adapted from "Talking Money,"  coming soon from The Freelancery.]

Here’s a pricing technique that sounds, at first, like the dumbest newbie move of all time.

Call it ‘fill-in-the-blank’ invoicing.  Or ‘pay what you want’ pricing.

The notion is, you do the work first, then let the client decide how much to pay for it.

I know, that sounds like a sure way to end up working for nickels and peanuts.  I once thought that way, too.

But it’s actually an ingenious tactic that should be in every freelancer’s arsenal, ready to wheel out when the wind is right.  (Notice I said when the wind is right. We’ll come back to that.)

It goes like this.

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A new client calls about a possible project. It feels right, like it might be a steady client.

Don't.

You discuss the project, figure out what she wants. How many pages, how many shots, what’s broken, what she needs fixed. What she wants built.  It’s not so tough.

You do the figuring and thinking. It seems to come out around $1300.  Yep, $1300 is right. Considering all you have to do.  “She’ll go for that,” you say.

So you start to type the email, and you suddenly hear a whisper in your head.  “Whoa, maybe figuring three hours for changes is too much. I bet we can crank those out way faster than that.”

Good point.  You sit back, hand on chin.

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I’m not sure why, but clients seem to be more comfortable with odd numbers and specific amounts.

A project fee of $1730 sounds like it’s based on some calculations or considerations.

A project fee of $1600 sounds like a number you just made up.

A day rate of $1150 is somehow easier to swallow [...]

The rule is:  Get paid sooner rather than later.  Get money up front if you can.  Get paid as you go.  The least desirable is to bill when you’re done, and wait 45 to 60 days to get paid.

The trick is how do you get money up front, without making the client wary?  Or uncomfortable?  Without actually saying ‘up front’.

Easy.

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Deciding how much to charge is one thing.  Figuring out how to say it is another.

Never, ever say “This will cost $500″  or “This will cost you $900 per month.”   No, no, no.  You don’t want to be a cost factor.  (Even if you are.)

Never, ever say “I charge $50 per hour” or “I charge $500 per page/photo/day/logo.”  Or worse (and I actually heard a photographer say this once) “For a half-day shoot, I like to get at least $500.”   No, no, no.  That brands you as an amateur-moonlighter-tinkerer.

And never, ever let the dollar figure hang by itself at the end of the sentence.  That makes it echo in the silence.  Better to end with what they get.

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