There’s a great post over at Blue Favor on Pricing Web Design Projects. The post is excellent and definitely deserves a read. A couple of points I really like:
A crucial problem to accurately pricing projects is that proposals happen so early in the process, as the vendor we only have a couple of meetings, phone calls or a document to understand the project. We do our best to come up with a fair and accurate price, but it often feels like a shot in the dark.
This is something I have grappled with for years. To be able to give an accurate idea of price you need a clear idea of what the client is after. And to know this you need to spend time working with them to determine their goals, requirements and strategy. Which brings me to the next point in the post:
Though every book I’ve read on the topic of pricing says to never ever ballpark, I have a tendency to do so. If they can’t disclose the budget I typically try to start throwing a few numbers from previous projects to help gage the scope of what we are talking about, call it a good faith effort to start the discussion.
I too often do this, partially for the reasons above. Ideally I like to get a budget but that is not always possible. If not I try to do a rough scope of the project and give the client an idea of costs. If we’re on the same wavelength we take it from there.
The post also goes on to talk about determining hourly rates, quoting by the hour or project and tips for clients when pricing a web design project. Definitely worth a read, and an addition to my feed reader.