Design Costs

I read once that charging an hourly rate for website design is not such a hot idea.

I have two offers and I need some advice from people who have been here before, starting out. One is to develop, mostly programming, that will take 3-6 months to get completed. I suggested a price of $16,000 canadian. This is about $13,000 USD and about $10,000 EURO.

I was also offered a job doing a site for a security company. I don't kno wany of the specs so I told them a website would PROBABLY range anywhere from $2,000 to $8,000 CDN. Converted again this is about $1,200 - $5,000 EURO or $1,600 - $6,500 USD.

I got these values using estimated time multiplied by $19 an hour. Fortunately neither of these sites have major design template requirements. No templates at all maybe a bar of digital imaging but that's mostly done by camera, from my experience.

I don't know what to charge people for a web site. The main difference in cost SHOULD be technical difficulty. If you can do it shouldn't be in the question. It's assumed.

I don't know how to charge people. I'm a person who would rather do it for free than charge them and hassel them for payments. I hate hassles and hasseling people is the biggest hassel ever so I don't bother. I let them think I forgot about it and it's all good.

In my country there is a "thing" called cost of living. This is the MINIMUM ammount of money someone will need in a year to live. It's at about $7,000. That doesn't include internet and development resources.

So with that in mind I try to decide how to charge people.

It takes me about 1 month to create a dynamic site with poor design and no special features like Google optimization. And I know from my developing experiences it takes me two months to develop USABLE software, combining the two, since this project requires a lot of server side scripting I get a 3-4 months per project @ 8-10 hours a day.

So at 3 - 12 projects a year needing to make at least $7,000 a year I find that I need to charge at least $500 - $2500 for a project...to live. When I search the net, everyone charges less. Then there is the fact that I'm definately NOT guaranteed even 1 project a year, so I need to plan ahead or else...

So I'm not competing. So I have a disadvantage. I can't compete with the dot coms. What can I offer that the internet can't. Nothing?

Learning new things isn't hard but it takes time, time I don't have.

An tried alternative...

Get a job doing something else...

I tried getting other jobs like minimum wage jobs. I'm tired of the social situations I keep putting myself in, especially at work to the point where I can't work there anymore within two months... So I can either try and do something with computers or look for a new job every month or so suffering emotionally in the process.

Try doing design for businesses locally, they are more willing to go to you because your local than to some company they know nothing about. Also most web designers and programmers do not do this full time unless they are hired full time by someone. It is more of a side job to do while not working your other more steady job/career.

Okay thanks. I charged too much. I've decided to focus my efforts towards linux, again. Both jobs flopped...****EN HELL!!!

Charging hourly can be problematic in many ways I think. The main problem is, how long should it take to develop a site? Most clients want the safety-net of knowing the final cost (or at least a very good estimate).

The answer varies on the complexity and developer! For a standard site with some server-side coding, it takes me about 7-10 days to produce a design, code and debug it (part-time); and I am not a Ninja, been designing/developing for 2-3 years in my own time. If I had absolutely nothing else to do, It would take me half that time.

For a project to take months....is just not really feasible in the real world. A team of developers from a big company would be the most realistic option to complete such a task, and it would need to be the mother of all projects to take months.

I generally charge customers around £200 - £300 for a 5 page static site and a bit more to include dynamic elements. Thats probably about $400-$600 Canadian. There are many people like me offering such services and what will set you apart from the competition is the quality of your work. It's got to be very good!

I wish you well in whatever you do,
Good luck and don't give up on web development,
There is lots of business around. Take the advice above and start small with local companies and clubs. When you gain more experience, you can consider web design as a career.

Hope this helps,
Duncan

It does help. This morning I called up one of the job places and said that after doing some research on the net I could probably start a site for about $200 and it goes up from there, 1/10 of the original price. They sounded interested and said they'd get back to me. Wether they will or not that's their choice.

I hope I get it, I've done sites for people before. I just never been paid for a site. My skills are just now, starting to become sellable I think. I hope I get this job because they don't sound like they want something major.

Now for that other site I was charging $16.000 I think it's a 2 month project for one person. They want to be able to add a textfile and images to a folder through a web application to add content to the server as well as a fully database driven website. I did charge an hourly wage but I "costed it out" they said as they reviewed it.

I was interviewed unofficially by one of the members of the organization and he said they'd be luky to get me. he asked me questions like what I knew about them and I said nothing really and just said what i knew and he said that's all 'd be expected to know. Also, they said they would be announcing who got the project by the 26th and did not announce anyone. I called them the first working day after and they didn't pick anyone.

My aunt working for the governement said they probably don't have the budjet this year and she'd be surprised if they picked anyone for it so early. They said they'd like a representation by June 26th so I'm hopping on working on that for that deadline. I then plan on showing it to the person who interviewd me and see what he has to say. It's going to be lots of work.

I haven't given up on web development completely, that's impossible. I have 0 social skills so I need computers for a job. Work-a-holic in the making? Who knows, all I know is I love programming, playing with linux even though it rarely works, my own fault all the time. Also I love cool webpages and it would be cool if I could make one too. And people put me on edge. The stares the stares....


Ahaha anyway time to go drink with my little brother :P hahah little.

Good luck,

Duncan ;-}