tips on freelance pricing and other difficult grown-up tasks

ok lol i just sent off my first ever actual quotation sheet inc.breakdown for a soup-to-nuts book editing job, quoting what i'm WORTH instead of what i suspect they can PAY (i think they're tiny and have no money but it's time i bit the bullet and stopped strapping myself into underpaid projects where i feel sorry for all concerned and like the idea of it)

i think i probably undersold myself even so (tho i may have overestimated the hours it would take)

unless i underquoted and won't get it bcz they don't take my hardball seriously

Nothing more self destructive than undercharging your own time, it’s explicitly undervaluing yourself. If you get it, vindication! and if not, ask for feedback so it’s a range-finding exercise.

yes i guess i have to get over feeling that "oh noes these goodhearted guys with a project i approve of can't afford me" is some kind of failing on my part (tho deep down i'm not sure i ever will)

https://media0.giphy.com/media/7KZ1PHjnrn4Q0/giphy.gif

Are you in dire straits financially if this job falls through? If not, congratulations! You negotiated from your only position of power, ever, and this is exactly the time to work on negotiation skills.

i have some work coming up but not much! we shall see what transpires, i am definitely at the trainer-wheels-on trainer-wheels-off transition point currently lol

(which is in one sense ridiculous but i have always just been very lucky with word-of-mouth and stable long-term client relationships) (16 years at the same magazine etc as the world changed shape around me)

I totally get that. Do you have any contemporaries to talk to re: their pricing schedule?

yes my hated rivals for the same jobs!

(at the end of last year and very belatedly, joined a professional organisation* which has forums and such, so i've been extrapolating from info i've found there. i know i'm not wildly out of the ballpark, it really is a matter of pricing in a lifetime's experience and wisdom fairly and sensibly… and then losing the opportunity to the newbies in the forums excitedly undercutting me and doing a rubbish job lol lol lol ugh)

*(there was an exam and everything)

for me (full-time freelance; haven't had a staff job of any stripe in...15 years, i think) the challenge isn't knowing what i'm worth, it's what isn't worth my time. usually there's some intersection of money, difficulty and off-putting client-ness that makes me say no to a job. yeah i'm leaving money on the table -- money which is alllllwwwwaaaayyyysssss needed -- but the opportunity cost of taking something becomes too great. that said, I've done a few freebies/cheapies in the last year and a half or so because the project amused me, or seemed like a worthwhile challenge that only demanded a small amount of time.

In my business (film/TV) most rates are fairly well known and based off a union scale. It's hard to negotiate higher man-hours outside of union shops. You can bill up on equipment (most of us own some or all of our equipment and bill accordingly) but most of the time I usually end up negotiating my time on set. I know how long it takes me to set up and be in position to work and how long it takes for me to break down and clear set. if someone is coming at me under rate i start asking when talent is appearing and when they are leaving so I'm not sitting around 5 hours early and staying 3 hours after they leave. I know illustrators and designers work specific numbers of client revisions into their contracts/deal memos so they aren't spending all their time fielding phone calls and emails from clients making tweaks or trying to "see what this looks like."

even if you're excited by this particular job it's worth setting your price as high as you can, for the others in the industry and for your own sense of self-worth. if this client really wants you, they'll come back with a number. what happens next is your call but if they don't respond then they're not actually interested in YOU, they're looking for a warm body to do the job. In that case they can go to hell. Just because a client is good-hearted doesn't mean they're worth while.

also don't forget to give yourself raises.

Booming post.

all very good points, thank you, yes -- and all things i am going to have firmly to internalise once more proposals from randos start actually coming in

the challenge isn't knowing what i'm worth, it's what isn't worth my time.

exactly ... in my current line of work, I know I charge much less per hour than most people with my level of expertise, though most people in my line of work are very much in it for the money, whereas I approach it from somewhat of a social services perspective. That said, I've gotten to a point where I tell myself, "I don't have time to help everybody who asks." and there are some prospective clients (and uh, past clients) that aren't worth adding to the hopper of balls I am perpetually juggling.

Also, more relevant to everyone else's posts, there are now competitors who are younger and are charging my rates or lower, and I find myself in the position of having to decide/figure out how to (ugh) "position myself in the marketplace" ... though I am not in a "creative" line of work, so there isn't the scarcity that seems so prevalent there.

lol still no response to my quotation two days later (since monday's "thanks, will reply soon, out with friends tonight")

no idea if this is good or bad: it fits an earlier pattern of promising stuff immediately and taking three days to send em 🙄 🙄 🙄

in conclusion: i am not the flakiest person in this relationship

Did they have an idea of their timeline when you quoted them?

yes, a mix of loose ("by christmas") and tight ("i want to get going")

well that's not helpful

i'd circle back monday (or whenever you want, really). but I think checking on friday is bad just bc they will have an excuse to push to the next monday anyway and who needs anxiety on a weekend

i'm busy with something else right now anyway so less issue than learning curve at the moment tbh, i'm not chasing them

Welcome to freelance you graduated this day I’m proud

\o/

it's kinda like dating in a way -- you are best off when you are not desperate and have something/other things going, so that you can easily tell yourself "i'm not chasing them"

ok so they finally came back and basically accepted the quote (haggling over one tiny minor element in it which i was already tbh treating as a loss leader)

happy they said yes, apparently i have priced myself correctly
mildly eye-rolling at the mini-haggling but whatever, we're talking £20 difference, happy to swallow this to expedite proceedings
vaguely concerned it took them so long to come back to just say yes (were they checking out some other cheaper option that didn't pan out? probably)

(in-between i said yes to another piece of work and successfully upped my usual ask even tho we both know it's less onerous than the previous stuff i did for them -- so my text trick is going to mastering JUGGLING THE CLASHING DEADLINES OF CLIENTS I'M GUESSING)

text s/b next wrote the professional sub editor hastily

(since i began this thread my professional org -- which is where potential clients find my name -- has upgraded from a "Society for" to a "Chartered Institute of", which is interesting and exciting and even more grown-up than the thread title knew)

lol no wait now they're haggling abt everything, that makes more sense i suppose (in a bad way)

lol this is ballooning into an absurd saga: they haven't agreed to my quote for the big job, but i also did a very small rewrite for them on loss-leader discount basically so they could decide if they liked my work, and now i am copied in on beef between different ppl in their team over whether my rewrite improves on the original or is in fact worse lol

i sent them a brief email explaining which of them was my client and what the brief my client gave me was

i have a somewhat similar thing going on with a client. The board of directors wanted to hire a relatively expensive consulting firm to do the work I have been doing. I wrote a professional e-mail about it, that was basically a thank you for letting me serve you, good luck with the consulting firm. I was relieved, actually, because the board is getting in the way of running the organization. My client - the Executive Director of the org (who reports to the Board) did not want to hire this consulting firm. Apparently I still am working for this client and dealing with their annoying board of directors, even though I really wish I had been replaced with the consulting firm, but because my client expressed appreciation for my work and advocated for me not to be replaced, I feel like I can't quit.

Full time freelance is great if you don’t have to do crew work :)))))))