Comments on: Two Things You Should Never Tell Clients

By: Steve

Steve — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 21:50:11 +0000

Thanks for the great post! I am very close to starting an online business and never even thought about not telling clients how much time jobs take. Very good insight.

By: Lori

Lori — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 13:52:58 +0000

Cathy thank you for your advice, I know now that I give too much information and often undercharge way too often.

By: Brandon

Brandon — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 23:28:10 +0000

When looking at different pricing models for my business, I have considered hourly rates for my consulting, but hated being limited in such a way, especially when what people are paying for, often, is expertise. It may take you 10 hours or 1 hour to come up with a solution, depending upon your level of expertise. One shouldn’t be penalized because they may have more.

By: Cathy Stucker

Cathy Stucker — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 20:57:32 +0000

@Phil, I know that there may be times when you have no choice but to give some kind of hourly rate, but I would avoid it whenever possible. For example, perhaps the ongoing support work could be on some kind of retainer or other flat rate.

The less clients know about your internal rate calculations the better. Get them focused on the value of the results you provide.

By: Phil

Phil — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 20:49:45 +0000

Sounds like good advice, but I don’t think its practical… Most of the time the work cannot be defined well enough to estimate it with any accuracy (what client can tell you what they really want with clarity?). And what do you do for open-ended ongoing support work (which is very common). Estimating fixed bid software work is near impossible unless everything is crystal clear in definition. Even then, there’s always too much unknown that creeps in. Estimating accurately also takes a lot of time and effort. You also have the problem of disagreements on what “finished” means.

By: Kris

Kris — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 00:30:30 +0000

I absolutely agree with your points. The difficulty I have faced over the years, is that my competitors are not as professional – they will provide hours worked or planned for the project, they also provide a ridiculous hourly rate, and therefore an equally ridiculous project price. While I can develop a strategy to overcome this with clients I’ve worked with before; it is much more difficult when quoting on work with clients whom you may have met, but who don’t know or understand the value you bring. They compare the dollars and go for the lowest bid! Afterwards, I’ve had some come back to me for work. But I wonder if the effect is that they are lowering the bar on prices overall – as consultants, project managers, etc. we look like we’re overcharging!

By: Candy

Candy — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 13:30:17 +0000

Cathy,

Thanks for the info – I’m just starting out and had not heard that before. It makes a lot of sense!

Regards,
Candy

By: Old Welsh Guy

Old Welsh Guy — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 22:22:17 +0000

How true is that!

Just last week, I wrote a ‘Dear John’ to one of my clients because they demanded to know how many hours I had worked on their site last month.

I politely told them fist that the number of hours was not a deliverable, the deliverables were set out in the schedule of works.

They replied demanding they had a right to know how many hours I spent working on their site. I sent them back an email that listed the volume of hours i WOULD have worked had i not have invested in bespoke software built around my specific knowledge, that allowed me to work faster and do multiple tasks at once.

Oh & my final line was ‘As you insisted on there being no long term contract between us, I now consider our agreement to be at an end’.

They were on the phone apologising within the hour, Turns out they had argued with their developer and vented their frustration on me. Ah well it backfired as I am no longer doing their work for them.

By: Brett Slater

Brett Slater — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 21:50:50 +0000

Outstanding advice… As a freelancer who does a lot of jobs that take anywhere from 15 minutes to 15 days, coming up with a viable pricing structure isn’t always easy… And hourly rates do tend to spook some clients. Thanks!

By: David West

David West — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 21:28:55 +0000

Some good points Cathy. We dodge the “how long will it take” question by quoting time only on points that we have control over – such as how long it will take us to do an initial design. We can not predict how many revisions a client will ask for or when the client will have their content ready for their new site.

Cheers. David