dmc01

Hi
I have just entered the world of freelance web design and development.

I have managed to get my first client on board (subject to my charges being acceptable). But what is acceptable?

I am being tasked to take an existing static website and integrate this into a CMS system. Based on past experience and the size of the clients site, I am guessing it will take about 1 week to do (need to scope it out to be sure).

So, am thinking of charging about £40 per hour, which is about £1500 for the project. But to be honest have no idea with this is excessive or too low??

Would be grateful if anyone has any thoughts on whether this is a reasonable figure based on past experience similar jobs they have quoted for?

Many Thanks

bonnit

a good start would be to get some quotes from other designers similar to you - if your freelance you dont want design companies because they will charge for overheads and vat too etc and so on, i know its a bit naught but its a brilliant way of keeping up with pricing etc and checking your own fees and make sure your not losing clients to other companies because your fees are too high or even too low, see how your price comes in alongside theirs, also think of your qualifications or experience if any, thsi will again possibly raise the priceof work per hour

i would personally charge more for the site being there already - cleaning up someone elses mess is never a nice job, and everyone has their own working style. also it depends which cms system your using if its a custom one then you have to charge for the man hours involved in writing even if you already had it before taking on this job and if its an open source one there is going to be some degree of customisation and possible licensing fees.

this page may help, theres a lot more info on that site on charging too, just search for hourly rate or whatever and there are quite a few results which may help

http://webdesign.about.com/od/pricin...y_rate_for.htm

LightSpeedITSolutions

I personally think that £40 per hour is a bit steep for someone starting out.

But if you're client agrees that fee and you produce exactly what they want, then who am I to judge ;o)

Being a Web Designer for over 12 years and knowing what I know, I'd expect someone starting out to be charging me around the £15-£20 mark ...For an experienced designer, I'd be looking at anywhere between £30-£35 ... Sometimes more ...

Good luck

jonbey

I think that is a fair price. I too am new though. OK, it may seem a bit steep, but you are revamping an existing site which means that there will probably be a lot more than just "design" work. Copying content over could be a very time consuming job also, do not underestimate how long it could take to transfer everything from a static page to a CMS. You may have to reformat some content. Will images etc. have the same path? Will you be expected to maintain META elements or do you have free range to ditch keywords / descriptions and let the CMS deal with it? This could all make the project much bigger. Charging by the hour at least means that if you go over 1 week, you will not be doing it for free.

I recently built a site for my kung-fu instructor. OK, I did not charge (I am supposed to be having free lessons, but I am too busy!) but the site I built him, using Drupal, would probably have cost him about 1500 quid also (I guess). Lots of work involved moving from static to CMS. Oh, another thing I had to handle was all the 301 redirects, as all new pages had new URL's. Again, takes time.

designgenies

well i think to initiate, charges are bit high ...but if your client is ready to pay then it would be great .one suggestion please make the deliverables on time.and if he ask some additional work then just move with that .so that you can make your client permanent