Freelancers 3 Tips for Setting Your Prices

Freelancers 3 Tips for Setting Your Prices Freelancers 3 Tips for Setting Your Prices 15freelance worker sounds great you control the who-what-where-when-why of your work, including who you work with, what you do for a living, where you work, when you get your work done, and why you do the work in the first place. But when it comes to setting your prices  for your freelance skills, many professionals cringe and shy away from it as though they’re the Dowager Countess of Grantham taking part in a particularly vulgar discussion about some unseemly topic on Downton Abbey.   In the real world, however, we think that legendary actress Maggie Smith, who plays the Dowager, hasn’t gotten this far in her career by not asking for what she rightly deserves for her work. That’s why we were very pleased to see a recent article in the New York Times discussing the difficulty that new freelancers have in setting prices and being paid what they’re worth. Setting your price as a freelancer takes a lot of forethought. After all, you should consider in what way you wish to be paid by the hour or by the project or service? And what do other freelancers in your field charge? What is the average range for your services, given your location, experience, and market? Here are some tips for freelancers: setting your prices  and fairly charge clients. Get to know people in your field. Whether you join a professional association (online or in-person), strike up conversations and connections via LinkedIn, Facebook, and e-mail, or simply take an old college friend who works in your same field out for coffee, professionals are usually eager to help those just starting out. Ask people who have paid for professional work. Have your friends, family, or professional network ever paid someone else for the freelance services that you wish to provide? If so, how much did they pay? What were the terms? Were they satisfied with the price, or did they think it too high (or too low)? Consult websites for a general idea. If all else fails, there are a number of decent web resources that allow professionals to post, anonymously, the rates they’ve been paid for jobs. FreelanceSwitch.com has an Hourly Rate Calculator where you can punch in your business costs, personal costs, and how many hours you can bill, as well as how much profit you want, to get your hourly rate. Or, you could consider the yearly salary that you would make if you were working as a traditional full-time professional in your field, and then calculate that into an hourly rate. Salary.com can help you figure the average annual salary for your profession based on a number of considerations. As the NY Times article says, if you’re consistently hearing from clients that your prices are “very reasonable” or so much less than other quotes they’ve received, it’s time to up your fees. They advise, “Most important, don’t feel intimidated and underestimate your own worth. You’re not asking for a favor but engaging in a business transaction. It can be easy to lose sight of that.” If you’re ready to face the challenge of becoming a freelancer and controlling the who-what-when-where-why of your work life, then check out’ freelance job listings available in 50+ career categories.