Tip for today: the number one question to ask yourself when you’re thinking about whether or not to accept a given rate is, Does this rate meet my financial goals? I get a lot of questions from freelancers, asking things such as:
-“Is X cents a word too little to charge?”
-“Should I offer volume discounts to clients with large projects?”
-“What should I do if a client tells me I have to decrease my rates by 10%?”
The factual answer to all of these is, I don’t know, because the real question is, does this rate meet your financial goals? Step one is to get clear on your financial goals, in as precise a way as possible. For example I can tell you that my financial goal is to earn about $90 an hour, billing about 25 hours a week, 48 weeks a year, which gives me a gross income of US $108K. That doesn’t mean working 25 hours a week, it means billing 25 hours a week; things like marketing, accounting, professional development, giving quotes, writing this newsletter, are all non-billable time, on top of the time I’m getting paid to work for clients. Knowing this information makes it a lot easier to say no to projects that don’t fit my financial goals.
If you have no idea what those numbers (required hourly rate, number of billable hours per week, etc.) are in your business, here’s a simple worksheet that you can use as a starting point. That link will allow you to download the worksheet. It’s not comprehensive, but it will help you start answering this question about rates that fit your financial goals.
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