The recession experienced globally requires you to be more creative in pricing your professional fees. Proposing a flat rate for your graphic design projects may be beneficial to both you and your client. At the onset of the project, giving your projects at a flat rate allows your client to know about how much the project will cost. Unless, the project scope changes, the client will have little to worry about overshooting his budget.
The first thing you must do to determine your flat rate is know your hourly rate. To determine your hourly rate, use your annual salary rate from your previous full-time job or use the industry standard for determining annual salary rate for the graphic design field. Do not forget to include the taxes that you need to pay after the job is done. Make sure the hourly rate that you arrive at is enough to support both your business and non-business needs. Next calculate the business related inputs such as computer use, transportation and logistics, advertising, accounting and legal fees, and others that should be included as part of your fees. If you own the business, incorporate overhead expenses and insurance payments.
However, if you are freelancing, you must delete the costs of insurance, sick/vacation leaves and other costs that are not necessary. Determine the billable hours that you can ask from your client. The billable hours are the time you allocate to work on the clients project. To get the hourly rate, add your yearly salary, and business expenses and divide it by the billable hours. The result is your hourly rate.
After determining your hourly rate, estimate the amount of time required to complete the project. You may use similar previous projects as benchmark. Always consider that for a project, there are other activities involved other than designing. Such activities could include meeting with your clients and suppliers, research costs, communication costs and dealing with outside contractors. After determining the number of hours, calculate the cost by multiplying the number of hours with your hourly rate. Make the adjustment as necessary ensuring that all project expenses incurred will be included. Add other expenses such as material and printing costs, photography or illustration costs. You may separate these items from your fees if it would make it easier for you to negotiate.
Make sure to include contingency costs anticipating slight changes in the project as it progresses. It is also important to know how much the client is willing to spend on the project. You can work out the figures based on the clients budget and see if you can afford to do the project using a flat rate.
Once you arrive at a figure, it is time to negotiate with the client. Be ready for some bargaining. You must have an idea of how low you can afford to go to complete the project. When negotiating, think about the value of the project not only in terms of monetary but also in terms of what it can contribute to your reputation or portfolio as a graphic designer.
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