Chat #16: Do you charge by the hour or by the value?

by Lee Hopkins on August 28, 2006 · View Comments

in Uncategorized

G'day! Thanks for returning!

The Cafe Allan and I discuss the sensitive subject of ‘Pricing‘. Do you charge different clients different amounts for the same work? Should you charge by the hour, by the project or by the value of the project? Do you think charging a client $50,000 for one hour’s work, as one copywriter did, ethical or greedy?

I express my initial discomfort at charging higher than I normally would for a recent quote, but, as Alan Weiss says, consultants, not clients, are the main cause of low consulting fees – because they fail to have the courage and belief system that supports the high value delivered to the client, thereby reducing fees to levels commensurate with the consultant’s own low self-esteem.

I read several ‘value-setting’ questions that help define a project’s value, and Allan recognises that the questions are more valuable than they first appear, because they help the client realise the value of the project (and thus allow the consultant to charge appropriately).

Allan points out the necessity of knowing what your own internal costs are before you try and negotiate your services. We both ask buyers of consultants, “is it bad economics to beat a consultant down to the lowest price?”

And Fred Zelders and Tricia weigh in over the ‘internet/Internet’ nomenclature debate.

We welcome your comments! Agree with us? Disagree? Drop your comments on this post, or send a Waxmail to ‘comments at commscafe dot com’.

Download [9mb] and take a 19 minute coffee break with Allan and I. And don’t forget to subscribe to the RSS feed to catch every sparkling discussion as we pass the coffee pot around. And if you are an iTunes user, you can find our podcast on the iTunes Music Store (for free, of course!).

Let’s tag this baby!

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p.s. apols for the dull show note – Lee wrote these. Allan usually writes them, which proves that Allan is 15 times funnier than Lee.


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