How much to charge

corkstudent

I'm designing a website for a friend of my sister's and I'm wondering how much I should charge. I'm not exactly an expert but I should be able to throw something decent together, I've done quite a bit of it in college(I have a computer science degree) and have designed some basic sites before(though this was a while ago).

turgon

Here we go again

Bob the Builder

The question is not how much should you charge, but moreso what it's worth. thats your decision, not ours.

kjt

€9.99......

You haven't given any info for anybody to help tbh. Is it one page or 5,000? Shopping cart? cms? asp/php/sql? etc etc

corkstudent

It's just a basic web page advertising some beautician's services. I don't think there's any PHP or anything like that involved, I hope not, I'll have to raid my old notes. I need to know what people charge on average or else she'll just get someone else to do it.

kjt

It's still an open barrel tbh. It depends how good your are, how much time your going to spend, how much hassle it is, if you know your stuff already, how much is your time worth. I think this sort of a project - A static 5-15page site could cost anything from €200 to €2,000 from student to professional. I'd be guessing you'd be in and around €200-500?

Sorry I can't help any more.

corkstudent

Well I'm a student fresh out of comp sci with limited experience I guess. So I'd have to charge not that much. My Dad is pushing for me to not charge less than €300. I'm thinking more €200 but then also charge for maintainance, that way if she's happy with a more rough cut site she can leave it at that, or something.

kjt

Sounds reasonable to me.

Best of luck with it!

corkstudent

One more question; what about images to use in the site, say with stock images etc. Are there free images I can use for photomanipulation to use as graphics on the site.

kjt

The likes of google images are usually picked up from other sites so almost 99% of the time their private and should not be used. Stock sites will have different licenses attached to them. You can try here http://www.sxc.hu/ - one of the best free stock sites out there. Usually I'll just take the photos myself/make the graphics or ask the client to have them.

Best of luck!

link8r

corkstudent wrote: »

It's just a basic web page advertising some beautician's services.

FYI - websites don't advertise, they display. You have to get people to them and that is not as easy it sounds, especially for beauticians. A website without traffic is pointless. (wherever that traffic comes from)

Also, take a look at what other beauticians have - and then ask your friends sister (aka The Client) what her expectations are. Chances are she's thinking she'll get a good website for half nothing because you're a friend whereas you're thinking you'll charge as much as you can because you're a beginner.

It's clear you both already have different levels of expectations going in because you dont even seem to have them. Like you said there will be no PHP (or ASP I suppose). How will you handle changes for the future? What about Contact us forms - will you put capcha checks in? Will you use JS for that? How will users find the website?

The reason I'm coming across so strongly: I deal with people every week who've started this route with an inexperienced design - not just students/first timers but some with mini-companies (1-2 people + 1 or more sub-contractors) that have delivered websites that I have would thought were lousy by 1999 standards, have no SEO (putting in 300 keywords is not SEO) and 99% of the time - the site has to be thrown out because its just a non-starter. And the designer always things they've done a great job. I thought my first site was great and that was 1995! Trust me it wasn't (although I've still seen worse in 2008) and I'm not a web designer.

BTW - there are professional template managers who will do a design and customise a CMS site for €350.00. Seeing as you're not offering neither and you have no design experience (programmers who can use Photoshop dont count!) - you have a lot to think about. How can your dad expect you to charge no less than €300? because technically you can build a website? What about what this girl can get on the open-market. She has a business here and it's clear she needs to promote it. Are you sure you can help? Is delivering a HTML site that you need to raid your notes from college really the best business decision? Given that most of us can do something better in an hour maybe?

Good luck though if you do proceed.

corkstudent

I'm not completely inexperienced. I decided to go with €200 in the end.

While I'm not exactly a professional it's still a lot of work and essentially you can end up working below minimum wage at that, with tougher jobs.

There's nothing she wanted me to do that I can't do. I don't need notes for HTML and I probably won't be doing the site in HTML(except where it's preferable, and for tidying).

Yeah a lot of people can do it the same as I can but like I said, €200 for what can be quite a bit of work isn't bad. A lot of what she wants done is image editing and creative writing. Designing a layout if you're in any way artistic isn't that difficult. Keep in mind this is a novice and I'll be teaching her how to upate the site herself.

Right now I'm wondering what the best hosts there would be. I'm going to start out on a free host and work my way up.