[thelist] Business practices

[Paola Kathuria]

Marcelo Mammana wrote:
> 1) Working for someone that lives outside my country makes me difficult to
> know which is (if there is such) the international standard, how much can I
> charge, etc.
> Do you charge per hour, per page, per project?

I've not worked for people in another country but I suggest that you
come up up with a series of project stages you can charge against.
For instance, chargeable deliverables can be 1) information architecture,
2) graphic design options, 3) final graphics, 4) prototype (showing each
page type with final graphics), 5) copywriting, 6) final site (on your
server) and 7) launch & online promotion.  If you pass ever maintenance
to someone else, you can also add stage 8) style and maintenance manual.

I'd estimate how long each would take (then add 30% because everything
always takes longer when people start to see stuff and get more ideas)
and then apply your hourly rate.  You don't have to reveal where you
got the payments for each stage from if you're charging fixed price.

If you decide to charge by the hour, still provide estimates for
each stage but invoice regularly (against timesheets) with short
payment terms (e.g., 14 days).

I think the $3,500 is too low but then web site costs seem to be
either insanely low or insanely high.  I'd double it and then 
offer a discount of $1,000 for a credit and link from the home page.
Whatever you do, agree terms in writing (e-mail) before you start
any work.

I did a very small portfolio site for a photographer last year as
a trade of services.  It included 4 page types (1 home page, 3
subject pages, 15 photo pages and 1 info page).  I spent 45 hours
on it (I was aiming for 8!) and that was mostly for advice (for
the separate graphic designer whose first web site it was), photo
preparation, mark-up and online promotion.

If it helps, I considered ways of including the photos on the site
in a to minimise them being stolen by unscrupulous people or robots.
Rather than adding a notice or watermark to each photo, I chopped
each enlarged photo (which were max 340 pixels high and 50K) into
4 quarters and made separate GIFs to create the drop shadow (the
chosen framing device).  The site's http://www.scottstudio.co.uk/


Paola