Sometimes, freelance designing is challenging, especially when you’re just starting. But fret not, that’s why we’re here. We’re going to help you with your designer pricing of projects you’ll be doing now and moving forward.
Graphic design is becoming a high-demand industry. Since 2018, the design demand prediction has been a 3% increase per annum til 2030.
Statistics might be slow for an industry, but 23,900 openings for graphic designers open each year, according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Thus, you have to determine where you are in the spectrum of design experience to aid you in your pricing. Are you a novice, intermediate, or expert?
Let’s get into the guide below to help you earn from your hobby or chosen career when you answer that question.
Designer Pricing Strategy
Alright, let’s get into the financial side of creating projects for your clients. You have to understand there are two kinds of designers: freelance and in-house.
The former is more project-based, and the latter is contract-based. These terms mean that you could either have a per piece kind of payment or an hourly rate.
Thus, let’s talk about how to create a pricing guide for you then we’ll discuss how to implement it depending on your skill level (novice, intermediate, expert). We prepared five tips for you to devise your pricing strategy:
- Weigh Your Skill Set
- Investigate Your Industry
- READ the Responsibilities
- Budgeting is Key
- Frame Your Pricing
1. Weigh Your Skill Set
You need to know where your skills stand before you start getting paid for the projects you accept or get paid for rendering hours. A great way to do this is to beef up your portfolio.
Gain experience or try to finish graphic design tests online. Some examples of design tests:
- First Naukri: Test your knowledge of pixels.
- Agi Training: Test your photoshop skills.
- Zeptolab: Take the test and see which kind of game designer you are.
- Can’t Unsee: A quiz that makes you choose between two photos based on design principles.
- Color Method: A quiz that asks you to match the colors at the center to the wheel surrounding it, including analogous and complementary hues.
Aside from these, you can introspect on your past projects and year of experience. It’s integral that you understand your limits and capabilities to avoid burnout on your part as a creator.
2. Investigate Your Industry
Much like in creating your brand identity, you need to research your audience. Pinpoint who you want to target as a hired designer.
When you know the who, you now know the how. You will now identify the purpose behind your design and source the materials needed, like the applications, color palette, and business details to add to the visuals.
Aside from that, you can also look into the year’s design trends and mix and match them to suit better the enterprise that hired you. Below are some of the industries you can work in as a designer:
- Advertising
- Multimedia Animation and Art
- Product Development
- UX and UI
- Video Games
- Web Design
3. READ the Responsibilities
Whether hired as a freelance or in-house designer, you need to understand what they ask of you. For example, read the project brief for freelance, especially what skills are required to complete the job.
For in-house designers, make sure to read what you need to do for the team. Are you part of the web design team or the visuals team for in-house content?
After hitting the answer head-on, you now have a clear understanding of how to do your job well. Ideas start to sprint to life when you understand what you need.
4. Budgeting is Key
Okay, now you know your skills, industry, and responsibilities. Let’s get into budgeting your design tools and overall design needs.
From applications to print materials, know how much they are to price your finished products. Aside from labor, your future and ongoing clients would fund the usage of your tools.
A great way to do this is by determining the average budget of your co-designers. Base it on that and do the math. Aside from that, crowdsource from your market. Get a survey up and ask the price people are willing to pay for a particular design service you want to sell.
5. Frame Your Price
Lastly, let’s get into putting a price on your projects. Skillset analysis, check. Research the market, check. READ on the responsibilities, check. Budgeting, check.
Now, to price the actual service you are providing. Take into account that there are different types of designers worldwide.
Thus, we’ll show you how to price your projects based on your skill set and level of expertise. See the table below to understand better how to price your projects without downplaying your skills.
After all, you deserve to get paid for the effort you put into your output. We didn’t add the hourly rates since the estimate is $25 to $150 per hour. But if you’re starting, you can go for $20 to $30 as your starting price.
Also, we suggest you go for project-based projects since it’s faster to generate income and possibly double it as you go. Though you could shift between the two every one and then.
Below are the typical project-based rates for each type of designer:
And there you have it. A basis on how to price your outputs. You could go for the lowest per piece as a newbie, but don’t sell yourself short. If the project demands more effort, give a reasonably high price and be open to negotiation, but nothing below your standard rate.
Your Price is Right!
And just like that, you can now put a price on your outputs better! Just remember not to sell yourself short when it comes to design.
After all, that is a personal piece that you should be proud of and showcase to the world. Speaking of design, do you have a community yet? Or, if you are a business owner, do you have a designer yet?
If not, check out our DesignCrowd designer community. It’s the right place for your design needs. That concludes this blog.
Catch ya later, designer and business owner.
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Written by DesignCrowd on Tuesday, February 22, 2022
DesignCrowd is an online marketplace providing logo, website, print and graphic design services by providing access to freelance graphic designers and design studios around the world.