10 Signs You Should Raise Your Design Prices - RD201

<h2>Are you charging enough for your design services?</h2> <p>Many home-based designers don't charge high enough for their services. They undervalue their work and struggle to find meaningful relationships with great clients. And although it might sound counterintuitive, when you find yourself in this situation, the solution is to raise your prices.</p> <p>It's been proven time and again that the more you charge, the better and more appreciative your clients will be. But when should you raise your design prices? Below are ten indicators to let you know it's time to increase yours.</p> <p>But before we get to them, here's a quick way to determine your hourly rate. For the record, <a href= "https://resourcefuldesigner.com/episode115">I don't believe you should be charging by the hour</a>. The following just gives you an idea of where you stand.</p> <h2 class="p1">Calculating your hourly design rate.</h2> <p class="p1">Say you want to make $60,000 per year, a realistic number for a freelance designer that allows for comfortable living. As an employee working 9-5 for someone else, you would need an hourly rate of $28.85 to make $60K annually. But you're not an employee getting paid for an 8 hour day, five days per week. You're a home-based designer, a freelancer if you want to use that term, and there's nothing steady about a freelancer's income.</p> <p class="p1">To make $60,000 as a home-based designer, how much do you need to charge as an hourly rate? Let's do the math.</p> <p class="p1">There are 260 weekdays per year. Let's eliminate 25 days for vacation and other miscellaneous days. (3 weeks vacation plus sick days, medical appointments, children's activities, etc.)</p> <p class="p1">That leaves us with 235 working days per year.</p> <p class="p1">During an 8 hour workday, freelancers average 4.5 billable hours. This adds up to 1057.5 billable hours per year.</p> <p class="p1">So $60,000 per year, divided by 1057.5 billable hours, equals $56.74/hour (let's round it up to $57.)</p> <blockquote> <p><strong>$60,00