Part of starting a new business is marketing and sales. Up until recently, building websites and programing were hobbies. They didn’t demand time commitments or financial considerations. I could start working on something because it seemed interesting. I could offer to help a friend build something just for the fun of it. In addition to family related sites (chiswick.net) I also built a site for a catering business among others.
Now, however, I’m faced with a whole new set of challenges that have nothing to do with programing, or even computers. Sales and Marketing. Specifically, how do I know how much something will cost me to produce? How do I know how to convey that in a clear way to a client? How am I evaluating my costs in relation to my competitors?
Up until now, I’ve just sort of guesstimated how much time something might take, and then pro-rated a price based on a rough figure of how much I need to be bringing in each month to stay afloat. That works OK for informal relationships, but how do I create a real project price estimate? How much detail does the client deserve, and how much privacy do I deserve? Should I break the project down into tiny parts and estimate each one? That would give the client a sense of what they are paying for, but what happens if I don’t stick with one section…
Any suggestions?
