I make websites for a living Hi! I'm just someone who develops websites. This blog isn't about me, but it's vaguely related to what I do.

The age-old question for the freelancers or otherwise self-employed among us is "what do I charge?" Often when approaching a new client, one is presented with a dilemma about whether to quote low and not get paid as much as you possibly could, or to quote high and risk not getting the work.

Always keep in mind that no matter what you charge, clients will usually have the same expectations from you to get things completed on time. They will always expect to get what they asked you to do, but if they are paying you a high amount, they will definitely want a higher quality finished product than if they were to pay someone a cheaper rate.

If you already have a solid client base and/or work available, you should always quote as much as you think the client is willing to pay, and never lower than you think you're worth. A decent client is willing to pay higher than market rate if you're reliable and your work is good. Don't undersell yourself. Often it pays off to be bold and ask for a higher rate, and see who will accept it. Once you've done it with one client, it becomes easier to do it again. If you're asking for something higher than you've been paid previously, imagine you've already got clients paying you the rate you're asking. It'll make you much more confident about it.

The only times you should quote a low rate is if you're just starting out, or you're otherwise desperate to get new projects. You can always renegotiate to raise it for future projects once trust is built, or look for new clients who are willing pay you more. Unless you've signed an agreement, you're not under any obligation to keep clients who can't afford your rate.

A while ago, I was in need of work, and I offered a rate about 25% lower than my usual to try and attract some quick business. I got a client interested, exchanged some email messages, and they said they were busy this week, but they'd get their manager to have a phone meeting with me next week to discuss the project and "blah, blah, blah." Well, a lot can happen in a week. There is sometimes very little difference between having no work and being flooded with more work than you can handle. By the time they were ready to talk to me, I'd already signed up some projects at my normal asking rate, and told them I could no longer offer them the cheap rate. They did not reply.

It's not always a big deal to lose work because you're asking too much. Move on to the next client. In the long run you might end up doing much better.

A little tip for web developers. If you've ever had a client or employer who isn't too knowledgeable about programming, you may have come across the situation where they think a project isn't going according to schedule, simply because the design hasn't been implemented fully yet.

As web programmers know, sometimes adding in the HTML and CSS is only a small part of the project when there are more complex programming tasks involved. Still, some clients will get in a panic when half the time for the project has elapsed and they can't see something tangible yet.

Most of the time, when working with these kinds of clients particularly, it's better to fully build the design first, even if the back-end doesn't work. The client's perception is generally that the web form you're building is always 90% complete if they can see what it will look like. What happens when they press "submit" is often only 10% of the work as far as they're concerned, no matter what proportion it turns out to be in reality.

If you build the visual elements first, you should have fewer problems convincing them that the project is on track, because when they ask how it's going, you can show them something tangible (that they can understand) and say you're just sorting out some code on the back-end to complete the job. This generally gives them a lot more confidence about the work being finished on time.

If you're a freelancer, like I am, then you probably use your own equipment to do your job. If you also use your computer for entertainment, particularly if you're a gamer, it's probably a good idea to have more than one computer. After all, you don't want all those browser tabs, FTP windows and large Photoshop files hogging up precious gaming resources, do you?

Separate your work by having a computer specifically set aside for working. If you ever need to do a job urgently, you just get on that computer and start on the work. It's always ready to go. And you never need to worry about closing any of your programs to get better gaming performance.

Personally, I do all my development work on my laptop these days, which means I can take it with me to visit clients, or when I go on vacation. I keep my high-end desktop machine with the new nVidia graphics card and 28 inch screen for playing the latest games, watching videos, etc.