Back about 4 years ago at the agency I was at, we estimated "normal" work at $75/hr. Sometimes new work or uncharted territory was 100. Outsourced dev work rebilled at 150. Although I wasn't in charge of the books... I expect it's gone up since then.
@chriscoyier Hey Chris, curious, how many employees were on the payroll at your previous job?
@JamesBarnsley A good way to judge your hourly wage is grab the contact information of all the local competitors you can find, and send them a "fake project" (the same one for all of them).
Once they send you the quote with all the juicy info, take a look at each of their portfolios and see what level of quality they offer for their prices, find your closes match and go from there.
Of course you could also use the freelance calculator from freelanceswitch, calculate all your expenses, profit margins, and see what it spits back at you.
I still haven't set in stone my prices, It's one of those things that takes time to get right.
sliver37, how much are currently charging roughly at the moment though?
chriscoyier, I know you say you charge $75 an hour which is great. Just out of curiosity how much would you charge for a wordpress theme, that is similar in design to CSS Tricks?
I don't work solo, small partnership, front-end/back-end. We charge between $60-$100/hr. Depending on the company/project.
Define your target market, and get into it! Your prices will change as you gain experience, if you spend too much time worrying about what you should charge, you'll never get anything done. I've been there :)
@JamesBarnsley A good way to judge your hourly wage is grab the contact information of all the local competitors you can find, and send them a "fake project" (the same one for all of them).
Once they send you the quote with all the juicy info, take a look at each of their portfolios and see what level of quality they offer for their prices, find your closes match and go from there.
Of course you could also use the freelance calculator from freelanceswitch, calculate all your expenses, profit margins, and see what it spits back at you.
I still haven't set in stone my prices, It's one of those things that takes time to get right.
Good luck!
chriscoyier, I know you say you charge $75 an hour which is great. Just out of curiosity how much would you charge for a wordpress theme, that is similar in design to CSS Tricks?
@JamesBarsley: I don't do freelance. One of the reasons is stuff like this that I honestly don't like thinking about.
It depends on your location, cost of living, skill level, etc.
I don't work solo, small partnership, front-end/back-end. We charge between $60-$100/hr. Depending on the company/project.
Define your target market, and get into it! Your prices will change as you gain experience, if you spend too much time worrying about what you should charge, you'll never get anything done. I've been there :)