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Description
This is part of a series on multimedia professionals. Be you a visual artist, programmer, music artist and so on, don't bite the head off your client for underbidding you.

I made a stamp earlier, [link] which talks a bit about how professional artists get upset when other artists do work for a dime (or nothing). Both because artists who work less than their overhead will always be starving artists--we're no longer in the dark ages where that was the in thing--and also because it teaches clients that our work is worth less than it really is.

That said, if you have a client who is offering you a hundred bucks for a jaw-dropping web page, don't go frothing rabies infected terrier on them. Instead, tell them about what they will get from your high quality service that they won't get with a bargain bin template site or perpetual charity case/student
who is silly enough to fall for that 'Work for experience and networking!' line.

You use high quality stock that you made yourself or paid proper licensing for instead of pulled en mass from search engines? Great! You should be able to charge extra for it.

You use legally purchased Photoshop to do your graphics? Great! You can't put your client's product in jeopardy because it was made through illicit use of pirated software! You should be able to charge extra for it.

You know what Web Analytics is and how to use it without Googling it just now? Great! That's an asset your client should be willing to pay extra for.

These are just examples for web developers and designers, but this applies as much to other art industries who I'm sure know what differentiates a quality product from a 'out of school' project. People who can also teach their client. Not teach them the entire industry, mind you, but enough to understand you're not ripping them off with your price scale.)

Description
This is part of a series on multimedia professionals. Be you a visual artist, programmer, music artist and so on, don't bite the head off your client for underbidding you.

I made a stamp earlier, [link] which talks a bit about how professional artists get upset when other artists do work for a dime (or nothing). Both because artists who work less than their overhead will always be starving artists--we're no longer in the dark ages where that was the in thing--and also because it teaches clients that our work is worth less than it really is.

That said, if you have a client who is offering you a hundred bucks for a jaw-dropping web page, don't go frothing rabies infected terrier on them. Instead, tell them about what they will get from your high quality service that they won't get with a bargain bin template site or perpetual charity case/student
who is silly enough to fall for that 'Work for experience and networking!' line.

You use high quality stock that you made yourself or paid proper licensing for instead of pulled en mass from search engines? Great! You should be able to charge extra for it.

You use legally purchased Photoshop to do your graphics? Great! You can't put your client's product in jeopardy because it was made through illicit use of pirated software! You should be able to charge extra for it.

You know what Web Analytics is and how to use it without Googling it just now? Great! That's an asset your client should be willing to pay extra for.

These are just examples for web developers and designers, but this applies as much to other art industries who I'm sure know what differentiates a quality product from a 'out of school' project. People who can also teach their client. Not teach them the entire industry, mind you, but enough to understand you're not ripping them off with your price scale.)