Lemma Soft Forums

Greeny wrote:2: Your price is not a factor of your skills

Remember that as an artist taking commissions, you are a freelancer. As a freelancer, your price is not a factor of your skills, it's a factor of how much the other is willing to pay you. Fret not, your skills are a part of that. But so is their budget, your attitude, how fast you work, your reputation, how much the next artist is asking (spoiler: it's less than what you're asking), how much art they're asking for (the more they need, the cheaper they'll look for), even their mood today.

Some people will tell you that your price should be a measure of your countries' average wages. Ethically, this is just, but unfortunately, it's ultimately meaningless. You are not on a salary, you are an independent freelancer. Your market has its own rules, its own measures. The only money you get is the money they give you.

Don't get me wrong though. It's you who puts the price tag on your art. Never underprice yourself. However, it's important to understand that you can't measure your price by how good you are, and you can't measure how good you are by your price. Set a price you're willing to work for. If nobody will hire you at that price, consider lowering it. If you get flushed with offers, consider raising it in the future. Of course, you should never change your prices after an offer has been made. ("You want to hire me? Great! I guess I'm worth more. I decided I want more money for it then." People will suddenly realize they don't want to hire you after all, or ever again.) You can update your prices for new offers as frequently as you like, however, as long as you keep track of what your prices were for each commission you're in the process of doing.

Never ask them to make you a price offer. It doesn't look professional, and most importantly, what they want is to pay you as little as humanly possible. You don't want to be paid as little as humanly possible.

Most importantly though, never work at a price you're not comfortable with.

I would encourage you to look at your country's minumum wage as a starting point. You can work your way up the ladder from there, but you deserve at least that much when you're investing your own time for someone else. If you live in a country with low minumum wages, consider charging more for you work. Remember that while your country's wages may be low, your market is a global one and that means your market's earnings will average much higher.

Greeny wrote:15: Your thread
When you're not going to people who are recruiting, your thread is where you'll get your jobs from...
- Have a complete price list. Don't ask people to pm you for prices; you're asking them to put an effort when you want to get hired. Not to mention, if you're not willing to publicly post your prices, people will assume they're high.