Fast, Good, Cheap: Pricing Freelance Work
Have you ever heard of the Fast, Good, Cheap pricing method?
Clients should only be able to choose 2 of these 3 words and you must keep this in mind when pricing your next job otherwise your work / income / career could be suffering.
Fast, Good or Cheap – Choose Two
If you allow your clients to have fast, good, cheap work done by yourself then most likely you are working your butt off for very little return which is why you must allow them to choose a combination of two only – either good & fast OR good & cheap OR fast & cheap.
Below are some explanations of why and when to use each type of pricing method along with their advantages and disadvantages.
Good + Fast = Expensive
If a client wants good, fast work then of course we can put up our prices. We must put up our prices here because we have to postpone every other job we have, cancel appointments/meetings and stay up 24+ hours to get their job done.
The advantage here is that we get quick money however the disadvantage is that we could possibly let other clients down by not delivering their work on time. We get more stressed and if it is a major project, our sleeping pattern gets disrupted.
Good + Cheap = Slow
If a client wants a good, cheap piece of work then they will have to be patient to get it as they are getting a discounted price… We have other projects to work on from higher paying clients so they get more priority.
The advantage here is that we do not have to stress about tight deadlines and we can work on the project in our own time with less stress. The disadvantage however is that we get less pay even though we worked on the project over a period of time.
Fast + Cheap = Inferior
If a client wishes to have a fast and cheap job, then they should expect the result to be quite inferior. We do not have the time to make the job as good as it could be plus on top of that, we hardly get any return on the product.
The only advantage here is that we get some quick money in a short amount of time. The disadvantage is that the end result will probably be something we will want to keep hidden away under lock and key.
In this case, clients truly get what they pay for and this is the least favourable choice of the three. Try to stay away from fast, cheap labour.
How To Explain Pricing To Your Clients
Communicating your prices to the client is another important factor you must consider when using this good, fast, cheap, pricing method. How do you explain that a good, fast job is going to be more expensive? How do you tell them that by doing a fast and cheap job that the end result is going to be less than satisfactory?
Depending on your profession and the relationship with your client, this will change however the best way to communicate your situation is in most situations, to be honest… tell them if they want a cheap and fast job, that the end product will be only satisfactory and tell them why. (ie. the disadvantages I outlined above).
How To Price Yourself
If you want some more information on how to price yourself and how to build this pricing method into your business, Freelance Switch has written some great articles on how to do so and even has a rates calculator.
- The FreelanceSwitch Rates Calculator
Use this great tool to figure out how much you should be charging per hour. - Nine Factors to Consider When Determining Your Price
Learn about some other issues you must consider when determining your price. - Hourly vs. Fixed Pricing
Should you charge by the hour or by the job? - The Price Is Right
A practical guide to making both you and your client happy with your rates. - Figuring Out How Much To Charge
Get a short insight into how Collis quotes a web design job.
How do you determine what you charge… Do you always come back to your hourly price or do you take into consideration other things such as time, quality or price? Do you have a different hourly rate for different projects?
Jacob Cass is a 20 year old passionate graphic designer from Sydney, Australia. He runs a popular design blog by the name of Just Creative Design which provides graphic design tips, articles and resources.
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Hello,
I will come back to reply to comments too!
Thank you for publishing the article… I never expected that it was going to be published, I submitted it over 3 months ago! Anyway, hope you enjoy
- Jacob
Nice post!
But what would you call a ’slow’ job?
(In terms of time)
Great formula, i guess i gonna use this for my next upcoming job. heheh
LOL This sounds like Joe Bennett from Lipstick Jungle – he even used a triangle to place emphasis on. Definitely agree with it!
Spot on, great little article.
I only found this site a few weeks back and articles like these really hit the nail on the head. Kudos.
Spot on, great little article.
I only found this site a few weeks back and articles like these really hit the nail on the head. Kudos.
R.
*blink*…
Didn’t I read this same post over at Freelance Folder?
The problem is: “Fast” and “cheap” can be measured, “good” not…
Great article once again. I am definitely more on the side of fast and good and agree that if clients truly want good fast work completed they should be willing to pay for it. I have seen so many people with fast and cheap and the work you get is quite often dribble that you have to totally re-write before you can do anything with it.
Amanda
Hi James,
Yes you did! I wrote this article quite a while ago and because it wasn’t published after 3 months I thought I should post it elsewhere… it just happened to be very bad timing and I apologise for it. It was a genuine mistake.
Jacob
Interesting article!
Since freelance isn’t my main income I have the luxury of passing up the fast and cheap jobs.
Mike is spot on… “good is subjective.”
In my experience, the slow-but-good route is best. It implies that the timeline is stretched, but eh rate is “normal” as opposed to “discounted”. Working for a a discounted rate will make you the designer slightly bitter, but shifting into rush mode will make you downright angry! The above adage is a lot less of a dilemma if you don’t have a policy of no rush jobs. The “fast” manifests itself as fewer concepts, fewer revisions, and an overall “this is what you get” approach.
I think given the choice, any new client will choose to have the best results in terms of quality. If it’s an existing client who needs fast turnaround for a deliverable, chances are they trust your work by now.
So in conclusion, the struggle continues. I encourage designers to take a stand and eliminate one of the three choices, as dear as they may be.
I’m with James. Nice article, but I’ve seen it before.
Interesting article.Talking about FAST work, clients always want things right away; the problem here is that it doesn’t mean it’s going to be a good work.Sometimes they want things done “yesterday” just because they haven’t done their work in time.CHEAP= the less they pay the better (for them of course).GOOD work, not easily measured, a point to take into account , clients always want good work,of course.
I have started really thinking about my pricing scheme and will use this with my upcoming client. I recently had a client who gave me/ gives me free will to take as long as I like and paid fairly well.
Although she was a family friend.
As James and Steven mention, the method’s a valuable starter point, but you’ve gotta watch out for that duplicate content. Not sure exactly what affect it has on websites, though I’d steer clear just in case.
For some reason I can’t access the comments on the Freelance Folder article (only me?), but I remember there being a good one relating to never offering cheap work, therefore keeping your standards high, and letting clients know what to expect.
the only thing that didn’t resonate with me was choice of words, some have negative connotations. maybe something like Speed, Quality, and Cost?
Yup, seen this one before. Re-blog alert!
I’ve experienced a little bit of everything mentioned above, and I really do prefer working at my own pace to get the result I want and what I know the client would appreciate.
But sometimes, you can’t really get away with working faster than usual because of the demand of the client, even if you explain the difficulties of finishing a project and how time can affect the outcome.
I think you need to add one more thing. It has worked well for me when a client wants cheap (I don’t budge on quality and try to be firm on price), I scale back features. If they want something cheap I try to deliver a quality project for a fair price with less features than the client originally wanted. This is advantageous for a couple of reasons. I still give them a quality working project, while saving them money. But it also usually leads to a follow up project where I implement the features we left out. It gives the client a piece of mind as well as gives them a smaller investment.
Honestly, any combination of those would make me head for ze hills. However I might entertain good and fast, but as the article states, at a premium.
hahahaha… it’s a great formula. maybe i can explain it later to my next client. btw it’s becoming something reguler here in my country asking all those three terms. FAST. CHEAP. GOOD. …
I think you need to add one more thing. It has worked well for me when a client wants cheap (I don’t budge on quality and try to be firm on price), I scale back features. If they want something cheap I try to deliver a quality project for a fair price with less features than the client originally wanted. This is advantageous for a couple of reasons. I still give them a quality working project, while saving them money. But it also usually leads to a follow up project where I implement the features we left out. It gives the client a piece of mind as well as gives them a smaller investment
Great article once again. I am definitely more on the side of fast and good and agree that if clients truly want good fast work completed they should be willing to pay for it. I have seen so many people with fast and cheap and the work you get is quite often dribble that you have to totally re-write before you can do anything with it.
winsa_variodor
In my experience, the slow-but-good route is best. It implies that the timeline is stretched, but eh rate is “normal” as opposed to “discounted”. Working for a a discounted rate will make you the designer slightly bitter, but shifting into rush mode will make you downright angry! The above adage is a lot less of a dilemma if you don’t have a policy of no rush jobs. The “fast” manifests itself as fewer concepts, fewer revisions, and an overall “this is what you get” approach.
I think given the choice, any new client will choose to have the best results in terms of quality. If it’s an existing client who needs fast turnaround for a deliverable, chances are they trust your work by now.
So in conclusion, the struggle continues. I encourage designers to take a stand and eliminate one of the three choices, as dear as they may be.
datahandling
i hate doing work that is slow and cheap. cheap work stretched out over a long period demotivates me and usually winds up costing me more.
Nice article, thanks.
@ John Ek… good point. If I’m putting work out there, regardless of how obscure it is, its still has my name on it, and I’ve had to battle what is more important to me as a business and a person. Sometimes its a struggle to want to genuinely help people in their projects, but you can just tell this isn’t the kind of work you really should be spending your time on. Maybe I just need to take more time finding great reliable references that want to do the kind of work I don’t want to, so then I can at least help by point them in the right direction.
I come across this pricing structure daily as I run a professional website design company. Many clients don’t understand in the world of design that time is money and faster = more expensive or crappier work. We’ve just recently began charging higher to clients who want rush jobs and it seems that people have been pretty accepting of this idea, as long as we explain why an entire DB website in one week is going to cost them double the price.
Very interesting article. Grat job there, Jacob…
Great article, thanks!
Great article,
a perfect formula i always have troubles setting a good price for clients.
i’ll diffently use this.
Thanks
It’s possible to do Fast, Good, AND Cheap so long as you limit the scope of what you’re working on.
Very succinct!
At the moment I have a client that is in the “good & cheap” shelf … had to explain to them (as you described ) that although I will do a quality job for the price they’re paying that I won’t be able to do any “rush” jobs as this will cost them more. It’s good to be a little flexible w. clients, but not so much that it undermines your worth as a designer.
Great post! I remember this method being used in one of Berney Mac’s episode when they remodeled the house. They showed a triangle that had cheap, good, and fast. Pretty nifty!
I’ve seen the concept before; however, this is still an excellent to-the-point article.
Thanks!
Well my problem is when the client settled for fast and cheap and lo! and behold here I am scrambling and still desperately seeking help for something that ultimately requires a lot more than just customized php which never was my best skill.
I guess shame on me for not consulting with a more experienced developer before taking on this project to have a better understanding of the scope. Yet again the freelancer gets sucked in the loophole.
I believe that this wonderful formula (and it really is a good formula for a lot of instances) should not cover your entire list of services. Sometimes there is no other way but slow and expensive and of quality.
You simply can’t sell a used Lamborghini for $400 down and $30 per month.