baz watkins

Go niche, choose a business or technical area you can add value too, the more specialist you go the more you can (in most respects) charge, or the higher you can charge up to your chosen market / skill's price ceiling. For example, a developer friend of mine concentrates on working for and with dental practices, and has built the skills and understanding needed to meet the needs of his clients. Once you find your niche you can also go beyond time based pricing and look at value based pricing, it can be hard to get a grasp of, but if you specialise in one particular area and have a portfolio and the conversation to back it up, you will appeal to those looking for that type of skill and that client will usually value your input more as they are paying for the benefits your knowledge and experience can bring. For the most part clients want a service provider who understands their pain and can take it away. Generalists have their place, but it's a very crowded marketplace and prices have for the most part have been going down as the market has become more disrupted. If you can find a niche you can build your own audience, there will be less tyre kickers, and you'll earn based on your specialised knowledge of that niche.

Here's my place of residence, a bit cleaner than normal tho...

Hi all, I want to remotely acces my localhost for when I'm with clients, so I can showcase work at that point in time. I'm pretty certain it can be done, but I need to know which is the best method? Thanks, B.

Ok, how about this...

Ok, so this will be hopefully less octopusy, more headphoney. Built up the cans and the padding, and altered the font size and kerning. Baz.

Thanks for your feedback and advice, I like your site too. ;-)

Thanks for the quick reply, the reason I asked was due to my old logo designer giving notice, I want to step up and do the designs in the future, so I'm on a steep learning curve with regards designing them. I too do websites, but thats easy to price based on my business rate, but this logo has taken 3 hours in real terms, or £75, but I think it defines a market so succinctly that you could charge a lot more...hence my q on app price.

Yep, I like it, still not sure if it's good enough to be classed as a logo, but for my purposes I spose it's ok. Just a quick thought though, what price would you attach to it, based on final outcome?

Ok, headphones all black...

Ok, based on the feedback so far, here's the amendment. Ive reshaped the headphones slightly, removed the x and lost the colours. As for the font, I'm yet to find one I prefer in place of comfortaa. Anyway, let me know what you think. Thanks, Baz.

Hi all, I'm new to logo design, so I'm using Fireworks instead of proper design tools. But I was hoping to get a bit of feedback on my mix site logo...if you would be so kind. Thanks in advance, Baz W.

Hi all, Just to stop me second guessing myself, can you please spend a little of your valuable time reading through a few of my webpages. The design is a template, so I apologise in advance for that fact, but at this moment in time I'm much more interested in the flow of the content i.e. enough calls to action, points of interest etc. Anyway, a little help on the way it reads would be of a great help. The linky poo...

Thanks for your honesty.

Hi all, Just a quick question, you get a prospective client call you wanting a price. The request is for: 1. A 5 page Joomla website with a contact form. 2. Copy and image editing (Owners own). 3. On-site seo and minor template customisation. How much would you charge, and would you quote be based on a job rate or fixed hourly rate and if so how many hours/days would you take to deliver? This is just a hypothetical query to find out the differences of cost between designers when confronted by a fairly straightforward job. Thanks, B.

Have made some changes based on the feedback given. I hope it's better now.

Hi all, New business website, just gone live. It has a few changes still to do, 404's and 301's etc and and a repair needed on the index.php file, but otherwise all done. It's an heavily amended joomspirit template (Joomla), so I don't want to claim all the work as my own, but I think it looks cool. Open to your views, good or bad. Thanks, B. My site: http://www.create-enable.com/ The original template: http://www.joomspirit.com/template-joomla/template_18/

Hi all, Just a bunch of questions, feel free to answer them as best you can. Take on master status and give forth your advice to all the newbie designers of the world. Q1. Should web designers display their prices? Yes / No, please explain your decision. Q2. What price is too cheap or too expensive for web design? Please explain why. Q3. What is a good starting hourly rate for a web designer, a good mid level one, and a good top level rate? Please explain your reasoning. Q4. Should building a website with a CMS such as Joomla or Wordpress be more expensive? If so, why? Q5. Is the use of CMS templates cheating or a better use of time and resources over bespoke design? Q6. How can you define value in what is now considered to be an overpopulated market? Q7. Do web designers believe they are special and should be paid accordingly, or is that arrogance on their part? Q8. Does the customer understand the value of a web designer? If yes or no, please explain your thinking. Q9. Should web design prices be regulated and frameworked to skill level and qualifications, so customers can better define the designers ability? Q10. In the end do web designers charge what they want or what the industry dictates? That's it, 10 loaded questions. Maybe if a post like this existed when I was starting it would have saved a few months of hand wringing about what to do, what to charge etc. Thanks, B.

I expect it would be based on your hourly rate vs the number of quoted hours per design. I'd factor your rate into my agency rate and go from there. I have no idea as to how long a logo design takes from initial client conversation to design example through to completition, so any price would be dependant on the designers ability to deliver to the time quoted to the client.

Hi all, I'm repositioning my business to become a small digital agency as the lower cost web design market seems to be full of sharks and 12 year olds who can charge £60 for a website. Part of this repositioning is being done so I can offer a wider range of services, and I was wondering if anyone out there could recomend a logo / branding designer who would want to work as a freelancer under the umbrella of my small firm. Basically I want to offer a logo and branding design service. I have all the ideas but none of the technical skill, so I am looking for someone to provide the service on my behalf. If you know of anyone who can provide a quality service, I need to know their / your rates and speed of delivery. Who ever I give this too must be reliable, as a small, very new, and very poor company I cannot afford a bad rep, so reliability is very much the equal of ability in this instance. If this request is successful, the key person will be named on the website as the designer, so I will also require work examples to display. Also if the designer has web design experience that will be a major plus, especially in bespoke design and Wordpress (I have Joomla covered). I need a freelancer because in all honesty I have no idea if the service will take off, so a freelancer who isn't reliant on this for income suits me as I can't guarantee any money. I also know that at this moment in time small design firms are tanking, so a freelancer who has independant income leaves me in the position of offer a service which then only becomes active when a call comes through. This request may be to fanciful I know, but any recomendations would be of a benefit. The new website will be live before the end of May, and if you go to my current website, please ignore it, the new one is a heck of a lot better in design, message and focus. Thanks in advance, Baz. My link

Hi all, Just in the process of building a new business website and my mind turned to logo's and stuff, so here's my first go at 2 simple designs. You're thoughts would be welcome. Thanks, Baz.

I had just got used to v1.5, but v1.6 is a nightmare. Nothing makes sense, it all too complicated for my little brain. Maybe its time to jump to Drupal and Wordpress. If I'm going to have to start my learning again, maybe it should be on a different CMS. Aaargh. B.

Stock images work best for a few reasons: 1. They are legally available and made for the public domain. 2. Who the hell wants to see real people on a website, maintain the illusion, sell the dream. On another note i use bigstockphoto, as they seem to be better priced than the others. Baz.

Hi all, Just a few quick questions, in no particular order, answer if you wish, allthough it would be cool to know your answers: How many web design jobs do you get on average a month? What are the biggest client issues you have to face on a regular basis i.e. price, timeline etc? What is your main source of clients e.g. google, word of mouth, ppc etc? Have you ever cold called businesses to get work? How many prospective clients do you turn down? Are you worried about your future work prospects, and why? Are your prices limiting or enhancing your work prospects? At what price does a website design become too cheap or too expensive? Have you had to diversify or specialise to stay in business, if so how? How many hours do you work in a week - billable against non billable? If you could change anything about your life as a web designer what would it be? Would you do something else if you could? Thanks in advance, all the best, Baz Watkins.

Hi all, I want to learn Magento, and I was wondering if anyone has had any experience of using it on Localhost via Xampp? As far as I've researched, it can be done, but has problems, so if anyone has been able to use it without problems, I'd love to know how. Thanks in advance, B.

I run with templates (Stated on my packages), as I'm not a qualified web designer, I prefer the term website builder, as its basically what I do. But I believe that by offering package options, with limits to scope I can target all budgets. So a basic website wil cost £160 to £395 with various limits attached, a small to mid level business site will cost £800+, and a pro website will be £1,400+, both open ended. Prices are calculated as a page rate for the cheap option, and an hourly and time to completition rate for the other two. That way hopefully I cater for most markets. www.create-enable.com