After doing websites professionally since 1998 but only for friends I went full-time this past January of 2007 and pricing has become a major issue in generating both quality leads and inking contracts to the point where I am going to have to restructure my rates and terms and conditions.

Every client needs at least some sort of beginning ballpark figure even if it's just for a simple single landing page and they want a hundred page site eventually. This is why I have my "base rate" of a turnkey package for $395 for such a single page "business shingle" and anything other than that I quote (I always give a complete written quote with a full scope of work regardless).

The old rule in pricing consulting work of any kind I think applies still to webwork: if you need, say, $25 an hour takehome pay before taxes (call it $50K/year), you need to charge four times that or $100 per hour. This is because you have lots of unbillable time for marketing, collecting, research, etc. and that time has to be paid for somehow.

That said, I have had several clients absolutely freak when I mention that my base rate is $95 an hour ("my doctor/lawyer/plumber doesn't even charge that much!" is typical) so just as pure response to existing local marketing conditions, I am going to have to lower my base hourly rate just to keep the stickershock low.

In the end, though, since all work is quoted, exactly how much I charge for my work within my own internal accounting is irrelevant to the client, since all they care about is the bottomline cost and if they have confidence in me to give them what they want.

If I do, they're happy and they'll generate me new customers by word of mouth, if they're not happy then I could give them everything for free and they'd still be un-happy.