Should I discount my website design

Hi, my name is Dan. In this video, we're going to be talking about discounting. 

Now, when you're new to web design, if you're watching this video, and you probably are, it's going to be really hard to price your first few jobs. 

Now, I've said my pricing is around the $2000 mark, and there are some clients that either just can't afford it, or it might be a family, or relative, or it's just somebody-- you're desperate for work. It happens to me. There's times I've got loads to work on, and there's loads of times that I don't.

Say my rate is $2000, and I know a friend here who can't afford it, so what you don't do-- what a lot of people do is they start discounting in their head. They start thinking, "Okay, he can't afford this, or he's a friend," so it can't happen, and I know I need the price to be lower. What you need to do is, you need to tell your friend that it is $2000 normally, and you can discount him, because he's a friend, because he's starting off, and you can say, “Look, I'm going to do it for $500, or $200, or $50, but normally it costs me this.” 

What ends up happening is, in your friend's head, he's like, “I'm paying top dollar, and I should be able to demand whatever I like,” and in your head, you're thinking, “Jeez, friend, I gave you a big discount, you shouldn't be so demanding,” but all that happens in your head. 

You need to make sure that your friend knows that this is what it normally costs, that this is what the sweet deal that you've given to him, so that the perceived value-- there's a lot of value in perceived value; like buying a hotel room. If you went to The Hilton, and you got a room for-- a $700 room for $250, when you tell your friend, you don't tell your friend you had a $250 room, you tell him it was a $700 suite room you had, and you don't explain that you got it on lastminute.com, or what if, for a lot cheaper deal, so-- you need to tell him that these are your prices, and you can kind of discount within them.

Now, the big thing to not do is to do it for free. Now, to do it for free, I'm virtually, even if-- say it's your-- say it's anybody; friends, family, anybody, or charity. Free, nobody sees value in free, unfortunately. I've done so many free jobs where it ends up being a really painful situation, because you're doing a lot of work, thinking out of the goodness of your heart, and asking them-- because it's a two-way, this is a two-person job, you need him as a client, and that needs to supply things, they need to supply logos, and images, and copy potentially, but if you're doing it for free, they don't see the value in that, and you end up in this awkward situation, where you've done all this work, and they stops replying to emails, and you end up seeing them again, and you've got this website half finished, they haven't really seen the deal, so it's kind of-- even if it's anything, it's a box of beers, it's something that there's a bit of a transaction, so that—

I don't get started until I get half my right up front, so it kind of qualifies people. Even if it's Mildred, and it's just a jar of jam. If she still can't be bothered giving me the jar of jam to get it started; it's a really good indication. It's a nice idea that she wants to do it, but she's not going to get around to all the things that come along with building websites. So, free is bad.