2. Include your url (if you have a web site)

3. Brief description of your services

4. Use several different signatures - you will never know if your signature is working to its full potential if you don't test a few signatures out. Test out a signature for a few weeks and then try something different. Eventually after tweaking it for a while, you will find perfect signature for your business. You should also try using a different signature for different situations. For example, if you want to stress inexpensive to an individual that has a tight budget and then stress talented to another person.this is a good strategy.

Make sure to keep your signatures brief. I cannot stress this enough. Take this following example:

EX#2: John Doe (JohnDoe@deezin.com) You looking for an inexpensive web designer? Look no further.I work cheap.and I'm good! http://www.deezin.com/

In above example there is way too much text to sift thru. Noone will see your message, and your signature won't be effective. However with EX#1, you can't help but see "Inexpensive Web Design", reason for this is because signature is short and to point.

There is no other marketing technique that is as easy as utilizing signatures. Signatures are included in all of your emails without you even having to think about it. Taking advantage of signatures is essential and necessary. Good Luck!

Article submitted by http://www.Allfreelancework.com - 1000s of freelance jobs, articles, and resources.

Ask yourself following questions:

1. How much money do you want to make on this project?

2. How many hours do you want to work?

Now all you need to is Divide these two numbers. Its that simple, you now have your hourly rate.

FORMULA 3

Use following formula if you are interested on how to set rates for your entire business.

Add up all costs to run business on an annual basis (including profits) by annual hours (2,080). This will give to you your pay rate.

1. Salaries + Overhead = Annual Costs

2. Divide Annual Costs by Annual Hours

So For example, if following is true:

1. Salaries = $60,000

2. Overhead = $50,000

3. Annual Hours = 2,080

Then this is how you figure out hourly rate:

200,000 / 2,080 = $52

FORMULA 4 - PRICING BY ORDER FORM

This method is order form method. The reason I call it this is because you use an order form to add up all ingredients of project. This would be how you figure out how much to charge for your work. I don't recommend using this method unless you are only designing simple sites that all have same basic ingredients. Otherwise, there are too many variables to use an order form. Here is an example of an order form:

======================================================= Purchase Order # Customer # Company Name Domain Name Your Name Address State Zip Code Phone Number Fax Number Email Address

=======================================================

# of Pages

=======================================================

# of Photographs

=======================================================

# of Illustrations

=======================================================

# Custom-made Illustrations

=======================================================

# Custom-made Animation

=======================================================

# Forms

=======================================================

# Pages of Flash

=======================================================

# of Scripts (What Language)

=======================================================

Other

======================================================= | | TOTAL | | | | =======================================================

FORMULA 5 - ESTIMATION BY PROJECT

Most clients are going to want to hear how much entire project is going to cost. Even if you have an hourly rate already, probably this isn't going to be acceptable to your future clients. It takes practice but you are going to need to learn how to break projects into individual tasks in order to estimate how long project is going to take. Make sure to find out what responsibilities client expects you to take care of. If client expects you to do everything, then take this into account. If this is case break up project into following phases in your mind:

======================================================= TASKS # Hours ======================================================= Administrative

=======================================================

Purchase Server / Domain

=======================================================

Planning / Flow Charting

=======================================================

Storyboarding / Mockups

=======================================================

Optimize Images

=======================================================

HTML / Programming

=======================================================

Create Prototype

=======================================================

Testing

=======================================================

Make Site Live

======================================================= | | TOTAL | | | | =======================================================

Now Visualize how many hours you feel each stage of your project is going to take. Add up all of these hours.

Multiply your hourly rate (figured out from one of above formulas) by total estimated number of hours for project (from above). This amount would be how much you bid on project.

So For example, if following is true:

1. Hourly Rate = $30

2. Total Estimated Project Hours = 50

Then this is how you figure out how much to bid on a project:

$30 x 50 = $1,500

Make sure that your client is very clear on what scope of project is. You should write a clear contract to make sure that outline of project is written down in clear terms, otherwise client may take advantage of you.

The bottom line to your freelance business is that you want to make a good living. If your hourly rate seems too low then raise your rate till you feel comfortable with it. If several clients are way too eager to hire you as a freelancer, rethinking your hourly rate might be a good idea. On other hand, if clients are very interested in you at first and then stop communicating with you after they hear what your hourly rate is, then you need to lower your rates. In other words, feel customers out to see whether your fees are correct or not.

If you have determined that your fees are too high then you might need to lower your overhead in order to lower your fees. Try cutting some of your unnecessary expenses in order to make ends meet. When you make change over to freelancing, sometimes there is a little suffering at first. Don't worry; it doesn't usually last long if you know how to save when times are good.

Good Luck.

Article submitted by http://www.Allfreelancework.com - 1000s of freelance jobs, articles, and resources. Allfreelance is also host of creative portfolios.