Some designers have 500 followers, some 5K, some 50K.

And the designers who have fewer followers often think that they are losing the projects because they are not one of the “famous” ones on design X.

I assume you are one of them.

No big following.

No photo on a conference stage.

No former-Apple, former-facebook designer badge in the bio.

So, when your ideal clients browse X to find their designer, you assume they’re comparing you with a designer who have all of that going on for them, you assume you’ve already lost the client to them.

Then you do what most designers do.

You either start tweeting viral crap to gain following that doesn’t bring clients or you go back to the portfolio to redesign for the 100th time.

Because you think that’s what costing you clients, right?

Well, it isn’t.

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Assuming you are good at what you do, most clients cannot tell the difference between your work and the famous name’s work. They’re not designers. They don’t judge craft as you do.

What they judge though is how you make them feel from the very first message.

More than once in my career, I had prospect telling me they were deciding between me and a designer you’d all recognise. Big following, conference talks, the lot and that they chose to go with me.

Not because my work was better. I wish!

But because;

• I replied fast.

• I smiled.

• I assured them.

• I was relaxed.

• I was not trying to sell but help.

• I asked real questions about their business.

• I challenged them when something didn’t make sense.

• I treated their project like the most important one I had. And I did think of it that way, every time.

Or simply saying

“Oykun, I like your vibe : )”

I also had a lot of clients came over from a “famous” designer with subscription model serving 20+ clients as solo. Even though client was somewhat happy with work, they felt neglected.

This is what most designers miss. Communication isn’t the thing you do around the design work, it is the thing that brings you the work!

Remember;

Now, time to be honest with yourself; The last project -you think- you lost to a “bigger” name, or to any other designer, was it really the design that lost it?

Leave a comment

See you tomorrow,

@Oykun

“Designers earning $100K, $500K, $1M are just lucky, I’m not!”

I hear this from designers more often that you would think. Perhaps you said it too.

And you know what? You are right. We are incredibly lucky!
We get all the clients, all the high budget projects, all the …
They just fall into our laps.
What a “luck”!

Now, let me give you the honest picture of how we see it;

Luck isn’t a lottery ticket, regardless how terribly you want it to be.
It’s a “probability”, and you influence that probability positively or negatively every single day with what you “choose” to do.

- Scrolling X for 2+ hours.
- Binging another episode from a Netflix show, then another, then...
- Playing another run through the same game you’ve already finished before, for hours.
All of that is you turning your luck down.

+ Emailing a founder you actually respect.
+ Posting a designin your category, every day.
+ Showing up to the meet-up you don’t feel like going to.
All of that is you turning your luck up.

Same day. Same 24 hours. Different activities.

You have to accept that; No designer started earning $100K, $500K, $1M out of pure/effortless luck. They got it because;

Btw, I’m not suggesting; do not play games, do not watch Netflix, enjoy them, I do too, but in moderation, after the activities that moves my business forward is done. As a reward, not as an escape from what needs to be done!

Every content you post,
Every connection you make,
Every meet up you attend,
Every hand you shake,
Every email you reply instantly,
Every …

is you increasing your “luck“.

In the end, your luck is your choice, you can keep sitting around and waiting to be “lucky”.
Or you can go increase your odds.

What I did/do to be “lucky”?

• I left my home town and moved to a country with more opportunities.

• I said yes to every opportunity to meet new people, despite being a hopeless introvert.

• I designed everything, never treating any work as beneath me.

• I posted a design a day for more than a year, no missing a day!

• I’m writing this issue for the 8th day in a row with the goal of 100 days.

• I connected with 1+ new founder a day for years.

• I …

I do not mean to compare you with me or anyone else you would call “lucky“. I just want to give you the deeper picture, the sacrifices, the work lucky ones do, every damn day!

So, when was the last time you did something to turn your luck up?

Not about making it but being smart with it.

There is sooooooo much to cover on this topic actually, from saving to investing, budgeting, expenses management and more… Thats’s why I have a dedicated in-depth Finance Module for it in the Six-Figure Designer Programme.

I want to keep it super simple in this first newsletter on the topic and save you a huge headache and anxiety that hits freelance designers in January ( for most places).

Yes I’m talking about the big T!
TAX

Usually this is how it goes;

1. You get a project for, let’s say, $4K

2. You deliver the work, money hits your personal account, because you don’t have a separate business account.

3. You open your bank app, and see you are +$4K richer.

4. Olalalaaa! You say “okay, now i deserve that Apple Display.“ $2K, easy, you see $4K after all and you “need” to design, right?! done.

5. Then you see a fancy notebook on X, $50, you “need” to plan your work after all. you buy it,

6. OOhhh what about that watch you wanted. Only $300. done.

7. Oh look Apple released a new iPhone, you “need” one, $1K. done

8. Let’s go to that new fancy restaurant for dinner, $200. easy

9. You know what, I really want …

You see where it goes.

I can hear some of you;

Then my friend, I’m sorry to inform you that you must be living above your means. You are living in a house, driving a car, using furnitures that you can not afford, yet.

No judgement btw, I' been there!!

Sorry for the bearer of the bad news, but you know what comes next.

The tax season, $20K, $40K, $400K, depending on your income. The higher the income, the higher rate hits!

You open your bank account to pay, NIL! Zero! Uh!!! Just enough to pay the bills, always!

Then you call the tax office, IRS, HMRC, … to discuss a payment plan.
Horror! That anxiety you go through!! Daaaammnn!!!! Maybe that anxiety stopped you doing the call completely, and you are just paying quietly, with crazy added interest!

Ouch!!

You promise yourself that, you will NOT repeat the mistake in the new year. Yet, the same cycle happens over and over again.

*

So, enough of that stress. I will give you the simplest tactic to never experience that anxiety again.

Nothing magical, nothing new, nothing you didn’t think of before.

Common sense really.

As we all know though; Common sense is NOT common practice.

Ok, here it is;

First of all, create a separate a bank account for your business. It doesnt have to be a true “Business“ account if you are not even qualified for that. You can just create a separate personal account to only use for business income and expenses. More on that in another newsletter issue.

You can automate that with any bank.

Why 50%?

Think of it like that 100% money belongs to 3 people;

1. Your current self

2. Your future self

3. The Tax-man!

Your selfish current self wants to spend it all. When the time comes for your future-self and tax-man to take their cut, they see $0 balance! Can you blame them for getting upset at you?

You have to understand and accept that!!!

That $4K money client sent you was never all yours!

I know. it is so daaaamnnnn hard pill to swallow! But it is what it is.

If you worked full time as an employee before, you know the tax-man already got his cut from your salary before it landed in your bank. Not any more. You are the employer now as a freelancer and agency owner.

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I hear you again, saying;

First of all, again, it means you are living above your means, but lets put that aside for a moment,

then I’d remind you the Parkinson's law, which says

“Work expands to fill the available time"“

The same applies to Money as well.

Give your self $4K to spend a month, you will spend $4K a month.

Give your self $2K to spend a month, you will spend $2K a month.

and here is the part nobody believes until experiencing it; your life will NOT feel drastically different. You will still eat out, still buy the thing, still go away for the weekend.

You will just, somehow, fit into the smaller number without noticing.

Trust me, your future-self will thank you for thinking of him/her. reflecting back on a tweet I shared not long ago.

*

I can go on and on but I need to stop!

I can not express strongly enough how important for you to be smart with your money!

I have seen too many designers earning $500K+, always stressing about money and too many with peace of mind, living happily with $90K.

It is not really so much about how much you earn, but how much you keep/how smart you are with it.

Btw, I say 50% just to keep it simple.

Usually 25% to 40% goes to tax-man, and you invest rest for your future-self.

You can lower that to 40% based on your tax situation. but i like the simplicity of saying “half of it is not mine to spend“

That mindset impact many different areas from how you structure your offer to how you negotiate with clients, and more…

OK ok! again I’m going down the rabbit hole. To be continued in the future issues.

So,

Are you saving a portion of your money as it comes?

If you do, how much do you?

If you do not, what makes you not to?

Leave a comment

To your richer future-self with peace of mind, my designer friend.

See you tomorrow,

@Oykun

How do I find new clients?

For some reason, always chasing new new new new neeeeew clients!

Most designers see a completed project as a dead contact. Done deal. Move onto the next one, a “new” one.

I’m going to assume you are one of them. I want to introduce you a new mindset here.

Forget about NEW!

Remember;

It’s so damn hard to build that trio with strangers.

First you gotta make them aware of your existence by creating content, reaching out them, asking around, running ads, …

Then you gotta build rapport with them via various converstions.

Then you prove your competence, show evidence with confidence and build trust.

Then work happens!

Sometimes all these happens at once, sometimes not.

For someone who has a lot of public proof, experience and network, it comes easier then others, but it is rare.

So why chase that every single time?! it is exhausting!

Share

In the Six-Figure Designer Programme , we start with leveraging the past connections first.

We call it “Warm List“. People you already have “warm“ relationships with.

Think about it; Why trying to go through all that trio as the first point of action.

With you Warm List you already established that.

They “know” you, since literally you know of them and they know of you.

They “like“ you enough, since they gave you their contact details.

They “trust“ you, assuming you did business in the past, referring to past clients.

You already have all these established with these people, why not leverage that.

These people can be

• past clients

• colleagues

• family

• friends

• people who follow you on social media

• …

Anyone who already knows of you.

You start there! Not chasing new people.

Some of my recent best clients came from the connections I did a decade ago.

*

Now I bet some of you are thinking “so Oykun, referrals?!”
Nope!

Referral is them doing the work.

You finish a project, you ask “know anyone?”, they say “sure!”, and then nothing. You wait. You hope they remember you in 6 months when their mate needs a website. They won’t. They have their own life.

Warm list is YOU doing the work.

Nobody has to remember you because you never let them forget about you.

And it’s not just past clients. Your old colleague can’t “refer” you, but she just became head of product somewhere and has a budget.

The founder who liked three of your posts can’t refer you either, until you message him and he says “actually, we’re rebuilding onboarding next month”.

Warm list is something you own, you run!

So,

“How do I find new clients?” is the wrong question until you run your warm list.

The right one is “how do I make sure the people who already know me never forget me?”

Answer that now!

Do you have a list? When did you last message someone on it?

Leave a comment

See you tomorrow,

@Oykun

Then, you go on Twitter and see all these designers posting photos of their fancy houses, Porsches, trips, Rolexes, 1st class flights, … (I’m guilty of sharing some of them as well!)

You wonder how they are earning all that money.

They must be getting so many projects, right?!

They must be really good at what they do, right?!

They look soooooo happy. What a beautiful, stress-free life.

You want that!

OK, let me tell you how and at what cost!

Share

There are 2 ways for you to earn more $$$ as a designer.

1. Earn $ from more clients

2. Earn more $$$ from fewer clients

That’s it!

There is no 3rd way (with 1 exception that I explain below)

You either get more clients paying you an average $ amount, or you make each client worth more $$$.

These are 2 separate lives and 2 separate businesses.

As a designer who has been consistently earning six, seven figures with design for the past 25+ years, I want to give you an insight to both.

Subscribe now

01 Earn $ from more clients

This is the most common approach you see on Design Twitter. Most of those “landing page” designers fits into this approach.

With this approach, clients tend to be with you for a short period of time. A landing page, an intro video, a funding deck, …

You do the work, handover and done, on to the next client.

Ideally you’d be productising your service and operations to deliver these. Similar production line to a McDonalds branch.

You’d charging average rates that most small businesses can afford.

Since these clients stay with you shorter period of time, you need to constantly be bringing new clients in the door.

Big focus and investment on “Marketing” in needed to make this work!

To attract more clients; You would be

• creating content, every day

• spending $$ in ads to reach new clients

• doing outreach via email, DMs, phone calls…

• and more…

Since you are playing the numbers-game with this approach and you are only 1 person, you’d need more designers to help you to deliver for the higher number of clients and projects.

The higher number of staff means, higher number of ops, salaries, tax, software cost, hardware cost, …. people management challenges, keeping the quality high, the list goes on…

Not easy.

Stressful in its way.

02 Earn more $$$ from fewer clients

This is the approach some senior designers you see on Twitter take.

Here you have fewer number of higher profile clients.

You usually cover longer term work in multiple areas from marketing website design to iOS, Web app, branding, deck designs. Whatever the client needs.

You truly are a “Design Partner”.

These clients tend to stay with you longer, for months, even years.

So you do not need to constantly chase and bring new clients in the door as you’d with the 1st approach.

Yes you still can do that. You still can choose to get higher number of large scope projects, then you build a proper design business like Pentagram, Metalab, etc. but then you are no longer a designer really, and most designers reading this newsletter are not after that. ("this is the exception I mentioned: the approach to turn it into a real firm, and stop being a designer")

You can easily earn multi six figures with only 2-3 clients at a time with this approach.

There were periods in my life, especially when we had our first born, I had only 1 client at a time for the year with taking months break in between and still earned multi six figures.

For this to work, you need to constantly upgrade your client profile and skills and network and rate…

Since you are dealing with higher profile clients who are ready to pay you the 5x 10x market rate, they keep you accountable for the results.

Especially if you are working with certain industries with strict regulations like Finance, Banking, Healthcare, etc.

If you mess it up, the consequences become higher/tougher!

Not easy.

Stressful in its way.

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As you can see, both approaches has it’s pros and cons. I wanted to give you a bit of challenges side as well since you do not see designers those on Twitter.

And for a good reason, since they need to present themselves as “I’m in control!” to the potential clients on the platform.

There is no right or wrong approach here.

You can be happy and earn multi six-figures income with both approaches.

The choice comes down to what kind of life and business you want.

As a designer who experienced both, I tend to lean more towards to the 2nd approach of earning $$$ from fewer clients.

I always appreciated the deeper connections I built with my clients, turned friends.

I always appreciated the deeper design challenges I get to put my teeth into to solve with clients-turned-friends.

I find it more rewarding and easier to manage as a solo designer.

There are many more detailed to each approaches of course, but I wanted to keep it short to give you a high level idea. If you want more in-depth info in any of them, let me know in the comments.

*

OK. So, which one you are leaning more towards?

Are you already facing some of those challenges?

Reply to the email or comment below. Happy to give you my honest answers. Either way, best of luck. You got this!

- @Oykun

You see all those Design Twitter Celebs, posting stripe screenshots of millions of dollars income.

They keep saying;

Just post your work and clients will find you.

Sure. That works, but that recipe is missing a big chunk.

Plus that approach takes a while for you build the audience & reach to start attracting clients.

I do not want to focus on that on this letter, on the next one perhaps.

*

I want to give you a simple tactic you can do NOW to find a client NOW as a designer.

It is gonna sound so simple and dumb and obvious,

yet every time I share this, it turns out that surprising number of designers have never thought of this.

Ok enough teasing, here it is.

or just click the link below;

https://x.com/search?q=looking%20for%20designer&src=typed_query

That’s it.

I promise, I’m not mocking you :D

You do not even need to do any fancy advanced search trickery.

Put it in your daily todo list and check this religiously every morning/afternoon/evening.

it just goes on and on, endless!!!

Share

now what you are NOT doing is;
being one of the herd and dropping your forgettable reply of

No!

You will actually dedicate ~20mins to create a personalised reply.

You will look at their bio → find their website → redesign their logo or website header or anything of theirs or one of their clients if it is an agency

or if you have portfolio in their business category, you will curate your portfolio with relevant pieces and send them

or better record a quick loom video introducing yourself and show your portfolio and what you designed for them.

or …

be creative!
be resourceful!

Stand out from the crowd of vast majority of designers who just leave their portfolio link.

If you are thinking

lets be honest! that’s the procrastination talking!

what else do you have to do?! probably gonna be doomscrolling twitter or watch youtube videos or …

remember the letter from 2 days ago

Designer Mindset

Choose your difficult

Another Monday, another week you are wondering where your next client will come from, if any…

Read more

7 days ago · 2 likes · @Oykun

So, stop procrastinating and waiting “easy” to save you. That does not exists!

Now, go and do that search to find your next client ; )

I know this works! I have been sharing this tactic in the designermindset.net community for years.

Many many designers in the community found clients with this.

Now it is your turn.

if you ever need help closing, negotiating the clients you find this way or another, you know where to find me ;) at Designer Mindset Community (for FREE)

See you tomorrow.

@oykun

why?

A difficult partner on a client project costed me a lot of hours.

Not difficult work.
Just a difficult person to work with.

And it is okay. It is part of the job, especially working with large teams, there is always that someone : )

Someone who is actually good at what he does.

But today i realised again how important being easy to work with is.

It does not matter how good of a designer you are.
If working with you feels painful/unpleasent,
you will not have a sustainable future in this business.

Very few clients hires you twice for your skills alone.
Vast majority rehire the designer who was good and was fun/easy to work with.

Most of my clients lasts over a year. some multiple years.
You know what makes them stay with me that long?
Not being the best designer alive. I wish! : )

But,
Being someone they never had to manage,
never had to chase,
never had to complain,
never had to …

Being someone they respect,
have fun conversation,
feels relaxed with,
…

Remember;
On every project you are building 2 things;
1. the product,
2. the memory of what it feels like working with you.

The first one gets you paid $$$.
The second one gets you the NEXT project, the NEXT month,
and the referral,
and the retainer,
and the career.,
and the …

Your portfolio, your talent gets you recognised.
Being easy to work with gets you hired,
and keeps you there.

*

So sit with this question tonight, honestly;
when clients finish a call with you,
do they feel lighter, or heavier?
do they smile, or curse?

Because I assure you, somewhere right now,
a less talented designer is winning your ideal future clients,
simply by being a pleasure to work with.

Don’t let that be the reason!

See you tomorrow

You worry even though you know exactly what you need to do to get clients coming in;

You need to;

1. define your category

2. create a list of potential clients in that category

3. create content/designs in that category

4. make yourself visible to your potential clients with reach and attract activities.

That’s it!

You already know that you need to do these, consistently, for weeks, months…

And you start doing them for a day, two, …
Day 3 comes in and you still don’t have a client,

It gets difficult to keep going, because

- it is a “boring” work,
- you are bad at it and it take you hours because it is new to you
- you don’t see results as fast as you wish to see
- …

You realise this is more difficult than you expected, so you are looking for excuses to go back to the familiar difficulties you are comfortable with;

- not knowing if you can get a client this week
- stressing about if you can make the rent/mortgage payment this month
- feeling down for not being able to arrange that family holiday to beach
- …

*

What an absurd situation, isn’t it?!

Yes, networking and creating content every day is difficult!

So is not knowing where your next client comes from.
So is not knowing if you can pay the bills this month.
So is not knowing whether you can afford the family holiday this summer.
So is not knowing ….

STOP waiting for “easy“ to arrive and solve your business/life problems.

It does not exist!

Take the control into your hands and choose your difficult.

I don’t know about you, my fellow designer friend,

but I will take the difficulty of
writing this newsletter every day,
connecting with my potential clients every day,
creating content to attract clients every day,
logging my numbers to improve my activities every day,
doing anything and everything in my power to grow my business every day

over the difficulty of
worrying whether I can take care of my family!

So, one last time,

Nothing worthy is easy,
Choose your difficult!

See you tomorrow

@Oykun

*

it is so much more easier to do the activities with others going through to the same challenges as you are.

that’s what we do in the designer mindset mastery programme, 18 designers supporting, learning from one another every day.

join us today. let's make the difficult feel easy together.

You are receiving this email because at some point in recent years, you subscribed to one of my newsletters.

You may have forgotten me as it has been nearly 2 years since my last newsletter. I was busy with scaling my design agency Crucial.Design and designer community DesignerMindset.net where I share everything about how I scale my design agency while living my dream life.

This is the 1st article of the new series I’m starting to help you earn some serious cash with your designs.

Ok enough introduction and reminders!

*

Let me make a wild guess about your situation;
You are good at design,
You are working damn hard,
You mastered figma, framer, whatever it is you use

Yet;
You struggle to get clients,
You are hardly getting paid anything when you do,
You are always stressed about bills,
You don’t know when the next client will come or from where

You think, you need to get even better in Figma and create flashier designs,
Maybe you use AI to create and nature backgrounds and animation,
So you do, you work even harder, longer hours
You get close to the burnout

and still the same! hardly getting clients and hardly earning enough to survive.

OK, here is the problem my friend;
Over the years you kept sharpening your design skills,
One tutorial after another,
One software after another,
One design trick after another,
because you thought, you are a “Designer”, so the better you are at design, the more you will earn

Well, that’s only the half the story.
I have seen too many amazing designers struggling to earn enough money to survive,
and I have seen too many average designers earning $100K, $500K, $1M a year.

The difference is not the design skills,
but the Design Business Skills.

But, nobody taught you anything about these business side of design I speak of,
How you get/attract clients,
How you charge five six figures for each projects,
How you position yourself in the market,
How you ...
How you become the version of yourself who run a sustainable design business that earns you your dream life.

That’s what we are going to be covering in these series.
There is a lot to cover in the coming days,
I’m going to give away everything via this newsletter!

*

What I want you to do today is to sit with this idea, even if it hurts!

Your hard work in figma and good design skills got you this far,
It won’t take you to your dream future on its own.
Business skills will!
and yes they can be learned, same as the design was.

Do not fear though, I will walk the whole road with you

See you tomorrow

Yes, you can already call yourself a “Designer”
Everybody in this world is a designer.
What you want to be is an “Excellent Designer”.
To become that;

Explore!
Do not worry about specialising. You will have time for that.
Take whatever comes your path in design.
Find out what you are good at, what you are terrible at, what you enjoy/hate doing...
You will discover who you are and what you have to offer.

As you explore, build lifelong relationships with people.
Make friends with clients,
Care for them, care for their business,
You will never be alone in your life-long journey with design.

Don’t be lazy!
Don’t sit around and wait for people to give you work.
Do not be satisfied with the bare minimum to save the day.
Go above and beyond. Show what you can do, first to yourself!
Make the most of the opportunities you have for the moment.

Move your head out of your screen!
The answer to being an exceptional designer is not all in the pixels you move around.
It’s rather in the world out there.
Go out, see a musical, get lost in a museum, try surfing, try new things.
As you expand your experiences, you will notice the way you see design will evolve for the better.

Read!
Not as in moving your eyes over the letters, but looking through them. Study them!
Not only design books but philosophy, architecture, science, history, fiction, nonfiction...Expand your mind’s horizon.
Design is everywhere, fed by everything. Read them.

Don’t worry about good design when you first start!
Just design! Accumulate as many ideas, techniques, styles, approaches, art movements as you can.
Your creativity will harmonise them with your self-being.
It will guide you to your unique sense in design.

Learn the rules.
Not to follow them. To know what, when and how to break them.
Be brave, make your own rules.
Explore and see what you can do with design.

Grow tough skin!
This world will be brutal at times.
People will rip your design apart, change it, reject it.
Don’t let this process discourage you.
Take these moments as opportunities for your growth.

Earn!
Don’t shy away from earning with design. It is not an insult to your craft.
Design gives so much to people and businesses, do not undervalue your contribution.
Cherish the endless possibilities Design has to offer, earn from them.

Years will pass…
If you do these and more, you'll find yourself in high places.
The imposter syndrome will kick in, you will question your abilities.
Don’t give away to that inner voice!
Look back at the years you put in the hard work with passion and the relationships you've built.
Acknowledge that your journey brought you there and you deserve it! Own it!
Stay humble though and hungry, forever…
There is always more to learn in design. This is a lifelong journey.

Remember,
Some days will be tough, some easy. You will need to do things you do not enjoy.
Accept the design with everything it has to offer with ups and downs.
When you stand back, take a moment and look at the big picture, you will see a beautiful life.

Never ever forget!
There is more to design than the pixels you see on your screen.
Develop your confidence, communication, negotiation, your human skills.

I’ve every faith in you!
You will have an amazing, rich, satisfying life with Design.

With Love
Oykun

Understandable concerns with the common fixed mindset.

However, if you want to grow as a Designer, you must be comfortable with losing the wrong type of clients who demand cheap and low-quality designs. 

You need to level up and attract the right kind of clients. Type of clients who 
- value design
- value quality
- are easy to work with
- pay premium $$$ 

By charging higher rates, you are signalling to potential clients that you offer a level of expertise, professionalism and dedication that sets you apart from the competition.

Important detail though; I'm not suggesting you charge more if your design doesn't deliver it. You need to master your skills first. After all, higher-value clients who pay premium $$$ will often come with a certain level of risk and expect higher quality work to lower that business risk.

Don't let this stress you though.
Since you are charging higher $$$ now, you are able to dedicate
- more time
- more focus
- more care
- more resources
and this will influence the outcome of your work positively.

By charging more, you are enabling yourself to deliver higher-quality work, as a positive consequence.

By charging more, you are not helping only yourself with higher income, but your client with a higher quality of work.

By charging more, you are attracting the right type of clients who value design and trust your advice.

By charging more, you are becoming a better designer due to the environment it gives you.

By charging more ... 

It is a win-win situation for you and your clients! 

Charge More $$$! 

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We are deep-diving into such ideas via live events and workshops in the DesignerMindset.net community. You don't have to go through this by yourself. You can grow with like-minded designers and experts.

With Love
Oykun

I have been designing for many years now and my one-man freelance design business has generated income in millions of dollars. It is not because I’ve worked more hours, on the contrary, each year I've worked fewer hours while earning more. How?

Price for the value, not for the hour!

What is Value?

Businesses greatly value time, the longer they are off the business, the longer they won’t be making revenue. So with this logic, the sooner they go live, the sooner they start making revenue. Now, reflecting this to your hourly pricing, the fewer hours you put into your work, the less it costs to the client. Wait! There is a conflict here! How come something so valuable to the client would cost less?

Let’s change the logic here.

The fewer hours you take to deliver your work,
The less time it takes your client’s business to go live and start generating revenue,
And what is enabling this is your efficient delivery.
That’s the VALUE!

The shorter it takes (without sacrificing the quality), the more valuable it is. Not the other way around.

✋ I want to be careful with what I say here though. I do not mean to rush or work long hours to finish your work quicker.

OK, so how do you finish something quicker without overworking or sacrificing quality?

Experience! The more experience you have, the more you can make educated decisions in your design. That’s how I have been increasing my rate with every project and earning more while working fewer hours.

What your client pays is not really the 1-hour work you do at the technical level, but the 10 hours of work done in 1 hour backed with years of experience, based on educated design and business decisions, the time you save for your client and the value you give to your client’s business.

What if I don’t have the experience?

There is always someone out there with less experience than you have. It may not be the 10x rate at first for you with less experience, but at least 1,5x or 2x. Btw, there are many ways to position yourself as an expert, but this is a whole another 1000+ words article.

But how do you communicate that to clients?

Here is how a traditional conversation goes for an hourly rate. Of course, this is overly simplified, but the general flow is like this;

(C)lient: I need a website.

(D)esigner: OK, what is it for? what is the scope?

C: A website to sell my clothing products. How much do you charge for that?

D: OK, a typical e-commerce website. It usually takes 15-20 hours, and I charge $100 per hour. So between $1,500 to $2000.

C: OK, can you do $1k? (because there is always a negotiation)

D: Maybe, $1,200?

C: OK. Can you start today?

Here, the designer asks questions to understand the timeline, so he can make the magic calculation to find how much he can make from this project. Congratulations, you just punished your experience and greatly undervalued your design work.

The sooner your client goes live, the sooner they will start making $$$ revenue

Here is how a value-focused conversation goes:

C: I need a website.

D: OK, I have experience in that. May I first better understand why you need a website, please? What business do you need it for?

C: A website to sell my clothing products. How much do you charge for that?

D: OK, so we are talking about an e-commerce website. How do you currently sell your products? Do you have a physical store? (don't answer that how much $ question yet, you are trying to understand the value now)

C: Yes we have 2 stores in London. There is big interest from people around the world. That’s why we want to go online.

D: Awesome! Your product must be of high quality for such demand. What is the average price of your product? How many do you usually sell a year? (you are trying to understand the revenue model)(or you can directly ask based on the client) How much revenue does your business generate a year?

C: It averages between $1m to $2m.

D: Amazing job for running such a successful business! Do you know how your competition is doing with their online store? Having a reliable, high-quality online store would open your business to millions of potential customers with much greater revenue. It is important to have a digital market that reflects your personality, high-quality products, your attention to detail though...

C: Yes exactly! It is good to see you understand our concerns and goals! How much would it cost to design our online store?

D: (OK now you have a better idea about the client’s business, revenue, potential value, problems, concerns, so you start with a little assurance...) It is important e-commerce websites carry the personality of these physical stores, and it is important ...... I charge between $50k to $30k (for example, 5% of current revenue which is an even smaller amount comparing what the online store is going to bring to the revenue bucket).

C: It sounds a bit expensive. We do not have that kind of budget.

D: I understand. FYI, I’ve experience in this field, and I have faced and solved various problems in this area. The design I’m going to hand over is going to be

• time-efficient, so you will be able to start welcoming your new clients sooner.

• high quality, so it will reflect the quality of your products and gain the trust of your new visitors.

• reliable and easy to use, so your visitors will be able to easily find → add → purchase your products.

I’m offering efficiency, you will not have to go through many design revisions with me and certainly not worry about your online store’s quality. You will be able to focus your energy on your business goals.

C: Well, it all sounds great, but can we do £25k?(here client either agrees to your price or negotiates. But now you have a good starting number for the negotiation.)

What if the client doesn't want to see the value I add and insists on the low budget?

That's okay, you do not have to take every single project. You can kindly refer him to places where he can find designers for his budget. Your relationship with that client is not finished yet. There have been many occasions where such client has reached back to me after months, saying

"Hey Oykun, so we have found someone to do the job for $1k, it took 5 months and we are not happy with the result! Do you have any time now to help?"

Now, as you are pricing for the value, there will be some projects where you earn 5 figures and some 4 figures for a similar amount of work hours. The difference is the revenue and risk level of these businesses. The more risk, the more value.

There is a crucial matter here though!

You have to deliver what you promise!
This is not a manipulation tactic. This is a way for designers to better communicate their value and earn what they deserve. Because I have been there, I had many projects that I undervalued my work when I first started.

Don’t punish yourself and don't undervalue your work, your experience by starting client conversations with questions to understand the timeline for your hourly rate calculation. 

Instead, ask questions to understand the client, business goals, competition, problems, the VALUE and offer your solution based on that, not on your hour.