⁉ How to properly price my gig?

[xuntes]

Hello,

I often see sellers asking how to price their gigs, or even complaining about the 20% fiverr cut.

It is really simple to fix this.

Steps:

1. First calculate the total of ALL your expenses working directly 1h. It’s not always precise, but you must have an idea. For example: Energy, Internet, Softwares Licenses, Paid sites, signatures, rent, in other words, everything that impacts on the expenses to deliver a gig. Lets say it would cost $5 for 1 hour worked.
   -Most of these costs are different between the countries/areas. So you must have an idea about all these costs.

2. After all your expenses are calculated, now calculate how much you would like, or do you think it would be fair to earn, cleanly, in 1 hour working. Let’s pretend it would be $10 per hour.
   -Know that this price must be realistic within the category of the service offered. If you don’t know, start researching for this.

3. After all costs and how much you pretend to earn per hour worked, you just need to sum both number and it’s done, so it would be $15 for our example, right? WROOOOONG! There still is the fiverr 20% cut.
   Now you must multiply all this by 1.25. BUT Why this number??? Simple, fiverr keeps 20%, and you will get 80%. When you multiply 80% by 1.25, you will get back to 100%.
   So, $15 x 1.25 = $18.75. Since you cant set this price (only multiples of $5), I would suggest to charge $20 per worked hour.

"So that’s all, right?" WROOOOONG again. The price of $20 mentioned is per hour worked, not necessarily the price of your gig. So if you want properly price your gig, you must calculate the average time you take to start working 1 order, till deliver it, knowing this, you can properly set up a price for your gig.
Let’s pretend we take 30 min per gig, but our hourly rate is $20, then simple set the price of your gig to $10.

Of course your can generate more earning with your gig extras, but you must be reasonable. You MUST add value to the delivered extras ordered, or buyer wont simply order it.

What was mentioned above isn’t a rule, but it can help your decision on pricing a gig. If you undercharge your gig you may have losses instead earnings, and if you overcharge your gig you may not have the right amount of buyers necessary to your “freelancing life”. You must balance both sides.

I hope it helps.

Thank you,
Rafael.

[jmills]

Thank you for the information. It just enforces some of the things I need to consider

[mahfuzazahan]

thanks for your information

[wpazim]

Thank you for the information

[akbakash]

Thanks a lot for your information.

[misscrystal]

It’s not something complicated. Keep it low as possible if you need reviews, only $5 or $10. Keep it there a couple of years until you build your reputation. You can have a few higher priced gigs also.

Only try moving your prices up once you have established yourself, through reviews, as a great seller. Remember this may take a year or more.

If you try moving your prices higher without those reviews you may get some sales or you may find your sales stop. It costs nothing to try a few different prices to see what happens.

[sk_sajib]

Thanks for the instruction…

[xuntes]

As a newbie, should I make my price higher?

why would you do this?

being a new seller, with low reputation, making your prices higher wont make you sell more your gigs.

[cecylinares]

I was actually wondering if the total price of your product would be reduced by Fiverr, thanks for sharing the percentage.

I think its ok to start with low prices, but as a question… how much is the average “low price” for someone new to the site and as an artist? $5? $10? Because the most difficult part for a newby its to stablish the base price.

[xuntes]

For new starters the best way to set a price is the lowest possible price, to attract more buyers, ONLY! Because you could probably be “paying to work”, instead “earn to work”. Maybe we could call this as “investment”.

But it must be reasonable. This strategy only works to attract buyers, nothing else. Because there is no other meaning in paying to work.

Also, the price depends a lot on the category you will offer your services It’s not an exact science. You must study your public and competitors.

[cecylinares]

Thank you so much for the advise!

[sumaiya_t2]

Thank you so much for the advise

[andrewbobiq]

I am completely new to Fiverr, but would like to add competition aspect of the price decision making process.

When I first went to create my gig, I did extensive competitor research of the niche I was about to work in.

At first, I really don’t expect to cover expenses or earn a “fair” hourly rate. There are sellers in my field that are Lvl 1/2 and I have to provide more value at a lower price to get those initial orders.
When I manage to establish myself in the field, I will definitely use the above suggested procedure for price calculation.

[freddyfiver1]

A good approach is to view yourself through a buyer’s eyes: they will select a handful of sellers to compare. This will be a balance of price against apparent quality. From there, the buyer forms a subjective view, like a hypothesis, and they place small orders to test which seller actually performs well.

After that, they can confirm if their hypothesis was correct, and they begin to get a true feel for the market value. It’s all determined by the current collection of sellers, not so much what YOU think you are worth.

If you think you are worth $100/hr, but after running a standard deviation analysis on the top 20 sellers in your category reveals they price themselves on average at $10 bucks, you will be ignored at $100. You will be seen as the overpriced seller who delivers diminishing returns. If the buyer, for example, paid $10 bucks and got decent service, they could pay double that at $20 and they likely would not get double the quality. So, what could they expect to receive at $100?

It’s at this point you must realize that you stand too far from the 2-sigma area of the curve. You are the outlier. To compete, you will have to bring your expectations closer to the current competitive price level. From there, with enough experience and diligent study, you can begin to see where you can expand your service level, and offer more value to buyers. This is how you can command higher prices.

The other side is to play on the typical marketing “hacks”, like perceived authority and being the seller with the most reviews, etc. Still, a buyer is not easily fooled. Vanity metrics have their place, but if everyone is flaunting them, the buyer grows tired and ignores them. Ultimately, real value must be discovered by the buyer through small and measured risks with a small group of sellers they believe can serve them.

I love mathematical formulas. But relegate them to 10% of your approach. The other 90% is common sense. Look at the market like a captain observing the vast panorama. Don’t look at your instrument panel (numbers) but the actual real environment and current conditions (market pressure and demand). Go from there.

That’s how I roll

[jessiana]

Thanks for your help.

[js_havilah]

Thank you so much

[chic_marketer]

Thanks for your premium information