Proper way to increase gig price?

[lbenterprises]

Hi there,

first of all, let me explain my current situation.

I am still new in the logo design category and trying to build my brand. Therefore, money isn’t my priority. But somehow, I feel like the nominal price of 5$ is kinda low and I’d feel way more comfortable with say at least 10$.

The problem is, I have a really loyal customer who tends to come back every now and then, is satisfied with the service and leaves positive ratings. I don’t want to lose that client in any case, as my priority is to build an excellent rating over gaining money.

However, I feel like (and again, I know this is normal) I am doing way too much than what it’s normally expected to receive for $5. I believe, all beginners were here in the first place.

I want to know if it’s better to:
A) increase the starting price to 10$ and inform him about it or
B) ask for tip if he’s content with the service I’m providing (probably not directly, but putting it out in the delivery message I’m sending in a subtle way)
C) do nothing and focus on my priority

Thanks and looking forward to hear your honest opinion,
Lupe.

[uxreview]

Hi Lupe,

I wouldn’t recommend increasing your price for your basic gig, but you can make source files and high-resolution copy into gig extras. Most designers go that way.

[lbenterprises]

Hi Lupe,

I wouldn’t recommend increasing your price for your basic gig, but you can make source files and high-resolution copy into gig extras. Most designers go that way.

Well yes, I have them as gig extras, but I offer them in my basic package as I am still new with less than 10 reviews.

I plan to gradually decrease the amount of work I am offering (source files, high resolution, revisions, etc…) as I get more reviews, so I guess I should stick to that plan?

[uxreview]

Well yes, I have them as gig extras, but I offer them in my basic package as I am still new with less than 10 reviews.

I plan to gradually decrease the amount of work I am offering (source files, high resolution, revisions, etc…) as I get more reviews, so I guess I should stick to that plan?

Yep. You can try out offering packages and what not, but with only 6 reviews you should have $5 gig option available.

[lbenterprises]

Thanks for your input. I appreciate it.

[gina_riley2]

Here is what happened to me with one of my sellers.

I was a regular customer who purchased a gig + extra + tip = 3 times the basic gig price.

He decided to raise his prices and never notified me of it. The new price was twice the budget I had planned, which meant no tip and no extra (the extra price was also raised). He did great work - but I could not afford him anymore. I was forced to find someone else. It took awhile, but I found two other seller’s who were equally great at the same price.

My advice, go ahead and raise your price but let your regulars know ahead of time. I’m not a fan of spam messages, but in this case, I would not consider it a spam. If you think price is a factor, let him know that as a long time regular customer, you are willing to work with him. Tell him you will send a custom offer for the old price whenever he is ready to order again. Make sure you phrase it correctly, otherwise, he may think it’s a “forever” offer.

[nzrajput]

It’s totally up to you. If you feel that you are doing worth more than $5, then be confident and ask for more money. In the beginning, everyone started with $5 gig to gain reviews and clients. However, as the time passes, you should increase your gig price, or cut down the package that you offer in $5. Since you are new, I would suggest you to cut down the package until you make 10 sales i.e Level 1 Seller.

Regarding that repeat customer, let him know that you are planning to raise your price. If he is okay with it, that’s good for you. Otherwise, you can always discuss the best deal for him. He isn’t going to raise your price on his own. You can also offer him to work for $5.

I am a seller, but I have been in buyer’s shoes as well. Therefore, I suggest you to don’t ask for tip. It comes out as begging for money. IF your work is worth it, you will be tipped. I am saying this from personal experience.

I hope it helps.

[dion]

Hi @lbenterprises

It’s crucial to focus on your product and process in these early days, weeks, months and years as increasing your rates will come naturally after you essentially ‘prove it’ to the buyer in the Fiverr marketplace. In the design category, having a portfolio of well crafted design is only a portion of the presentation as people want to see a trail of aunthetic feedback coupled with a substantial amount of positive ratings to support what you’re offering.

When I started out back in 2010, there was no easy way to tier a design offering, so you had to be SUPER descriptive in your gigs detail and instruction prompts. I think we had the same 1200 character count then (or it may have been even less) to describe EVERYTHING. This isn’t the case now as beginners have the ability to concisely layer services so that they meet higher pricing margins right off the bat. This means that for $5 your buyer receives SOME of the ingredients of a complete logo. You must then think carefully about all you can offer in the formation of a complete logo to price gainfully and competitively.

As for your new/faithful clientele… Simply reach out to them and communicate the changes. You can have a custom order option for them if you’d like, but over time I’ve observed that when you offer great value to your buyers, most of them won’t mind when you increase your rates. There will be some that continue to search the marketplace for lower pricing margins that meet their budget (and that’s okay), but this will be the exception and not the rule.

So long as you provide a great experience and excellent worth to your buyers, you don’t have to fret about asking for tips or losing clientele, because in the long run your service will speak for itself and you’ll reach a point where you’ll receive extra rewards and can price your offerings based on the apparent value that your gig provides the marketplace.

[miiila]

I would leave the starting price at 5$, but reduce what you´ll do for that.

Admittedly I´m a bit biased and flexible with my prices, which works, because almost all my return customers don´t order a gig directly anyway but ask for a custom offer, if your regular does that too, you could tell them you raised your prices, but offer them as a regular customer a special rate (either once to make them aware of the new pricing but in a nice way or generally you could devise your new prices so that you can still give a kind of rebated rate to regulars, while still getting somewhere close you want or need to be).

I´d rather drop down dead than asking for a tip, personally. 😉

[djgodknows]

Plenty of great recommendations above, so I’ll keep mine short and to the point.

IF YOU TRULY desire increasing your price and you think that’s in the best interest for you, then go ahead and do so. This is YOUR business, and you will best understand from testing the waters.

As for the regular customers, this is the best and most simple thing to do with your current status.

Notify them of your price increase, but also tag in that you will still offer them their original pricing via “CUSTOM OFFER” of the relative gigs. So ask them to contact you before an order so you can send them the custom gig with the original price.

Good Luck 👍

[mzie88]

I can relate to what you are talking about. Sometimes i work for hours over a $5 Logo because i always want to deliver the best. I started early December 2016 and i’m a level 1 Seller. At this point my target is to get as much reviews as i can and earn level 2. If it means working a lot for $4 pay , I’m willing to do so because i know what’s ahead in the future.

Your gigs and services must really standout and be really convincing for a buyer to choose to pay $10 over $5 offered by thousands of Logo designers.

Here is my advice, make use of the buyer requests and when a buyer picks you to do their logo, try as much as you can, in a professional way to convince them to buy an extra, or if you have another gig for a different service like business cards , mockups, etc, you can make an offer and provide the two for $10.

[selfors]

lbenterprises, when I raised the price of one of my gigs from $5 to $10, I sent a message to one of my favorite repeat customers telling him about the change. I invited him to request a quote at the original price promising that, for him, I would always honor it. Of course he doesn’t request that. Instead he orders at the new price. Which helps explain why he’s a favorite customer. 🙂

[zeus777]

I raised my price after working at Fiverr for maybe 2 years?
I did notify my regulars about the price change.
Most of them were cool with it, in fact they told me it was about time, others told me
I was being “greedy.” Duh, yeah right.

I waited until I felt like I had enough reviews and good ratings where new buyers will see me
as a reliable seller. If your work is good, the buyers will understand and will be more than happy to pay. You MIGHT lose some buyers, but you can’t make everyone happy.

Raise the price? Yes, absolutely.
Just be sure to let your regulars know, and maybe look for the right timing.

[miiila]

I commented already, but since this popped up in my list, I thought I´d elaborate a bit, since it´s Sunday and the forum has this great search function and this probably is a question many sellers face at one point or other.

I actually had to raise the prices at one point, simply because I was getting too many orders with my low ‘entry-prices’ and I couldn´t work till 2 am every night. 😉 but it´s difficult of course especially when you have regular buyers, then again, anyone who can think, knows that prices for everything go up all the time, and sellers do have to live as well.
If the quality of the work matches or exceeds the price, it should not be too big a problem, I did get less orders after I raised my prices from my initial ‘I am new and want to see if this fiverr thing works at all’-prices, but I´m not less busy.
I did ‘split’ my initial gig though, when I adjusted my prices, and didn´t raise them for some kinds of translations as much as for the other kind, which really reflects the situation ‘in real life’ as well, also my preferences. 😉

I think Zeus’ approach makes sense if you have a lot of regular buyers, or high volume buyers though.
If someone books a 5 $ gig 3 times a year though, I don´t think it really warrants to actively contact them, which could be seen as ‘spam’, only to tell them that 5 $ now gets them only 200 words instead of 250, but it all depends a bit I guess.
Some buyers might appreciate that, personally I think I´d prefer to not get a message, but would just check the gig again when I want to book next time, will see the new price and think to myself, 'yeah, they are right, who can work for 2,50$ (or whatever remains after fees, taxes and health insurance) actually, this is still much cheaper than ‘out there’ 😉 and hit the order button. Or of course I might think 'yeah they are right, but sadly this is over my budget now, I´ll have to find someone else. Which is okay.

If I’d buy regularly and at least one or several times a month or high volume, then again I’d probably appreciate the seller informing me about the price change, because then I guess I might not check the gig description/how many x I get for y$.

Most of my gigs, especially those with high wordcount, are booked per custom order anyway though, so usually buyers should be aware of the price before they book and I quote them the prices for the exact wordcount too, so they won´t pay for 2x1000 words by booking 2x the 1000 word gig, when they only got 1750 words etc.

It all depends on a few things, and reading all these opinions and approaches should help everyone a bit to figure out the optimal way of dealing with the issue for themselves. And lastly, ‘optimal’ as in ‘as good as it can be’, there are no 100% right or proper or wrong ways to do this, I think.

[jhallawalla]

I’m a Logo Designer as well and i think a real logo costs way more than $5 or $10 but since you are still new i’d recommand you to wait and increase the price of your Extras, Once you achieve 400+500 reviews with a very good overall rating you might want to change price, On that level people will buy from you seeing your experience and expertise in related service,Moreover i believe all new sellers need REVIEWS in their initial time of freelance career, Review is the only thing that attracts other buyers and they are for forever here. So you might know that the volume of sales will decrease if you add +$5 extra to your basic gig. Sometimes i buy services from fiverr so i search mainly for the people providing real stuff for $5 and YES i always check their Negative reviews, They are sometimes very informative and buyers feedback to Negative reviews is extremely valuable for avoiding future problems and confusion.

[mjakkerman]

I actually lowered my prices a bit temporarily and it appears that my old clients pay the old rate.

[matteo_7355]

I think a lot of people that have cheaper gigs ($5) will get bulk orders.

However people with more expensive gigs ($10+) will tend to get not as many orders but more regular customers.

Thats what has happened in my experience and I know a few people that have told me this.

Great post by the way!

Matteo 😃

[lbenterprises]

I think a lot of people that have cheaper gigs ($5) will get bulk orders.

However people with more expensive gigs ($10+) will tend to get not as many orders but more regular customers.

Thats what has happened in my experience and I know a few people that have told me this.

Great post by the way!

Matteo 😃

I almost forgot that I’ve started this topic, my bad. Will have to spend more time around after this wonderful feedback. Thanks to all for that.

Meanwhile, I’ve created a separate gig where I am testing the waters with a 10$ minimum gig and 2 other packages which cost around 30$ and 50$.

I will certainly lower down the extras in the near future because to be honest the value that I provide for 5$ is huge and some people can’t appreciate even that. I mean come on, design takes time. I know punctuality is key, but if I say I’ll deliver in 2 days it doesn’t necessarily mean it’s 100% accurate and then I get 1 star review for not keeping my word.

I resolved this issue once (last week) only to have another customer share the same opinion this week. For what? Five bucks. But this is a different topic, I might open up a different rant. 🙂

Anyways, thanks again. I appreciate each and everyone’s advice on this matter.

Lupe

[animexstudios5r]

I almost forgot that I’ve started this topic, my bad. Will have to spend more time around after this wonderful feedback. Thanks to all for that.

Meanwhile, I’ve created a separate gig where I am testing the waters with a 10$ minimum gig and 2 other packages which cost around 30$ and 50$.

I will certainly lower down the extras in the near future because to be honest the value that I provide for 5$ is huge and some people can’t appreciate even that. I mean come on, design takes time. I know punctuality is key, but if I say I’ll deliver in 2 days it doesn’t necessarily mean it’s 100% accurate and then I get 1 star review for not keeping my word.

I resolved this issue once (last week) only to have another customer share the same opinion this week. For what? Five bucks. But this is a different topic, I might open up a different rant. 🙂

Anyways, thanks again. I appreciate each and everyone’s advice on this matter.

Lupe

I mean come on, design takes time. I know punctuality is key, but if I say I’ll deliver in 2 days it doesn’t necessarily mean it’s 100% accurate and then I get 1 star review for not keeping my word.

Design takes time, yes, but if one promises 2 days, it necessarily means 2 days. If one thinks it will take more time then he/she should increase delivery time right at the start. Or at the very least inform the buyer in advance that the delivery can be a bit late.