An Interior Designer on Consulting Fees

Sorry, this article is kind of interesting for it's view of another industry, but as a long-time consultant I didn't see any particularly useful tips/advice. The anecdotes are fun, but they don't really tell you how to handle some of the common concerns that come up around fees.

With respect to price objections, for example, the advice seems to be "refer to their own business practices, and don't show them the wholesale price." That's not going to take you very far. The comment that "making money is not a dirty word" is valid, but doesn't tell you how to talk to your client. Better advice would be:

* Explain to the client how you arrived at your cost estimate or fee - often they just want to know that it wasn't made up out of thin air. If you tell them it represents 6 weeks of design, code, test, and deployment support, they will understand better.

* Clients are often comparing your price to what they think it would cost them if they were using an employee. But they don't have that employee (or an employee with the necessary knowledge/skills). Explain to them that it there is a cost to having your resources/skills "on tap" for when they need it.

* Always be prepared to lose a job to preserve your fees. Once you give a "discount" it will be hard to get back to full price. If you think your price is fair, be prepared to suggest that they talk to some other consultants. You should have a good idea of whether your rates are high or low compared to the competition. I have even gone so far as to suggest other companies that a client could talk to, referring to them as "the cheap option" and "the expensive option."

She's in a totally different industry, but the things interior designer Maria Killam talk about transfer neatly to software consulting. She also talks about handling price objections and presents a very good value sell.