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Yesterday I had this crazy idea: People pay me $15, I make them a web design

designfor15bucks.com

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Re: Yesterday I had this crazy idea: People pay me $15, I make them a web design

#111

Post by wccrawford »

calloc wrote: post #66
wccrawford wrote: post #24

I just started a new blog and wanted a nice design for it. $15 is definitely a good price, if it's a decent design. (Note that I said 'decent' and not 'outstanding'. I know what design is really worth.) But without some samples, it feels like I'm just throwing away $15.

For $15 you can test the waters. How much do you make in an hour? How long will it take you to design your own web site? In other words, is it worth the $15 gamble to see if someone can come up with something to blow you away?

No, I don't think it is. I could give random people $15 all year long and still not end up with a decent site.

Now, someone who has a history of decent-looking sites is a good gamble.

And it is a gamble, since he says it's non-refundable and no changes can be made.

Re: Yesterday I had this crazy idea: People pay me $15, I make them a web design

#112

Post by Aqua_Geek »

notyourwork wrote: post #100
jacquesm wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Brazil a $ goes a bit further than in the US.

Can we quantify "a bit"? How much further?

I spent 2 years in the greater São Paulo area ('05-'07). The exchange rate went from about 2.7 Reais : 1 USD when I got there to about 2.1 when I left.

I lived in an apartment off the beach in Praia Grande for a few months. Rent was about R$650 (~$300 US) for a little 2 bedroom.

I met a number of people who lived on less than R$300/mo (granted, that was in some of the poorer areas).

Lunch in the financial district (where I spent about a year) was ~R$10 (for a pretty good lunch - chicken, rice, vegetables, and a drink). Most American fast food restaurants, however, had prices comparable to the US (McDonald's dollar menu items were about R$2.50, it was R$30 for a pizza at Pizza Hut, etc).

Re: Yesterday I had this crazy idea: People pay me $15, I make them a web design

#113

Post by wesgarrison »

crocowhile wrote: post #72
jonknee wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That requires you to maintain a mail server of your own and everything that comes with that. I prefer to have pagers go off at Google's HQ instead of mine when something happens. What features are you using in Gmail that I'm not getting in Google Apps? I have priority inbox and all the latest Labs experiments. I haven't heard of anything I'm missing.

As I said, I closed down my google apps account a few months ago because things were missing or they arrived later compared to the regular gmail, so I don't know what you may be missing right now. Also, if you have an android phone you cannot buy apps if you sign in only with your apps account, you must use a regular account. That is a PITA, believe me.

With the new multiple sign in, I use my gmail account as primary, then sign into my other two gApps accounts (personal, work). That way, all my analytics, web history, and such remain under my [primary] gmail account and I can still open multiple Gmails with different accounts in them.

I've found a little lag in gmail to apps features, but not long enough that I've worried about it.

Re: Yesterday I had this crazy idea: People pay me $15, I make them a web design

#114

Post by jordanlev »

Staydecent wrote: post #58

I'm wondering, as I'm not making any money (devoting time to a startup idea) right now, if anyone would be interested in a similar service for the markup? I'm really quite good and would charge $15/page. I can offer impressive turn around times and even CMS(WordPress) integration for an additional flat-fee($250?).

A service already exists for this -- http://psd2html.com . Not trying to dissuade you from doing it yourself, but you should take a look at them (I've used them in the past -- it's about $100-200 for basic pages, and was totally worth it as it saved me a few hours of work).

Re: Yesterday I had this crazy idea: People pay me $15, I make them a web design

#115

Post by rokhayakebe »

soren_dahl wrote: post #12
steveklabnik wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or portfolio building.

Please don't build a portfolio based on work you spent 2 hours or less on.

Interesting. Can you look at any logo or webpage and tell how long the designer spent on the mockup?

Re: Yesterday I had this crazy idea: People pay me $15, I make them a web design

#116

Post by Staydecent »

jordanlev wrote: post #114
Staydecent wrote: post #58

I'm wondering, as I'm not making any money (devoting time to a startup idea) right now, if anyone would be interested in a similar service for the markup? I'm really quite good and would charge $15/page. I can offer impressive turn around times and even CMS(WordPress) integration for an additional flat-fee($250?).

A service already exists for this -- http://psd2html.com . Not trying to dissuade you from doing it yourself, but you should take a look at them (I've used them in the past -- it's about $100-200 for basic pages, and was totally worth it as it saved me a few hours of work).

Good point, definitely aware. But, I have zero-overhead and am quit fast so $15/page is possible for me. And, of course it would be my intention to deliver equal quality work as those services.

Re: Yesterday I had this crazy idea: People pay me $15, I make them a web design

#117

Post by user24 »

Benjo wrote: post #73
user24 wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

but on the web, there is no street on which to see sites next to each other. I knew a jewellery company once which had two sites. One was all red and gold and stars and flashing things, the other was all purple and white and curvy things. The items on the purple posh looking one were 15% more expensive. Same products on each - heck, it was the same database, product description and images on each site! Point is, this…

Actually I think that street would be Google search results.

that's the obvious reply, but it fails for two reasons:

1) SERPs are not fixed; they vary from month to month, and even from day to day as new sites and pages appear and are added to the mix. This is akin to the houses on a street changing order frequently, and ruins the analogy

2) SERPs differ between terms - you and I might be adjacent for "cheap widgets" but for "budget widgets" the SERP might look entirely different. This is akin to shops having a million doors, each on different streets, and ruins the analogy.

Re: Yesterday I had this crazy idea: People pay me $15, I make them a web design

#119

Post by DavidBishop »

swombat wrote: post #3

Assuming it takes you at least 1-2 hours per design (and even with mad photoshop skillz it's unlikely it'd be much shorter than that), you're probably better off getting an office job somewhere, or even maybe a burger-flipping job. Given all the additional expenses of running your own business, this is probably not a viable business model (i.e. you will lose money on the whole). The only way this would be justified i…

I like the idea, and I believe you have a market, but your prices are too low. More importantly it won't scale with inflation. In 10 years, that $15 will be worth around $10 but you will have all SEO links pointing to a domain that is most likely in need of change (You are stuck with a particular price with the domain name you have now).

$15 is way too low. I don't know where you are located, but you need to do some market research to figure out what you want to make per hour, how long the average project will take you, how many projects you can do a week, and what your overhead is per week (to figure overhead per project). Once you have those numbers, you will have a better price point.

Also, keep have a plan for what you want to do if there is more demand than you can support. Do you hire others? If so, will others work for that price and if so, how much do you need to make to pay them appropriately?

I hope above all you do not find my post discouraging. Instead, I hope you continue on with what you are doing, tweaking it to make is sustainable for as long as you wish to do it!

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