Q: A local company has asked me to write copy and provide ongoing marketing advice and direction. After our meeting today, she asked if I would give her a flat rate to cover six months of part-time hours that would include every aspect of my services (copywriting, creative, marketing advice, and ongoing consultation) instead of paying my a la carte fees for each service I provide. I can’t find anything that addresses this kind of arrangement. How should I handle this?
A: This is more like a long-term retainer. And these can be tricky. The key is to hammer out strict parameters in advance. As in, figure out how many hours per week you are committing to for a certain fee. If your hourly is, say, $75, then you might choose to give them a break on it given the big chunk of hours they’re offering. But say, it’s 10 hours a week that they want to get you for, then that’s 40 a month x whatever hourly rates you’ve chosen to go with. And you get paid that at the beginning of the month. And typically, you’ll get it even if they DON’T use all the hours they contracted for, but you’ll charge more if you go beyond that. If they balk, too bad. You can’t have an open-ended situation where they pay for X and get X+Y+Z, ad nauseum.
And to make everyone feel comfortable, you might suggest that you try it out for 1-2 months and see how it goes, with the option for either side to revisit the terms after the trial period.