Lorraine Thompson has a great post up about the pros and cons of long-term projects on her Market Copywriter blog. She does a great job showing it from both sides.
We talked a bit in her comments section about the other issue with long-term projects: payment. It’s not about making sure to get it, but moreover when you’ll get paid. Sometimes a project, even one you know is going to take a while, stretches on endlessly in front of you. Having had that happen to me twice (one project went on for two years), I now include specific payment dates in my contracts. Here’s how it works:
Ask for a portion of the payment due up front. If you’re charging per hour, figure ahead of time your expected final price. Cut that into thirds and bill the first third at contract signing. That gives you some financial cushion should this project monopolize enough time that you can’t take on more projects.
Set a midway point. Forget about page count or word count – set a calendar date. If the client expects the project to take about four months, set your invoice date for the two-month mark. Again, put it in writing.
Set a clearly-defined expected delivery date. Again, if this is a projected four-month project, bill that final installment at four months out. This does one of two things – it secures the payment you’re due up to that point, and it helps keep your clients’ eyes on deadlines. You’re only as fast as their responses to your edits sometimes.
Spell out any final payment arrangements. Sure, the project ended in May, but here you are, toughing it out in October. If the clients have been paying you hourly, then it’s not outside of reason for them to pay you on a monthly basis any additional work you need to complete beyond that deadline – that is if you’re not billing in lump sums and the additional work wasn’t already part of your original contracted total.
Some quick notes: Make sure whatever payment arrangement you have includes limits to your time invested or else is billable at an hourly rate. I had one heinous project that was expected to last two months. It lasted ten. I lost plenty of money on it as the contract was a flat fee with no maximum hours attached. The simple solution: quote your flat fee and the maximum rate that applies to, and add that any additional hours worked will be billed hourly and invoiced monthly. If the client balks, offer to renegotiate once the maximum hours are reached.
What’s your worst payment arrangement? Any particular nightmares you’ve had in terms of collecting on a long, drawn-out project?
Once I knew I'd picked up a bad payer, and once I knew they wanted me enough, I negotiated a deal in 3 parts – 1 part on contract; 1 part on delivery; 1 part on publication. Worked well enough for me for quite a few years, and if they didn't pay the 3rd part, they didn't get the next contract.
LOVE it, Diane! At that point, you wield the bulk of the negotiating power. Great idea!
Also, define clearly what constitutes "revision." I have two rounds of revisions included in my initial quote, with additional revisions billed at either my hourly or per page rate.
But clients will sometimes say, "oh, that was just a TWEAK. It wasn't a REVISION.'
You've got to define terms clearly. And put the late fee and the dates those kick in into the initial agreement.
Great idea on the revision definition, Devon. It's true – a lot of them will think changing a few sentences isn't really a revision. Sure it is. I think also it's important to spell out that a revision does not equate to a complete rewrite.
I would have to second what Devon mentioned. My biggest mistake was offering free edits or revisions, but I didn't clarify what those would be. I assumed minor little changes, but one client took advantage of that.
Needless to say, I have never made that mistake again.
Yes, I do what Devon says, two revisions, sometimes three and after that we go to hourly.
For truly big projects I'll take a third or even a quarter… more recently, in an attempt to get clients to do their end I've started asking for monthly payments… take the total value and divide it by the number of months… great for smoothing out cash flow too.
Super idea, Anne! I love the idea of billing it out monthly. It's also an indication of whether your client intends to pay you without an argument.