I sent a quote with a number and nothing else. The client was right not to sign it

The email said, more or less: we've seen the quote, which comes to a significant amount, but we haven't seen any document explaining exactly what's behind that amount.

It arrived three days after we sent a quote for the new website of a small company in Girona that runs experiences for visitors.

They were right.

We had talked it through on the phone, yes. But what landed in their inbox was a link to sign and a number. And a number on its own, with nothing next to it, always looks expensive. Even when it isn't.

How to price a web project (when the number is the least of it)

Search Google for how to price a web project and almost everything says the same thing: count your hours, multiply by your rate, add a margin and a buffer for surprises.

That's fine. I do it too. Hours tell you the price below which you lose money.

But that's half the job, and it's the half the client never sees.

Clients don't buy hours. They buy what they'll be able to do next Monday that they can't do today. If the quote doesn't show them that, the number is left standing alone. And a number on its own can't defend itself.

A price with no explanation isn't expensive or cheap. It's a question you leave the client to answer alone.

The best part of that email was that it didn't stop at the complaint. It said what they wanted to know: what platform change we were proposing, what improvements they'd notice, whether there were optional features, and whether being more self-sufficient in managing the site would lower the maintenance fee.

Four questions. They had just written the table of contents of the quote we should have sent.

What we sent instead of a document

I replied the same day. I told them they were right: the document was missing. But instead of a PDF full of text, I sent something I think explains a price better: a link to a draft of how their website could look. With a big warning on it: the design is a rough draft, and we'd adjust it with them as we went.

And underneath, what they'd be able to do with it. In their words, not mine:

• Schedule an experience to close for bookings on a given day and time.
• Export the people booked on an experience to PDF or Excel.
• Check people in with a phone by scanning their QR ticket. Recommended, but optional.
• Cross-sell between experiences and products.
• See bookings clearly, without depending only on emails.

I also explained that it wouldn't be a closed tool but a custom build: we'd be moving them from WordPress with WooCommerce to something made for them. And I attached two screenshots: the loading speed of their current site and the kind of result we get with projects built this way.

Notice that none of this changes the work. It changes how much of the work the client can see.

What a web proposal should include (according to my mistakes)

There was a call. There was a revised quote. They asked whether maintenance would cost the same as they were paying already. And almost two months after the first quote went out, they accepted it.

The next day they were already sending us their calendar of experiences for next year, so it would be ready for Christmas bookings. That's the signal I like: when the client stops talking about the price and starts talking about their business.

So this is what I'd put in any web quote today, big or small:

• Something they can see. A draft, a screenshot, a sample page. Anything before a paragraph.
• What the client will be able to do, in their language. "Export attendees to Excel" makes sense. "User management module" doesn't.
• The optional parts, kept apart. So they can say no to one piece without saying no to everything.
• Maintenance, separate and explained. It's the first thing they ask about, so answer it first.
• Why that technology. No lecture needed. One reason they care about is enough.

And how much should you charge for a website? I don't think there's a right number in the abstract. Hours give you the floor. What the client will be able to do with it gives you the ceiling. And in between, I suspect what decides whether they sign isn't where you put the number, but whether they understand what they're paying for.

I've written before that nobody teaches you to charge what you're worth, and that flat fees are discounts in disguise. This is the other side of it: you can charge properly and still not sell, if the price arrives without context. Even more so when the project is leaving WordPress for something custom, because the client compares your number with what they once paid for a template.

The client didn't ask me for a lower price. They asked me to explain the one I'd given them.

That's a huge difference. And I should have seen it before they did.

P.S. If you're a client and you get a quote that's just a number, do what they did. Ask what's behind it. Anyone who knows what they're selling will be able to tell you.