Are you charging enough for your audio work? Ryan Ike is back with more thoughts on pricing, and how to calculate if you're doing highly specialized audio work - at rates that are effectively below the minimum wage. Read on for his thoughts on setting the right price for your freelance audio work:
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After my thread (and post) about how game audio people (and freelancers in general) donโt charge enough, a lot of people responded with โI want to charge more, but I donโt know how to price myself.โ
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 Itโs easy, but you need to analyze your work, a thing lots of us donโt do. Iโll explain:
Most of us, especially if youโve been at this awhile, have a basic idea how long it takes to make X thing. โI can write a minute of finished music in a week working full time hours, less if itโs a genre Iโm comfy with, more if it requires lots of live playersโ Something like that.
As freelancers, weโre charging for our skillset, but even more so, weโre charging for our time. And a TON of us forget to take this into account when we set our rates on a new project.
If you sign on to write a full sized indie game soundtrack, (letโs say roughly 45 minutes of music), break it down. How long does it take you to write a 3-4 minute track? Or a minute of music? What about edits and revisions?
Yes, this is tricky and not an exact science, and every project differs based on the working dynamic, the type of work, etc. But just ball park it.
In most cases, youโll find youโre charging not nearly enough for the amount of work youโre set up to do
Once you have an estimate on how much of your time this will take, charge based on THAT.
In most cases, youโll find youโre charging not nearly enough for the amount of work youโre set up to do. If I charged $20,000 for the above example and it takes me roughly a week to write 1 min of music, thatโs 20k over 45 weeks at BEST.
If we do a little math on that, that works out to roughly 11 dollars an hour if Iโm putting in a full 40 hour workweek each week. Thatโs way under minimum wage here in Seattle, and a lot of other places too.
And thatโs the really surprising thing Iโve learned by asking fellow audio folks to compare how much of their time theyโre providing VS what they get paid. An absolute ton of you arenโt even working for minimum wage. Youโre working for less.
I was chatting about this with a sound designer friend of mine who wanted to raise their rates, but wasnโt sure what to raise them to. I wonโt name them, but theyโve worked on some incredibly popular things youโve DEFINITELY heard of.
ME: Well, how long does it take you to make a sound asset, usually?
THEM: I mean, theyโre all different, but usually around 3 hours.
ME: Ok, and what do you charge?
THEM: $50 per file.
ME: So . . . like 17 bucks an hour?
THEM: โฆoh.
And again, this person is crazy talented and has already worked on some major franchises, and theyโre still barely charging over minimum wage where we live. And didnโt even really realize it, because weโre not used to thinking of our work in terms of time spent.
Game audio is far, far from a minimum wage-level job. The amount of time and practice required to get good, the cost of building a studio space and having the right gear/software, going to cons to network and stay in business, itโs HUGE.
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Yet so many of you charge barely more than what youโd get paid if you worked at Starbucks. And not that working there is bad, of course, but it doesnโt require years of practice and thousands of dollars in gear to be employed there.
So, the next time youโre figuring out the finances of a new gig, think how much an hour of your time as a creative professional SHOULD be worth. 50 bucks? 60? More (typically, yes, more).
Break down the amount of work, figure out how long itโll take you, and charge accordingly.
And it doesnโt matter if you prefer to charge clients based on X amount per track or asset, X amount for the whole project, or if you actually just bill based on how many hours you worked. But base X on how much time youโll spend, and how you value that time.
โข How to Set (and Get) the Right Price for Your Audio Work
โข 10 Essential Tips for Game Audio Freelancers
โข How to be a successful sound designer โ with Scott Gershin
โข 5 Useful Tips for Upcoming Sound Designers and Sound Editors
โข Building a successful audio post studio โ with Kate Finan and Jeff Shiffman
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โข The โQuit Aspiringโ book โ by Adam Croft
โข Applying for a job in game audio โ by Matthew Florianz
โข Freelance Game Audio: Getting Started and finding work โ by Ashton Morris
โข Yet Another Game Audio Hiring Article โ by Ariel Gross
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โข Hand-picked audio jobs on Soundlister
โข Get the weekly Audio Jobs newsletter
โข Join the Audio Jobs Facebook group
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โข Get a free profile on Soundlister
โข Upload your demos to Soundcloud
โข Upload your demos to ReelCrafter
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โข Find game audio community groups around the world
โข Find interesting audio events around the world
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โข Get an audio mentor at the Audio Mentoring Project
โข Read the 100s of sound stories and guides here on the A Sound Effect blog (search for stories here)
โข Browse Industry Data: Game Music and Sound Design Salary Survey Results
Ryan Ike is a composer and sound designer based in Seattle, WA, with work spanning games like Gunpoint, West of Loathing, and Where the Water Tastes Like Wine. Outside of making audio, he spends his time trying to help newcomers find their place in the game industry, and is passionate about making sure that game audio pros (and creatives in general) are getting the pay and respect they deserve. You can listen to his work here
