Was dead set against time tracking till I heard a podcast host say billable hours expose your true hourly rate

I always thought tracking hours was for people with micromanaging bosses. Then I caught an episode of The Honest Freelancer where the host said if you don't know your billable hours, you don't actually know your hourly rate. She broke down how a $500 project that takes 20 hours is really $25 an hour, not $500. That math hit me hard. I started using a simple timer last month and found out three of my regular gigs pay below minimum wage when I look at actual time. Now I've dropped two of those and replaced them with better paying work. Has anyone else been surprised by their real hourly rate after tracking?

3 comments

3 Comments

craig.parker4d ago

My buddy Mike did this for his graphic design side hustle and found out one client was paying him like $4 an hour because of all the revision rounds lol. He dumped them fast and now only takes gigs with capped revisions.

kevin_williams4d ago

Feel for your buddy Mike honestly. That creeping revision cycle is brutal, I've seen it tank so many side hustles. One round turns into five because the client suddenly wants a new color scheme and then decides they hate fonts they picked last week. Capped revisions are the only way to go, saved my own sanity when I started charging per extra round after the second one. Glad he dumped that nightmare client before they bled him dry completely.

river_thompson4d ago

Did your friend also get stuck with a client who kept changing fonts every 48 hours?