client wants a store type website with a shopping cart? Need help

Hello i currently go to school as a computer programmer and I am learning ruby on rails. Currently i have a client that wants a website built with a shopping cart where customers can purchase different items and pair them together etc..

This is my first client therefore i am not sure how much to charge as well as this is my first project. Could you give me some insight on what would be appropriate to present as well as what i might need? Ex: hosting, domain, ideas for features...

Best Regards.

do you know wordpress? I would go with woocommerce, install wordpress and woocommerce and play around with it. That should be a good place to start. Yes you will need hosting, you must have hosting if you have clients right?

As oldwebs said, lots of Wordpress themes have all this Ecommerce structure built in and makes it easier on you and keeps you from having to build one from scratch. And most they look very professional and fully customizable!

these are easy to create they have custom shop themes on wordpress.

You can go to Wordpress or get help from other hosting firms. Wordpress may work well for you as it includes ecommerce and other options for you to build your site quickly . You can create your own also on programs like PHP as you are a programmer. However, I reccomend wordpress if you are in quick need.

Grats on your first client.

3 things you absolutely need to do:

1) grab a template contract for your services for client to sign before work starts. most people do 50% now, 50% upon delivery.
2) grab an invoice template and add the cost of domain, hosting, template, and your hourly rate for professional services.
3) host everything on your server until the client pays 100%. then move it to their server.

setting up a shopping cart (e-commerce) site is real easy. set up wordpress, install woo-commerce plugin. find a nice theme (themeforest, or the downloads section). configure all that needs to be configured and upload your clients products one by one.

a lot of starting designers are afraid to ask for what their worth. take what you're billing him and double it. remember you're providing professional services that will take many hours to do. you'll also likely be monitoring it and helping him with any problems that arise from now to forever. those monthly recurring invoices are nice to have.

There are several books out there on how to run your consultancy.

I've been doing it for almost 20 years, so here's how I still do this: I estimate my work time in hours. Multiply that by X per hour and that's my price.

By doing this, you keep your price coherent between customers.

I have friends who will look at the client's car, his watch, and then give them a price. As a result one guy pays 15000 and the other 800 bucks. When these two clients meet up and chat at the pub and the one who paid 15000 finds out, you are FUBAR until you can explain why he paid 20x more.

So to keep your price standard, charge by the hour, no matter how rich or poor your client is. As you gain experience you learn to estimate your hours better. In the first few projects you may come out at a loss, but then you learn how to estimate the number of hours.

Just my 2 cents.

I'm taking your advice thank you very much. Since i'm a student i'm charging 15$ an hour but i don't think it should take really that much so i was thinking of charging him a total of 200$. Do you think its reasonable. it's a webpage with an additional shopping cart for his business which im all going to run through wordpress. i'm building it on my own hosting and gonna switch it over after he pays the remaining amount. Do you think my price is good since i'm a college student?

It doesn't matter whether you are a college student or the Saudi King, the amount you should charge is the amount of value the customer is receiving and the amount of effort you have put into it. So $200 for an ecommerce site sounds stupidly cheap - unless it is shit of course.

drew77 said:

I'm taking your advice thank you very much. Since i'm a student i'm charging 15$ an hour but i don't think it should take really that much so i was thinking of charging him a total of 200$. Do you think its reasonable. it's a webpage with an additional shopping cart for his business which im all going to run through wordpress. i'm building it on my own hosting and gonna switch it over after he pays the remaining amount. Do you think my price is good since i'm a college student?

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It's dirt cheap. Unless you're using solution that already exists. If you code all yourself (the shopping cart and paiment processing api), then its too cheap.

$15/hour? Value yourself more.

I'm guessing this project will take you around 3 hours? $300 seems fair

Euphorix said:

$15/hour? Value yourself more.

I'm guessing this project will take you around 3 hours? $300 seems fair

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bartosimpsonio said:

There are several books out there on how to run your consultancy.

I've been doing it for almost 20 years, so here's how I still do this: I estimate my work time in hours. Multiply that by X per hour and that's my price.

By doing this, you keep your price coherent between customers.

I have friends who will look at the client's car, his watch, and then give them a price. As a result one guy pays 15000 and the other 800 bucks. When these two clients meet up and chat at the pub and the one who paid 15000 finds out, you are FUBAR until you can explain why he paid 20x more.

So to keep your price standard, charge by the hour, no matter how rich or poor your client is. As you gain experience you learn to estimate your hours better. In the first few projects you may come out at a loss, but then you learn how to estimate the number of hours.

Just my 2 cents.

Click to expand...

Combining both replies, I'd say have a minimum upfront payment before you start adding the cost of your hours. Probably on later jobs when you get used to it tho.