#164 – The State of Web Designer Pricing in 2025 (Freelance Rates, Survey Insights + Industry Trends)

Shannon Mattern (00:01.39)

Hello everyone and welcome back to the profitable web designer podcast. I have a super exciting episode for everyone today. We are going to be talking about the state of web designer pricing in 2025. I'm joined by my income report co-host and our client success coordinator, Erica Nash, and also Lee Scott from Zana Tang Consulting, who you hear me mention all the time on this podcast.

who is our conversion rate optimization expert and also a web designer academy member. So Erica and Lee, welcome to the show.

Erica Nash (00:39.098)

Thank you.

Leigh Scott (00:39.871)

Thanks.

Shannon Mattern (00:41.784)

So just to give you all a little background, back in, I don't know, winter or spring of last year, the admin bar, Kyle from the admin bar put together this state of the web design industry survey, and it was the survey of WordPress professionals. And...

he asked a lot of really great questions of his community over at the admin bar and got a lot of really, really good responses for WordPress developers. And so I loved that survey. It had so much gold in it, but there were so many questions that I was like, I wish you would have asked this. And I wish you would have asked this. I'm so curious about this. And so,

at our Simply Profitable Designer Summit that we hosted in spring of 2025, we put together our own survey and asked attendees to fill that out, asked our email list to fill that out. And then we just recently compiled all of the data. When I say we, I'm like, Lee.

Erica Nash (01:52.73)

you

Shannon Mattern (01:54.744)

compiled all of the data and pulled some really interesting insights out. So we wanted to just talk about them on the podcast and share those with you in our takeaways. So that's what today's episode is all about. But before we dive into all of that, Lee, I would love for you to share a little bit more about you and what you do. Our listeners haven't.

met you yet unless they listen to like one of our way back episodes of your interview from like right after you joined the Web Designer Academy. But I'd love for them to meet you and learn more about you and what you do.

Leigh Scott (02:35.634)

Yeah, I'm so excited to be here. Get to talk about one of my favorite topics. Data. Surprise, I'm a nerd and and talk with some of my favorite people. So I'm very excited about this chat and I do want to kick it off with a joke because my five year old has been having me come up with knock knock jokes every day. But this is not a knock knock joke because I couldn't come up with a good one.

Shannon Mattern (03:03.406)

You promised you'd have a knock knock joke to kick off this podcast. Okay.

Erica Nash (03:04.195)

you

Leigh Scott (03:05.448)

Okay. It's not a not not joke, but it's just as good. Okay. I think that's why did the web designer give her hosting provider a few extra dollars?

Erica Nash (03:06.91)

You

Shannon Mattern (03:13.486)

You

Shannon Mattern (03:22.819)

I have no idea and I love the look on Eric's face.

Erica Nash (03:23.909)

Why?

Leigh Scott (03:24.532)

Because... Because she heard you're supposed to tip your server.

Shannon Mattern (03:31.118)

Okay, that was worth it. That was better than a knock-knock joke.

Erica Nash (03:31.152)

That's a pretty good one.

It was, it was.

Leigh Scott (03:36.416)

Yeah, this is like the only audience I could tell that to and they're just not like look at me and their eyes gloss over.

Shannon Mattern (03:44.046)

So good. I love it.

Erica Nash (03:46.576)

That was a good one.

Leigh Scott (03:48.832)

Yeah.

Okay. Oh, so what you originally asked. So yeah, I'm so excited to be here. My name is Lee Scott. I have known Shannon and Erica for years now. And I joined the WDA in 2021, I think. It was like right after my first year of doing this. And I had left my, I left my full time job and I joined and I wasn't bringing in

Erica Nash (03:54.416)

you

Shannon Mattern (04:09.718)

Mm-hmm.

Leigh Scott (04:21.618)

enough revenue to hit my baseline revenue. And I was like, I need something. And so I need a community. I mean, it was during the pandemic. It was super lonely. And I need help because I don't have time for this like to delay getting this off the ground. And so I joined the WDA and it has just been incredible. You guys will never be able to get me to leave the community. I'm here forever. So

Shannon Mattern (04:45.965)

You

Erica Nash (04:48.4)

Thank

Leigh Scott (04:51.07)

Yeah, just the people and what it's done for my business. And then I've joined Next Level. I've been in it several years and yeah, I'm never leaving. So in terms of my business, I started off with web design and development. I have a design background, but I also have a marketing strategy background. And so what I saw in my projects with my clients was that we were...

building really great websites, integrating with their platforms, their tools, making them super efficient. However, the clients weren't always equipped to meet their business goals in terms, through the lens of the website. And so what that means is going in and like looking at the data and doing interviews and...

and figuring out ways to identify those friction points and improve those friction points for your customer, which will ultimately help you achieve your business goals. So I have been fortunate to partner with the WDA on optimizing the website. And it's just been absolutely amazing because I'm part of the program and I've been through the program.

but hearing it from everyone else and know, really, and people's needs evolve too, right? Because people change and the industry changes and the economy changes. And so it's just really fun and exciting to be part of it. And this report is also exciting because it gives us a glimpse into...

the current state of web design industry and also some of the challenges and opportunities that there are for web designers. yeah, I'm excited to talk about it.

Shannon Mattern (06:54.213)

I'm excited to dive in and I remember at our very first next level retreat that I hosted in Columbus, Ohio, it must've been 2022 maybe. And Erica had just joined the team as our client success coordinator. So she like became, she was in the web designer academy program. Then she like became an employee of the web designer academy, which is really cool. And I remember.

Erica Nash (07:09.2)

That sounds right.

Mm-hmm.

Shannon Mattern (07:23.389)

Lee, you talking at that retreat about this like new thing that you wanted to do and how you wanted to help clients and what you were really, really interested in passionate about. wasn't just building the websites. It was really helping your clients like, you know, get more, get more eyeballs convert, like all of the things that I recall you used to do at your day job. And that was like what you got paid to do. And you were so brilliant at it.

And I just remember like at that retreat, was like on my putting on my list is like work with Lee when she launches this offer, like that's exactly what I need. And so that was on my bucket list when you were talking about it at the retreat. And then, I finally was able to do that. Was it 2023 that we started working together? Has it been almost two years now?

Leigh Scott (08:17.834)

I think it was maybe the end of 20.

Shannon Mattern (08:20.395)

Yeah, like fall, like winter of 2023, we started working together and so many of the things that we have done, even leading up to like our rebrand and our new customer journey, all of that has been informed by Lee's brilliant brain gathering data, offering up like options for us to test, giving us data on the tests. And then like we've iterated our way here, which is really cool. And.

The survey is like one of those strategies, right? Which is really fun because it's like, how do we create more value for our listeners, for people who are searching? What types of things are they searching for? You know, like how do we leverage AI? And like this survey checks a lot of the conversion rate optimization boxes while also giving us really

cool data to talk about and like look at the opportunities and challenges for web designers. And even as a company, look at how we can support and help you. it just checks, it like kills many birds with one stone. And it's just been so fun to work with you on strategy and to see like how far we've come in the past almost two years of working together now. So what a ride.

Leigh Scott (09:48.832)

It's been a fun ride.

Shannon Mattern (09:49.407)

you

Erica Nash (09:50.874)

can't believe it's been almost two years. It's hard to believe.

Leigh Scott (09:55.242)

Mm-hmm.

Shannon Mattern (09:55.692)

I know, yeah. So Lee, let's hand it over to you. What we're gonna do is have Lee give us the high level overview of the survey, some of the key data points. And then we're all just going to kind of talk about what we found most interesting and just have a really casual discussion about the data. And then at the end, we'll tell you where you can go to like check out the whole survey, look at all of it.

and just dig in and really, you know, what we're hoping that you walk away with is like feeling maybe a little less alone and feeling a lot more hopeful about the state of the web design industry going into 2026 and beyond. So, ready, Lee?

Leigh Scott (10:50.014)

I'm ready. I'm going to try to make this as engaging as possible. So when I send over one time I sent over this deck just full of data and information is Shannon and Erica and I went through it I was like, this is so boring. Like I'm bored. And so I broke it up with pictures of like a T-Rex and Shannon loves chips and salsa. So I put a picture of that. So I can't do that here.

Erica Nash (11:03.888)

You

You

Shannon Mattern (11:08.32)

you

Leigh Scott (11:17.116)

If I had more knock-knock jokes, I could do that, but I don't know them off the top of my head, so I'm just gonna do my best.

Erica Nash (11:19.662)

you

Shannon Mattern (11:23.519)

Yes, feel free to sprinkle in anything to break up the boringness of the numbers. I love it. She's like, you said you ride four wheelers, so here's a four wheeler. I imagine this is what the farmland around your house looks like. You hit the nail on the head pretty well.

Erica Nash (11:26.352)

you

Leigh Scott (11:29.277)

you

Erica Nash (11:34.252)

you

Leigh Scott (11:37.16)

Yeah, I was imagining what the Ohio farmland looks like and what Shannon frolicking through the fields with her dog.

Erica Nash (11:45.36)

you

You

Leigh Scott (11:50.464)

Um, well, yeah, okay. So, um, I'm going to go over a little bit about who took the survey first and then go through some of the insight. So, uh, this, uh, report was, uh, or survey was in March and April, so right around the time of the summit. Um, so there were a little over 200 responses.

Shannon Mattern (11:50.484)

All right, let's dive in.

Leigh Scott (12:14.112)

And they came from really all over the world, but predominantly US, UK, Canada, but then there were several other countries included in that. And then in terms of gender identity, so we asked people to identify with gender they identify with. so 85 % were female, 13 % were male, and 2 % were non-binary.

And then in terms of age range, about 72 % of respondents were in their 30s and 40s. They did span all the way from 20 to 60 plus, but that's where the bulk of them were. In terms of business type, the majority identified as a full-time business owner. And for years in business, the majority had been in business fewer than six years, so about 60%. However,

there was a wide range between like less than a year to 20 plus years. So these are important because we kind of, use some of these data points to cut some of the data in different ways and analyze it in addition to revenue bands. So when I'm talking about revenue bands, we ask people how much they make in annual revenue. And so for simplicity sake, we group those into five revenue bands.

so that we can do some analysis. So there was less than 10K a year, 10K to 2500, 2500 to 50, 50 to 75, and then 75 plus. So that's how we looked at the data.

Shannon Mattern (13:50.638)

You mean 25,000, right? 10,000 to 25,000, 25,000 to 50,000. I think you said 100. 100.

Leigh Scott (13:57.92)

Yeah, what did I say? Oh, no, no, no, no, sorry. 10,000 and then 10,000 to 25,000, 25,000 to 50 and so on. Sorry. So the one of the reasons I broke it up that way is because in terms of respondents, there was about the same amount in each of those revenue bands. The highest was in the 10K, under 10K, but it was

Erica Nash (13:59.888)

Hehehehehe

Shannon Mattern (14:07.277)

Yeah.

Shannon Mattern (14:11.499)

All good.

Leigh Scott (14:27.228)

you know, it's a good mix between those five revenue bands.

Leigh Scott (14:34.186)

Were you gonna say something? okay. So the first thing we looked at was annual revenue. I was very interested to see how it was split by gender. So I looked at that male and female because the non-binary number was so small. So I really cut it between male and female. And...

Shannon Mattern (14:35.478)

No, go ahead.

Leigh Scott (14:59.424)

What we found was that men are more concentrated in the 75,000 plus bands while women were more concentrated in the 10,000 plus bands. And that number wasn't a huge difference, but it was a difference. About 26 % of men were in the 75K band and 18 % of women. So there was a difference there.

And then we asked them, how do you describe yourself? So we asked them, are you a freelancer or agency owner? And almost the majority said freelancer, but about 30 or 24 % said agency owner.

Leigh Scott (15:46.624)

So then, and then we saw a correlation when we looked at job title and revenue that as revenue bands increase, people were more likely to identify as an agency owner.

So the next question was around how do web designers structure their fees? So we asked them to use package rates, hourly rates, subscription, day rates or other. And by far people said package rates. So 82 % was the primary pricing method. However, we do see that a lot of them, a lot of designers do mix in hourly, but

that for the most part, they try to use package rates.

So then we dove into what the web designers charge per project. So what we saw was that over half of respondents charged an average between $2,500, just making sure I'm saying it right, between $2,500 and 9,999. And only 2.4 % exceeded 10K for their average profit.

Erica Nash (16:55.222)

Thank

Shannon Mattern (16:56.097)

Ha ha ha.

Leigh Scott (17:08.48)

project price. And sorry, I keep switching between K and thousand, but hopefully it's, hopefully everyone's tracking. but overall project average project price generally increased as the revenue bands got higher.

Shannon Mattern (17:15.689)

All good.

Leigh Scott (17:37.706)

see if there's anything else. But the majority were in the middle where they charged about 2,500 to 5,000. That's where the biggest group was. Okay, now hourly rates. 60 % of respondents reported selling at least some of their time hourly. And when we ran analysis to see what the average was,

It came to a hundred dollars an hour and a lot of people reported in different currencies. So I exchanged it based off of what the exchange rate was on that day in August. it came out to about a hundred dollars an hour. And that also increased significantly as revenue band increases.

Leigh Scott (18:32.138)

So paid discovery, and this is super interesting. So the question we asked ourselves was does charging for discovery increase project pricing? And what we found was that only 15 % of respondents charged for paid discovery. Only 15 % of the 200 people that took the survey are actually using paid discovery. But they're more than twice as likely to land

5,000 plus projects. So I think there's a lot to dig into there, which will be fun.

Shannon Mattern (19:08.109)

Yes, for sure. I already have notes of like where I'm like, oh, I'm so excited and dig in here, here, here, here and here.

Erica Nash (19:09.402)

Thank

Leigh Scott (19:15.648)

Yeah. Okay. Then recurring revenue. So we asked what percent of your revenue is recurring? What we found is that not much. The majority report less than 19 % of their revenue coming from retainers or subscriptions, meaning everyone's working project to project. I think there's a lot to discuss there as well.

And then we looked at services and platforms. So like what services do you offer and what platforms are you building websites on? And what we found was that the majority of the respondents offer web design, graphic design, and brand strategy. And then in terms of top platforms, was about 60 % of people use WordPress.

But then Squarespace was close with about 38%. And then there was a mix between Shopify, Wix, Showit among respondents. And a lot of respondents do multiple platforms. So then I wanted to see, is there a correlation between services and platforms and revenue? So.

I looked at the different revenue bands to see what the top services offered were in the different revenue bands and saw that. So web design is consistently in every revenue band, graphic design, web development. But brand strategy and graphic design showed an increase in prevalence as the revenue bands increase.

And marketing strategy was only present in the highest revenue tier. So I think there's some indication that there's strategy related services are tied to, somehow tied to increased revenue. And then WordPress and Squarespace are the top used platforms across all revenue bands with Shopify and Wix alternating for third.

Leigh Scott (21:36.614)

And Squarespace showed a notable increase in the higher revenue bands and was used just as much as WordPress in the 75k plus revenue band.

Leigh Scott (21:50.452)

So then we looked at business challenges. So what are the challenges that web designers are facing? By far, the biggest struggle is getting clients. And then that's followed by building recurring revenue, selling services, and pricing. But we do see that these challenges slightly shift as revenue increases. So how to get more clients is...

universally the biggest challenge. However, how to outsource and hire a team, how to create more work and life balance and how to manage my time are reported higher in the higher revenue bands.

Leigh Scott (22:34.652)

And I think this is the last one and then we get to dive in. Marketing strategies. This is also a fascinating one as well. So first we looked at, asked people what marketing strategies are you using? And by far word of mouth dominates with 91%. But then that was followed with social media, in-person networking, online networking, and then SEO. So then they were asked which of these strategies

works. Like which of these strategies do you think is actually driving clients? Word of Mouth stayed the top by far at the top. So 91 % of people are using Word of Mouth and 81 % say it works best. However, social media, 60 % of people said they're using social media, but only 17 % say it's working. So there's a pretty big drop.

in several of these strategies between what people are actually doing and what they think is actually moving the needle. And then

Leigh Scott (23:48.192)

Then we looked at it across the revenue bands to see if any strategies were more likely to be used in higher revenue bands and online networking and SEO showed an increased perceived effectiveness in higher revenue bands. And also people in higher revenue bands were using more likely to be a speaker or go on a podcast. So

I that's it. I don't know that that was entertaining, but it gave a overview and that we can now dive into.

Erica Nash (24:22.736)

Thank

Shannon Mattern (24:23.393)

You

Shannon Mattern (24:27.564)

That I found it all very fascinating and we actually will have this a link to all of this data on our website in the show notes of this episode. So we will have that linked for you. We'll send it out via email and all of that to our email list and you'll be able to find it on our website. I don't know what the link will be yet, but we'll make sure that it's in the show notes of this episode when you scroll up on it to to go to that.

Excuse me. So Erica, you've been quietly over there taking some notes. I'm so curious because I have my big, big aha moments and takeaways. I'm super curious, Erica. What were your initial, what were the few things that just really jumped out at you about these results?

Erica Nash (25:04.185)

You

Erica Nash (25:23.404)

Yeah, so there, I think all of it is fascinating. And I think that there are so many things in here that support what we already sort of knew, like what we already believed about the industry and about, you know, the people that we work with. But there are two things that rose to the top for me. So the first one was I'm going to I'm to have to scroll down and find where it's at so I don't say it wrong.

but where women are in the, like the highest percentage is in the lowest band and men, the highest percentage are in the highest band. That is just fascinating to me. like, I don't, I guess I don't want to say that like I expected that. I did expect the, like the male percentage to be higher than the female percent, or like the band.

to be higher, but I didn't expect the biggest population to be in the lowest band. That was really surprising to me. And I think there's a whole lot that we could say about that and dig into about that. And then on the marketing strategies, I love this piece so much. I find it not surprising that Word of Mouth is the highest one.

I don't find it surprising to be the most effective, but I think the thing for me there is like, okay, like we know this is the most effective thing, but simply word of mouth by itself is so passive. And if we're wanting to get into those higher bands of revenue, it can't be passive. So then how do we like close that gap? And obviously like we talk about that all the time. We have lots of thoughts about those sorts of things.

But I also find it so fascinating about the social media piece that the number of people using it is so high, but that it's so not effective. And just thinking about like the ideas of the things that we quote unquote should do or like what we have to do to be running a business. And instead kind of looking at like what is working for

Erica Nash (27:49.322)

us specifically in our business and our clients, where are they specifically and like not looking at the things of like, we should be doing this because that's what all of the people, that's what you do when you have a business. So those were the two things that like really stood out to me that, I don't know, there's something there, lots of things.

Shannon Mattern (28:11.188)

I want to touch on the first one about the gender identity and that the men who took the survey reported being, and more men who took the survey reported being in the higher revenue bands versus women. I do think there's like a caveat there of like, well, how long have these men been in business? Getting a little more granular to seeing like what the data shows I think would be.

really interesting, but what I do know, like anecdotally, right? So the data supports the anecdotal evidence that we see all of the time, which is there is a, there's just money mindset stuff that we help women clean up all the time. There's money mindset stuff. There's employee mindset stuff.

There's people pleasing mindset stuff. And that is not to say that men don't experience those types of challenges too. They certainly do. I've spoken in other programs and coaching programs where there are men web designers who are experiencing similar challenges with putting themselves out there and charging more and having confidence. So I don't like, it's not a blanket.

statement saying that like women are the only ones that struggle with these things and men don't have these challenges. But what we what we see day in day out is and what we hear from women when they come into our program, they're like, no one is talking about what you guys are talking about the way you're talking about it to me, in a way that makes sense to me about what's really going on underneath why I keep my prices the way that I

where I keep them and why I think I can't charge more the way that you talk about it in the web designer Academy. And I'm so glad that I'm here and I'm so glad you're helping me unwind this because I didn't even know what was going on. And that's what I hear across the board. And it's really interesting to see the data potentially support that theory. I understand I took, I like getting back into statistics class from college. I'm like, I know we need a sample of a thousand to really like

Leigh Scott (30:23.584)

Thank

Shannon Mattern (30:27.708)

make some generalizations to the larger population. There are some more ways we can slice and dice the data if we really want it to get into that. But initially it showed what we have heard, which is I don't think I can charge that much because XYZ and a lot of times we hear from our male counterparts,

Of course I charged that much. Why wouldn't I charge that much? Like, why couldn't you charge that much? And we can and we get to, and so that's what we're here to do. So that's my thought process. Lee, I'm curious what your thoughts are.

Leigh Scott (31:13.568)

Yeah, I think those two topics around gender and revenue bands and then marketing strategies are really interesting. One thought that I had around a higher percentage of men being in higher revenue bands was also looking at average project price, right? And granted, it was a smaller sample, but based off the data,

Shannon Mattern (31:36.492)

Mm-hmm.

Leigh Scott (31:44.256)

average project price was about the same between gender. And so what that kind of tells me is that there may be struggle in pricing higher, also getting the project, like landing the project, right? And so I think a lot of what we learned within the program is how the confidence around pricing and pricing what you're worth, but then also

how do you actually communicate that to a client and provide them with options so that you can close the project? So I think that there's a lot around it that could be causing that disparity between the bands, the gender. And then, yeah, in terms of marketing, know,

It's not surprising that everyone's like using social, but nobody thinks that it's, it's working because that's where we live. Like in everyone just assumes, okay, like I, know, I, I'm on social every day, so my business should be on social every day and working in conversion rate optimization. You really see that every business is so different. So you may have a client that you offer, offer.

social media services too, and it works amazing for that client. But that doesn't mean it's gonna work for you. And you have to really lean into, the things I do for my clients in terms of like generating traffic or in getting engaged users are not necessarily things I'm ever gonna do for my business. And so it's really looking at where are you investing your time and effort because it's finite.

right? And you can't be everywhere. I think that this survey definitely demonstrated that like, why are we spending our time there?

Shannon Mattern (33:49.677)

so good. So the other thing that jumped out at me, like a flashing red sign was that web designers say that getting more clients is their number one challenge. However, we see that higher revenue bands correlate with higher project prices. And so where I, the way I look at it.

is that like, is it that you really need more clients to meet your revenue goals? Or is it that you need to be charging more for what you're already doing? And also, you know, like, charging more for the things that you're not charging for. That's like, that was the thing where I was like, I look at this data. And the way that you sliced it between revenue bands.

Leigh Scott (34:27.296)

you

Shannon Mattern (34:45.278)

It's not showing that the top earners are charging less per project, would indicate that they have more clients. They're charging the same, like you said, men and women the same per, like, or they're charging more per project, meaning that they're making more money from potentially the same or less clients is the way I saw it. So I'm like,

If we could all just understand that you can charge more for what you're already doing. If you stop trying to just sell websites and you start selling the outcomes that people really want. And when I say selling, I mean, the way you talk, think and communicate about it, like Lee was talking about earlier, how do we, how do we communicate the value of what we do? When you can really communicate the value of what you do.

You get to charge what you really deserve to be charging. And you don't need to make marketing your number one biggest challenge that is holding you back and spend all this time, effort and energy trying to like figure out marketing and be places you don't need to be. You could really put that effort into

Serving your client your existing clients really well and getting paid really well for it That was the thing that just jumped off the page to me when I looked through every single thing. I'm like, can we just stop? thinking that We need a different strategy then word of mouth which is what Erica said proactive word of mouth not waiting but proactively building relationships connecting and then

pricing what we do for the true value it creates for our clients and what we really deserve to be charging. And then, my gosh, we would not have to make getting clients like the thing that holds us back all the time from growing our web design business and making the money that we really need to be making. I see so many people tell me, Shannon, get like.

Shannon Mattern (36:58.134)

Getting clients is my number one thing. If I could just crack the code on getting clients, then everything would fall into place. And that's actually like what's keeping you stuck.

So curious about your thoughts on that.

Leigh Scott (37:17.28)

I remember when I joined the WDA, right? I was charging hourly. was charging very low hourly and I joined, I'm like, how am gonna get more clients? And you said, no, like that's not, you said it nicer than this, I'm sure. But this is how I interpreted it. You were like.

Shannon Mattern (37:30.028)

Very sassily.

Leigh Scott (37:35.29)

No, that's not what we're doing. You're going to go to your existing clients and either increase your hourly rate or more ideally move to like a retainer project based model. I was like, no, there's no way they're going to do that. And they all did. And so like just by doing that, my revenue increased significantly and I didn't have to go out and work twice, you know.

twice the amount that I was working to increase my revenue. I just had to talk to my clients. So I kind of lived that one firsthand.

Shannon Mattern (38:14.412)

And we like what really shifted in you to give you the courage to do that because that was a big ask of you at the time. You had left your corporate job. You were working hourly with all these clients. You were hustling. You had a new baby basically like you had recently had a child. You, you know, were like

Leigh Scott (38:26.506)

Mm-hmm.

Shannon Mattern (38:43.306)

There was a lot at stake for you to make this work. And I'm like, hey, I want you to go raise your, I don't want you to go get more of these like clients who are going to pay you hourly. You're going to run out of time. Let me help you understand what you really bring to the table for them. I want you to raise your prices. Like what, what in the world are you thinking? Saying yes to that.

Leigh Scott (38:59.37)

Mm-hmm.

Leigh Scott (39:13.632)

I mean, I think what you just said, like talking to them was less painful than working twice as much. Like I wasn't sleeping. And so those two hours I got a night were precious to sleep and I just could not take on another client. So it was, I was at the point where, yeah, it was just, it was less painful. And also like,

Shannon Mattern (39:19.948)

you

Erica Nash (39:21.706)

Yes.

Shannon Mattern (39:30.142)

Yeah.

Erica Nash (39:39.224)

Yeah.

Leigh Scott (39:39.366)

You kind of instilled this confidence in me when you reviewed what I'd been doing and you're like, no, you can be charging more and this is how much you could be charging. And I remember my mind just was blown. I'm like, whoa, what am I doing? I can charge that? And that just really started to build the confidence in me that I really needed.

Erica Nash (40:02.266)

So touching on that confidence piece, know, something that we see all the time is that I can't charge that much because of XYZ. And, you know, there's a lot of things that we, you know, coach people through and kind of start to dismantle those beliefs and like build up some new ones. But just today, I'm reminded of something that just happened today. I was, we're in the middle of onboarding like some new students.

and I was going through one of their intake forms and I saw something that made me just so happy. And I don't remember what the question is. It might have been, it might have been, I think there's a question on there that asks sort of like their experience or something like that. And I've never seen this before. What she said was, I am fully self-taught and so proud of it.

I have never seen that whole statement. I literally, I told her that because typically what we see is that that self-taught piece holds people back from charging sustainable prices. It holds them back from going out after projects. It holds them back from doing outreach. It holds them back from like going on podcasts. It holds them back from like doing all the things that might help them reach that higher revenue band. And so seeing that was just like,

such a joy. It made me so excited because that means that she is not going to maybe experience or experience at the same rate or at the same level some of those obstacles that if that was like a piece that like was going to hold her back, you know, that she might otherwise. So I think that there's something there too about just like this idea of

the confidence necessary to charge those higher prices and to believe that like they can go after some of those projects. Maybe that's the reason for some of the disparity in the, you know, women holding that lower band and men holding that higher band. Like maybe there's a correlation between the projects that they feel comfortable going after and like the number of them and the, you know, maybe they see, you know, some sort of like

Erica Nash (42:22.018)

requirements for this project and maybe the men don't meet all of those but they're like I meet most of them let's try it anyway where based on the experience that we have with the women that we serve we know that they're not gonna they're not gonna do that unless they check all of those boxes so I just find that I find that really interesting as well.

Shannon Mattern (42:43.256)

That made me think of something that literally just happened yesterday. I was on a private coaching call with one of my private coaching clients. So Erica, you don't get to like hear these things because you're not on those private coaching calls, but she, she joined the web designer Academy just a few months ago.

Erica Nash (42:54.691)

Right.

Shannon Mattern (43:03.996)

And then she was like, I really want some extra support. want to add on private coaching with Shannon because like, I just left my corporate job. Very similar to you, Lee. She's like, I just left my corporate job and this is going to work. I'm confident I can make it work. And I want to make it work as quickly as possible. So let me give myself all the support I could possibly give myself. So we teach a strategy in the web designer Academy called the package matrix.

So here's what happens. She gets an inquiry off of LinkedIn because people know that she like left her company to go out on her own with an agency. And she's like, it's in my same industry. I don't even really want to work in that industry anymore. I don't really think this inquiry counts as like me getting a client on my own. And I'm like, okay, well, we'll talk about that. I was like, it absolutely does count.

Leigh Scott (43:58.944)

Thank

Shannon Mattern (44:02.675)

Then like we talk about, you know, doing a paid discovery step for this client as like a start, even though she's known this person for many, many years and she knows their company because they like, worked together in the same industry. was like, do a paid discovery step, and then you're going to make an offer with our package matrix strategy afterwards. So her very first offer with her very first.

package matrix to her very first client after leaving her day job, she landed a $15,000 web design project. She's been in business for less than a year on her own, after not even three months out of like leaving her day job, maybe a little bit more than that. And she was like, Shannon, I have to tell you.

Leigh Scott (44:40.49)

my god.

Erica Nash (44:41.294)

That's incredible.

Shannon Mattern (44:58.603)

I would have charged like $4,500 for all of this, like before coming into this program. Like, and I would have felt bad about it. And I'm like, this is it. This is everything. It's just, it's a decision, right? It's a decision to do it differently. It's a decision to believe something differently. It's a decision to be confident or to do it anyway and let us be confident for you.

Erica Nash (45:25.456)

Yeah.

Shannon Mattern (45:26.475)

You know, because nothing else changed other than she decided to like use the process that we laid out to have her be able to talk about not herself, how long she's been doing it, how she learned, like all of these things, but to go with

Here's what's possible for you when we do this project together. Here are the outcomes you can create. Here's what's at stake for you if you don't do it. All of the things. And she landed that project. And I'm so freaking proud of her. And she's like, I was like, I'm going to have to have you on the podcast to talk about this because this is it, right? And so that would like, she went.

Leigh Scott (46:06.464)

Yeah.

Shannon Mattern (46:17.975)

when she continues to do that because she will. That's gonna jump her into that high revenue band while having been in business for less than a year, right? And it's just...

That's what I want you all to see. I think there's so much conventional wisdom out there that it's like, can only charge more if I've been doing this a long time. I can only charge more, like Erica said, if I learned in the right way and I know all the things ahead of time and I check all the boxes, your pricing is not about you. And that's like the biggest shift that I need to help you all understand is that once you stop making your pricing all about

you and do I use Squarespace or WordPress or Wix and you just fully focus it on your clients? That's when everything changes. So yeah, I can't wait for you guys to like hear that whole story. It's like so fun.

Erica Nash (47:17.154)

That's so good. Yeah.

Leigh Scott (47:17.768)

That's awesome.

Shannon Mattern (47:20.467)

Yeah, so any other, what else jumped out from the survey with you, Lee? Anything that you were just like, that was unexpected or that was not unexpected. Like that confirms something that we've seen or thought or something that you, yeah, that you thought was interesting.

Leigh Scott (47:49.672)

definitely pay discovery. I know, you know, in the WDA, you teach it, I have not done that module. And I've heard people talking about it. And I looked at this and I was like, okay, that's what I'm doing next. Because it's, it's obviously very powerful. And it seems like it, it definitely kind of

Shannon Mattern (47:58.188)

Ha ha ha!

Leigh Scott (48:17.36)

to the point of offering strategy services are higher, more correlated with higher revenue bands. I think offering paid discovery definitely establishes you as a strategist instead of someone who's just a pixel pusher, right? And so it definitely sets the precedent going into a project and being able to charge higher. So that's something that it seems like more people need to be doing.

Hahaha

Shannon Mattern (48:49.285)

What do think Erica?

Erica Nash (48:51.256)

Yeah, I totally agree. And I was actually just taking some notes because I think that is kind of like a precedent for what just like really pleases me because I like my very like, I really do identify as like a graphic designer brand strategist. And so for the top services by revenue band, graphic design, web design brand strategy to be in the top three.

in the 75k plus revenue band, it surprises me a little bit and also makes me just like really happy because I do think that people who sort of identify more as a graphic designer than a web designer, they have the same challenges. It's like, you know, the whole like art industry and like struggling to like, you know, charge what you're worth and like all of that stuff. It's all the same thing.

but I think that it comes from, I think there's a couple of things, but I think that, paid discovery like absolutely has a place there in the strategy piece. And like, it's not so much about the actual, website. It's not so much about the actual design piece. It's not so much about like the pixels themselves. It's about, the results that are going to be created, which, you know, we talk about all the time.

And I don't know, think that that's just, that was really surprising to like see graphic design at the top. I think also it's probably that there can be, would question, not question, I would wonder about the correlation between graphic design being in the highest and like recurring revenue and like how much of that was connected. Cause I can see where graphic design could bring in some recurring revenue, like having some, you know.

additional packages and for the 60 % of social media content, you know. So yeah, that I think that I think that paid discovery likely said, you know, just positions you as that strategist, but really puts the forefront on the results and not the deliverables themselves.

Shannon Mattern (51:08.395)

So good. And I think that one of the things that holds people back from really thinking of themselves as a strategist is imposter syndrome. They're like, but what if I don't know what I don't know? What if I miss something? What if I, there's something I should suggest that I don't suggest. And what I want to say is like, you are already doing strategy. Like you already are, you have to be to build a website for a client.

There are some strategy there to design a brand palette for like a logo suite and fonts and colors for a client. There are some strategy there and you may not think of it that way or you may not realize it because it's like the thing that like comes so easy to you that you don't realize that that is part of it, but it's part of it. There are things that you need to like, you need to know from the client to translate.

Like what you do into something that's going to support them, you're already doing strategy. Most of you are giving it away for free. Most of you think that you have to use the strategy to prove that it's worth like paying you to like get the yes on this low price. And like, if I just give it all away for free, then, then they'll hire me. So the strategy is like one of the most valuable, most important things.

that you do, you deserve to get paid for it, not only do you deserve to get paid for it, it just helps you stop selling yourself, stop selling deliverables, stop selling like pixels, designs, websites, and really start it just the way we teach it.

Whether you realize you're being taken out of that mindset or not, we're taking you out of that mindset and we're like giving you the words to say it to your clients in a different way than they've ever heard it before. And that's what we hear from our students who do pay discovery. And then they get feedback from their clients where their clients are like, my gosh, you, you understood me in a way that no one ever does. How could I not work with you? And by the way, my budget is actually more than I said that it was.

Shannon Mattern (53:23.337)

and I want this package, like, because what they are buying is different than what everyone else is selling. And so such a huge opportunity. I'm excited for you, Lee, to add a paid discovery step to your projects and clients, because I know that's just going to like, I don't know, blow it out of the water for you.

Leigh Scott (53:50.462)

Yeah, I'm very excited as well.

Erica Nash (53:50.851)

report back.

Shannon Mattern (53:54.346)

The other piece that I wanted to just talk about before we wrap up, because we could probably talk about this all day, is the recurring revenue piece, where you had mentioned earlier that what we're seeing is most web designers are, there's not as much recurring revenue as we would have, as I would have expected. That shocked me. I thought that there was going to be lower,

or a higher percentage of people making more money from recurring revenue, especially in those higher revenue bands. And that one was surprising to me that recurring revenue isn't as big of a part of the revenue picture as what I would have expected. But the summit was simply profitable designer.

summit recurring revenue fast. Cause that's what we were talking about is like, how do we help you consistently consistently grow your revenue? I'm looking at the data now. And I think I said that wrong that what does the recurring revenue say across all revenue bands? The majority report less than 19 % of revenue from retainers or subscriptions.

Was that at, am I reading that right? That 75K plus, most of them get less of their income from recurring revenue.

Leigh Scott (55:29.353)

Yeah, the yeah, so across all revenue bands, the majority.

have less than 19%. However, as revenue bands increase, you do see a higher portion of recurring revenue.

Shannon Mattern (55:48.842)

Okay, that was backwards in my brain. I totally read that data backwards, which is why need Lee on my team. I like that surprise. I she's like, that's actually not what that was.

Erica Nash (56:01.392)

You

Leigh Scott (56:02.944)

Well, I mean, it's, you know, even looking at making 75K plus and you're 41 % of your revenue is coming from not 41. Now I'm all confused. 40 % of them are making hardly any recurring revenue. So almost all of that revenue is coming from projects. But you do see

Erica Nash (56:16.176)

you

Shannon Mattern (56:28.011)

Oh, so that is what I thought. Okay. I did think that's what I thought. I was like, oh, only 41 % of, of people who are making 75 K plus they're getting less than 19 % of. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. That surprised me.

Leigh Scott (56:43.453)

Yeah, that's correct.

Erica Nash (56:47.972)

And I think that they're like, the big opportunity there that I see is that their biggest struggle in the 75K band is time. And so if they increase their recurring revenue, like that has the potential to decrease the amount of time maybe that they spend on getting new projects, finding new projects. So I could see where, I don't know, that would be helpful.

in that obviously with the the finances as well, but like with the time.

Shannon Mattern (57:21.749)

Well, and one of the things that I hear from people is that they're like, I just want to like do a project and be done with it. I don't want to be on call for my clients. I don't want to like deal with their emergencies after the fact. Like I don't want any of that. So it's like they resist ongoing service and support aside from just like really hands off, like hosting and maintenance stuff that like

doesn't involve any client service because they're like, I don't want to feel like I have a job. I don't want to be on call. I don't want to deal with people's emergencies. Like that's not what I want to do. I want to do like higher level work. And so they're like project complete by, and one of the things that we talk about at the web designer Academy is like, you can support clients at a really high level at really good prices. If you're placing the value in the right.

place. And so we teach our students how to create retainer package matrix that really helps them charge appropriately for ongoing service and support. That's another place where web designers massively, massively, undercharge work for free, leave so much time and money on the table because they can't, they haven't figured out how to do that in a way that doesn't make them feel trapped and like they have a job and like they have no freedom.

And so that's one of the things too, is like, there are absolutely ways to do that. We teach our students how to do that every single day. And it's a great way to create ongoing revenue beyond the project without feeling like now you have 10 bosses with all of your clients.

Erica Nash (59:08.526)

Nobody wants Tim bosses.

Leigh Scott (59:08.926)

Yeah. I mean, I learned that firsthand too in the the WDA is like, think it's pricing appropriately, but also learning how to establish the appropriate boundaries for that relationship. And so I had many ongoing clients I had to work with the WDA community on. And over time, I have learned

Shannon Mattern (59:10.347)

No.

Leigh Scott (59:37.61)

how to establish those boundaries upfront and expectations. And I think that's a key part of keeping these healthy ongoing relationships where you don't feel like you have 10 bosses. And the WDA has just helped me so much with that mindset.

Shannon Mattern (59:58.783)

Yeah. Any other final insights before we wrap this conversation up? This is like, there are so many little like nuggets in this report that I find really, really fascinating.

Erica Nash (01:00:20.622)

You know, I think my final thought, and I just keep going back to like these revenue bands. I find it really interesting that on the highest revenue band, Squarespace and WordPress are neck and neck. And I think one thing, and it's, think going back to this idea of like, well, I can't charge that much because XYZ.

Shannon Mattern (01:00:45.523)

Mm-hmm.

Erica Nash (01:00:45.966)

Like one thing that we see all the time is not being able to charge as much because it's just Squarespace or it's just Wix or something like that. And I think what this tells us is that that truly doesn't matter. It really is about the outcome for the client. It's not about where it's built.

Shannon Mattern (01:00:52.2)

Yep.

Shannon Mattern (01:01:04.266)

So good. Lee, any final thoughts?

Leigh Scott (01:01:09.064)

Any final thoughts?

Shannon Mattern (01:01:11.152)

Any last jokes to share with us? You used up the good one at the beginning.

Erica Nash (01:01:12.398)

or a joke.

Leigh Scott (01:01:14.048)

I wish I had one.

Erica Nash (01:01:19.618)

you

Leigh Scott (01:01:21.024)

I know, that was it.

Leigh Scott (01:01:30.408)

Yeah, I think to kind of go back to the strategy piece, like, and what you were talking about, Erica, in terms of platforms, like...

Leigh Scott (01:01:46.482)

Yeah, I think most clients, right, they just don't care and like what platform you're using or or whatnot. They just they're looking for a something that's going to help them with their business and they're looking for you to help them do that. And.

They're looking for someone who is going to provide that direction to them and ultimately figure it out. I mean, your job's not necessarily to know it all, but it's to figure it out. And so having a community is incredible for that. Having Google is incredible for that. GPT, YouTube, throw it out there. And...

Erica Nash (01:02:27.408)

you

Shannon Mattern (01:02:28.083)

Ciao!

Leigh Scott (01:02:33.248)

You know, you also touched on being self-taught. And I think that like no one's ever asked me, do you have a degree in web design? I don't even think our college had anything like that when I was in college. But the ability to be self-taught is so, so valuable. I mean,

in life in general, but especially in this industry. when you're talking about digital and tech, right? Like the, the industry doesn't look like it did six months ago and it, it's going to look very different in six months. And so your ability to adapt, and provide direction because, you know, maybe you're just a few steps ahead of someone on, understanding a certain platform, but that's valuable to someone, right? That doesn't have the time to learn that.

So yeah, think this, this report was, this survey was very affirming in a lot of areas, but definitely shows where there's a lot of opportunity that we're not taking advantage of.

Shannon Mattern (01:03:47.601)

I love that you just said the ability to be self-taught is so valuable. I think people think of it as like a liability and it is a superpower. The fact that you can actually teach yourself how to do something that you didn't know how to do and you were able to be curious enough and ask the questions and find the information and find the right resources and then like identify another problem and figure out how to solve that, that's...

Erica Nash (01:03:56.4)

Yeah.

Leigh Scott (01:03:56.564)

Mm-hmm.

Shannon Mattern (01:04:14.342)

is the whole skill that you need to be a good strategist, a great designer. That's the skill. So if that's the skill you have, you have a very, very valuable skill that's gonna continue to evolve as technology evolves. And I think the thing that I really wanna know for next year that we get to ask is support by revenue bands.

Erica Nash (01:04:17.136)

Yeah.

Shannon Mattern (01:04:42.644)

Who in the higher revenue bands has mentorship, coaching, community versus lower revenue bands? And how does support correlate with higher revenue bands? Because anecdotally, that's what we see in our program is that when people decide to come to work with us because they have reached a point where they're like, I'm no longer OK with things being the way that they are. And I

I'm ready to like have someone guide me through this and have other people that have been there hold my hand and like lead me through it and just cheer me on through it. Like we see that transformation from I was going to charge 4,500 for all of that. And they said yes to 15,000. Like that's a big, huge deal. And that happens. That just doesn't happen. Like without someone.

saying to you like, I mean, it can you can say it to yourself, please do go do that right now. But also, like if you don't believe it, like we will believe it for you until you prove it to yourself. So that's my last that's what I want to know for 2026. Like, when we do this survey again.

Leigh Scott (01:05:47.198)

You

Erica Nash (01:05:47.66)

you

Erica Nash (01:05:58.553)

Yes.

Leigh Scott (01:06:01.344)

Mm-hmm.

Erica Nash (01:06:02.586)

So good.

Shannon Mattern (01:06:04.646)

Lee Erica, thank you so much for being here. Lee, thank you so much for parsing all that data, asking all the curious questions that you asked. Those were all these curious questions that she wanted to know. She broke down that data in a way that she followed her curiosity and like, you know, thought what would support the goals of the Web Designer Academy best. What questions can I ask of this data set to help us with our

with our programs, maybe that data would have shown us that we needed to like change our positioning on something or that maybe that we were teaching something that isn't in alignment with what people's experiences are. So, thank you for asking those questions that way. Erica, thank you for putting together the whole survey in the beginning and coming up with the initial list of questions and, everything that you did to like build that, get it out there.

and thank you for everyone who took the survey. We so appreciate you taking the time to share all of that information with us so that we can just make sure we're giving, you the best resources and education to charge what you really deserve to be charging. So that's all I have for you this week. Thank you all so much for listening and we'll see you back here next week. Bye everyone.