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Anyone have more info?

If my recon doesn't add up, can I blame Russia?
Every damn time.

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I had to start over estimating and then they’re pleasant to surprised when it doesn’t actually take that long.
Reminds me of when I worked in retail as a student. If a customer asked me for the price of an unlabeled item, I’d make up a ridiculous price so they wouldn’t buy it.
Open up a spreadsheet and at the top list all the tasks you do on any given day. Start a timer when you start a task and mark down the time it takes to finish under each one. Keep doing that for about a week or 2 for all your work. Baring any distractions you now have a rough idea once you calculate the average the time for each of the task.
You can also sort them for highest to lowest then split the averages of the top and bottom half for simple and complex tasks. From there mix and match your task averages based on what is needed for each project. Pad some extra to account for unknown issues and errors.
It takes a bit of work, but it will be pretty accurate overtime. The hard part is keeping the same consistency every time.
Rising Star
Ok great! What's the billing code for this?
Not a creative but if you have timesheets, you could look back for similar projects and compare hours to whatever the new ask is. Say it’s copy for 3 social posts and 1 social video, you can see how long it took to do overall and guesstimate how long it’ll take you to do the next ask based on the brief. Overestimate it too. As long as your hours were accurate, that is! If you keep doing this you’ll start to see the patterns and get a better sense of how long things take you. Finance and accounts can also help you pull reports of your previous hours if you’re unsure or want to see it in a simple sheet.
If timesheets aren’t available, you need to start a short term tracking system for yourself. During the brief stage, note your hours. During the creative dev stage, note your hours. And so on and so forth. Even if it’s for one project, you can double it or reduce it for a bigger/smaller one.
Brief: 5
Creative Dev: 30
Production: 40
Total = 75 total
I have the same problem. I remedy it by working flat fee per project instead of by the hour.