When I first started my freelance copywriting business, all of 7 months ago or so, most of my work was project based. I’d give people an estimate for a whole project, and I’d work until the project was finished, no matter how long it took.

Most of my projects these days seem to be hourly because one project melds into another and into another. And most of my clients are having me work on several projects at the same time.

I used to think the project-by-project quotes were the best ideas, but now I really don’t like them at all. First off, there’s always “project creep,” where they ask for a little more or something a little different. The second problem is one I like even less: we start off with a proposal for a large project, and the project scope changes completely. Then I’m left with trying to go back and estimate how much time I spent in the first phase (always just a guess) to tell them how many hours of time they have left for other projects or the revised project.

I just finished up the residue hours for one client (they had 7.5 on account), and another client has LOTS of credit — perhaps 30 hours. Ugh. They’ve already paid me for those hours, so I have to keep bugging them for direction on new projects so they can use their time.