Change PUblic Request "Price Range" Field, pretty please? :)

[Debbi]

Re several posts in several threads:

Not making the buyer choose his price range is causing confusion for writers when it comes to pricing. Can you add an option to the request form, like [Select your price range] instead of letting it default to $10-$20? Maybe you've done this already and the requests we're seeing are really the choices made by the buyers? If this is the case, please let us know so we can stop thinking $10-$20 is the default.

Thanks, you guys!

[Celeste Stewart]

Agreed. Thanks Debbi for making this suggestion. I've been grumbling about it and meaning to come to this thread to make a formal request. With the default price pre-filled at $10-$20, customers may think, "What the heck? I'll leave the range here and see what happens." On the other hand, if the field said, "Select your price range" and then a drop down box suggested variable ranges, the customer would have to think about it and purposely choose a range. As it stands now, it's too easy to accept the default selection and move on.

Not only does this cause newer writers to potentially underprice their articles in order to comply with the terms of the request, it also discourages many of the more established writers from bothering. Speaking for myself, I rarely bother to even look at the $10-$20 requests - and that's knowing that the customer may have more to say in the description field and may be willing to pay more. I'd love to know that the customer has purposely chosen a price range, whether it's $10 or not. I know when the range is anything but $10-$20 that the customer has given the price some thought and that the selected range is likely what he has in mind, but when it's the default of $10-$20, I don't know if the customer just tabbed through the fields or if this is really the true budget. In many cases, I suspect the customer just accepted the default value.

Because $10-$20 is the default, there's always a doubt as to whether the customer really means it. This would be true if the default were $500 as well. If the customer had to choose a price rather than having a price pre-selected, then we'd have a better sense of the customer's intentions.

[hairyoctopus]

As a new writer, I read through the forums and the pricing guidelines, and sat down and worked out how much I need to be able to earn from writing, so that I can pay my bills. Having worked that out, I've been struggling with whether to respond to Public Requests that were asking for 500-600 words for $10-$20; I know that this is still better pay than I'll get on a lot of sites, and I'm more likely to sell articles quickly if I write for requests, but writing 600-800 words and pricing it at $40-$50 seems to make more sense, even if I have to wait for sales.

However, if I knew that buyers were prepared to pay more, I'd definitely write for more requests. If the buyers could be made to choose a price, it would certainly help beginners like me to make decisions about how best to use our time.

As an aside, work in psychology and economic theory would suggest that if buyers are given a high default price range (say $100-$120) and can then choose from other options like $10-$20, $30-$40, etc, they are unlikely to choose the lowest. So providing a high default may produce higher offers than a simple drop-down entitled "Choose a price range".

[Celeste Stewart]

Also the effect of having the lowest price range preselected could be setting the customer's expectations to a lower level. Customers could think that the low price range is the norm.

[Antonia]

Agreeing with everything that's been said here! It would be great for us if the default was [choose your price range]--and it would probably help buyers too, because they would get submissions that are more targeted towards their actual range.

[canywriter]

I agree too. Not having a default price range would actually be neutral - and make the offer more targeted.

Cany

[4rumid]

I'm going to seventh this suggestion. All the reasoning above is right on the mark, in addition to the fact that, as a newbie, I just WAY undersold an article because I didn't know that the range in the request was the default, and not the buyer's actual limit.

[eek]

Adding my vote.

[jrichards]

Heads up this has been changed so that the default selection is now.

" -- Please Select Price Range -- "

And the request will not complete until a price has been selected.


-jrichards

[Celeste Stewart]

Thank you! This is a simple change that will really help everyone concerned.

[4rumid]

Thank you! What a great site -- so responsive!

[Debbi]

Thanks, JR! We love you

[Antonia]

You're the best, JR! This is a terrific enhancement--I hope it was simple for you to implement

[canywriter]

Have I said this before? I love working with CC! Thanks, JR.

Cany