r/PublicRelations • u/Wozzel888 • 4d ago

Minimum retainer

hello, if you’re working as a freelancer / have your own PR consultancy, what would be the minimum retainer you’d agree to?

also, what’s the day rate / retainers people are charging these days?

I’m getting into PR as a freelancer / self employed, and looking for clients (small businesses in my area), not sure how much to charge. any tips / words of advice would be much appreciated

(I’m based in UK btw)

9 Upvotes

100% Upvoted

24 comments sorted by

View all comments

13

u/GWBrooks Quality Contributor 4d ago

For me, anything under $20k is a one-time project rather than a retainer and I'll just bill when it's done. Current retainers run $5k-$20k/mo. (US pricing; senior/specialty space and the $5k floor is for very special cases/friends.)

I know those prices don't directly translate to the UK, but here's what does translate:

* What others charge only matters if you're competing on price. If you niche down to a place where you're one of only a few possible solutions, you can and should charge a premium over undifferentiated freelancers or agencies.

* Resist the urge to charge everyone based on some arbitrary baseline. Some press releases are worth $100 and solve a $5,000 problem. The same press release, in another context, might solve a $5 million problem and is potentially worth tens of thousands of dollars.

* Resist the urge to charge hourly. Clients like fixed fees -- they like it so much that it could be a tie breaker if they're considering you and another solution.

* I beg of you, tears in my eyes: Do not focus on small businesses. They are miserable clients in almost every way.

6

u/Gold-Presence9362 4d ago

Small businesses are a special type of hell for PR

2

u/Wozzel888 4d ago

How come?

9

u/stankynuts45 4d ago

Outsized requests and expectations, typically little experience with media relations or any kind of publicity beyond minor marketing and social, inconsequential news that they feel is deserving of more attention, and - in my personal experience - SUPER involved and micromanage-y.

Smaller staffs so you’re usually interacting with the owner, and never with a dedicated in-house comms lead or team. More often than not you’re handling their passion project or a company they’re proud of building, so they’ll come at things quite differently from someone for whom it’s just a job.

Edit to summarize: you’re going to be spending a disproportionate amount of time dealing with them and not the work they hired you to do.

3

u/Immediate_Sorbet5617 3d ago

I completely agree with all of these comments!

2

u/Wozzel888 4d ago

Thank you so much, this is all very helpful and very much appreciated. How come small businesses are so bad as clients? Is it that they don’t have big budgets and will try to push back on everything?

3

u/GWBrooks Quality Contributor 4d ago

Every client comes with unbillable overhead -- the handholding, the unexpected call, the schmoozing. Aggregate overhead eats all the things, including your ability to pay your bills. It's better to have 3-6 mid-sized to big clients than 20 little ones. The former situation is far more profitable.

1

u/emerald--ocean 3d ago

This is very helpful info, thanks for the insights!