You're thinking about time spent designing/coding as a commodity, which it isn't. A storefront selling widgets exists explicitly to handle a never-ending stream of potential customers, but the investment per customer is very low.
When someone calls and asks for days or weeks of my time to put a quote together (pre-sale & often without pay). And then, if the quote moves forward to billable work, there's an expectation that I'll immediately block off months of my time to hold up my end of the bargain.
I think the relationship is quite different than someone merely "selling something", and should be treated as such.
When someone calls and asks for days or weeks of my time to put a quote together (pre-sale & often without pay). And then, if the quote moves forward to billable work, there's an expectation that I'll immediately block off months of my time to hold up my end of the bargain.
I think the relationship is quite different than someone merely "selling something", and should be treated as such.