So I had this guy contact me after he bought one of my items and wants me to create a few custom animations for him based on a few elements from my template. My template is here: https://videohive.net/item/handy-youtube-motion-graphics/23995638… So in my item/project/product I created a template for a facebook post (2:51 mark in the promo video). He wants that recreated but to fit his needs… along with a few alert pop ups… e.g share, like, subscribe etc and Im not sure what I should be charging for something like that. Advice on the internet from other motion graphics designers are in the hundreds 
. What do you guys charge for your freelance work or would charge for what I described above?. Also even all over the internet Motion Graphics pricing is so high. So how come for a minute video the pricing can be as high as $1000 - $1500 but with a FULL template with over 1000 elements like some authors on here have, the price can only go up to $65. I guess im not really understanding the big difference in pricing. Seems like we’re doing more for less? Or am I missing something? Thanks
The price goes up when you want something personalized.
I don’t work with graphics but i work with sound and music, I’m pretty sure the idea is pretty similar.
Things on envato sell for cheaper because we make products that can be used by anybody who buys them. The gold thing for the customer is that they are relatively cheap. The bad thing is…anybody who buys the item will also be using it.
Once you start working with customers who want personalized jobs done, you will be putting all your effort into one product that will be sold to one person and used by one person.
If your customer asks for some changes that are pretty general and you think others could use, you can sell that for a lower price but let the customer know that you will then add these changes to your item on envato, thus adding some extra elements to your item and possibly making it more desirable for other customer.
If he doesn’t agree and wants exclusive use of the new changes to the product then you can charge a lot more money but not resell after.
Thanks for replying. The difference is that it is custom/personalized work! 
Crazy thing is I asked for his budget and he is only willing to pay $100 and I’m thinking this is waaaaay too low to spend hours maybe days creating custom graphics (I’m having to come up with the pop ups from scratch). Anyways Id still also like to hear from other motion graphic designers on here aswell to see what kind of price they would put forward. Appreciate your reply, helpful.
The big difference between envato and other sites is as @BestSFX explained - economies of scale.
For example, you may sell an item for only $50 but if you then sell 1,000 copies (in theory you only need to do the work once) then it’s a great result.
There is also potential for that return to continue indefinitely, whereas with a private project - the fees may be higher but there will be a ceiling cost and it’s a one-off return.
In terms of your project - $100 would be an average hourly rate for most decent creatives on here.
If they argue it then send them to www.studio.envato.com (this is a polite way of rejecting work by the way) - they may find cheaper solutions but it’s not worth you losing sleep over.
I can almost guarantee that if you make concessions and do all that work for $100 then there will be more requests/tweaks/amends etc. that will come out during the process if they think that it is that cheap to create customised variations.
p.s. your item is great
In terms of your project - $100 would be an average hourly rate for most decent creatives on here.
That’s what most people on other forums were saying that it’s between $20 - $100 hrly based on how good you are. So im thinking if I charge this guy $100 for this pile of work im basically robbing myself.
I can almost guarantee that if you make concessions and do all that work for $100 then there will be more requests/tweaks/amends etc. that will come out during the process if they think that it is that cheap to create customised variations.
You are 100% right cause it started as a few small things he wanted done and it grew into this whole project now. Which im ok with if he is willing to pay me for my work. Anyways… Im curious what would your max price be for something like this? Im thinking of a counter offer so any advise on price range would be appreciated. I should mention also that this is my first client. Thanks in advance and thanks for the compliment
Unfortunately I am not an expert in video so am probably the wrong person to ask.
No problem. Thanks for responding and for the link
Can anyone else offer some advice?
Charlie gave you great replies already. The reason why the stuff here is cheap is because you can earn multiple times from one item. If you in the end got less earnings from an item than you would have charged for it as custom work, you can consider it a loss, but there is also the chance to earn more and it is a win.
Additionally, there is nobody telling you what to do and how it has to look like (besides of course the fact that it has to sell, so should at least has some kind of appeal to buyers 
) so you may even be fine with earning a bit less than for (more stressful) custom work.
As for the hourly rate, this of course depends on your living expenses etc but mainly, it depends on how you value your time.
The person offered you $100 for several days of work, you said.
Do you think your time is worth less than 100 USD per day? This is practically up to you, to decide.
I would decline the job right away, tbh.
edit: think about what you would like to earn per hour, then multiply it by 2, then multiply that with the amount of hours you need.
Why multiply by 2? because most probably, you will calculate too few hours or think of a too small hourly amount if this is your first job 
Thanks for your reply Creattive. I didn’t mean that I didnt appreciate Charlie’s response I just wanted to hear what other designers would charge. By the way all your points are great points and thanks for the knowledge at the end there. I’ll remember that for any future jobs I get…
I think after customers have bought templates on videohive they expect to pay the same low price for custom work. I certainly didn’t understand why people charged more for freelance work until you guys explained it. Anyways I think I’ll decline the work cause even when I was building the facebook post in my item I included above, it took me sometime to put everything together and then animate so it looks good and appealing for customers. Add 4 custom pop up alerts to that and I’m starting from an empty canvas i think that would take some time come up with ideas and then putting it onscreen then animating it…
Depends…On the type of work and project we get…Usually i got fair amount for content writing…So it totally depends on project work.
You should charge per hour of work. I charge 50$ per hours for custom work
Same reason why you can buy a console game for $50, but if you approach Ubisoft or EA and ask them to make you a custom game… it will probably be slightly more than $50. Maybe $100 or something.