🧮 Build A Price Calculator For Your Services In 10 Minutes

There’s a moment in every “how much do you charge?” conversation where the customer wants a number and you want to say “well, it depends”, because it genuinely does. Depends on the size of the garden, the number of bridesmaids, how many pages, whether they want the premium finish. So you either quote high and lose them, quote low and resent it, or say “let me get back to you” and enter the quoting doldrums for three days.

Here’s the third option almost nobody running a small business knows exists: Claude can build you an actual working calculator. Buttons, dropdowns, a price that updates as they click. Not a mock-up, a little interactive page you can send as a link, plus a spreadsheet version you keep for yourself. The clickable part is a Claude feature called artifacts, and the first draft takes about ten minutes.

Step 1: Describe it like you’d describe it to a person

No code, no jargon. Open Claude and tell it what you sell:

Nick this one, fill in yours:

You're building me a working price calculator for my business, the interactive kind I can click, not a description of one.

My business: [e.g. "mobile dog grooming, three towns"]
How my pricing actually works: [explain it like you'd explain it to a friend. e.g. "£35 small dog, £45 medium, £60 large. Plus £10 if they're badly matted. Plus £8 call-out outside town. Never under £35"]

Build it with:
1. Every price in its own clearly labelled box at the top, so I can change a number later without coming back to you.
2. A dropdown or button for each option, and a total that updates live as they click.
3. My business name "[name]" at the top, colours [yours, or "clean and friendly"], and text big enough to read on a phone in daylight.
4. A line at the bottom saying "This is an estimate, final quote confirmed after we chat", plus a "Get in touch" button linking to [your email or booking page].
5. Then build the same calculator as a downloadable spreadsheet, with my prices in labelled cells at the top and the total worked out by formula, so I can change a price in one place and quote from it myself.

Rules: no jargon anywhere a customer can see it, English spelling, and don't invent prices or add options I didn't give you. If my pricing doesn't fit neatly into options, tell me rather than flattening it.

Ask me up to three questions before you start.

Claude builds it in front of you, in the side panel, working. Click the buttons and watch the number change. It’s a strange little thrill the first time, like a vending machine lighting up.

You end up holding two things: the clickable version to send people, and a spreadsheet with your prices in it that you can edit forever without opening Claude again. Building files does eat your allowance faster than chatting, so if it asks you to come back later, nothing’s broken.

Step 2: Argue with it until it’s right (~5 min)

The first draft will be 80% there. Fix the rest in plain English: “The weekend surcharge should be 20%, not a flat £40.” “Add a dropdown for how many rooms.” “Make the total bigger, my customers are my mum’s age.” Each instruction, it rebuilds. This part is weirdly enjoyable & you should let yourself enjoy it.

Step 3: Send it into the world (~1 min)

Use the share option on the artifact and Claude gives you a link anyone can open, with no Claude account needed on their end. Text it to a customer mid-conversation. Put it in your Instagram bio. Add it to your quote emails: “Want a ballpark first? Play with this.”

What this could look like

Say you’re a social media manager who prices by platform count, posts per week, and whether stories & engagement are included, with a discount for a quarterly commitment. That’s a few dropdowns and a checkbox. Most of the time goes on wording the questions, like “how often do you actually want to post?”. Then, instead of answering “how much do you charge?” from scratch in every DM, you send one link, and people can see for themselves that daily posts on several platforms costs more than they’d hoped. The calculator has the awkward conversation so you don’t have to.

The honest bit

This is an estimate machine. It doesn’t take payment or bookings, and the “estimate only” line is what keeps a tap on a screen from becoming a promise you didn’t mean to make. Keep your real pricing judgement for the real quote. The link needs the internet & a modern phone, which is everyone now, but grandad’s work laptop running a browser from 2011 may sulk. And if your pricing genuinely can’t be reduced to options (some can’t), a calculator will flatten something that shouldn’t be flat. That’s not a failure. “It depends, let’s talk” is sometimes the honest price.

The one to do first

Build the rough version tonight, ten minutes, and don’t show anyone yet. Just click your own buttons and notice which options felt wrong. That discomfort is your actual pricing brain waking up, and it’s worth more than the calculator. Then fix it & send it to one friendly customer for a reaction.

That’s one awkward conversation handed over. The Claude Kickstart does the same for four more of them, set up around your actual trade and sounding like you. £47, one weekend.