One day, my mother asked me “How much does it cost to make a website?” After pausing for a moment, I responded with “How long is a piece of string?”

Through my years of designing and building websites, I have learned a thing or two about communicating with clients who have no background or understanding of design or code. I bet we have at least one or two horror stories where dream projects ended up as disasters because of this.

Besides pushing pixels, our secondary job as professional designers is to educate clients the importance of design and best practices. But sometimes, no matter how much we try to explain the negative impact their decisions will have, they don’t seem to understand.

A Picture’s Worth a Thousand Words

I have found a few websites and videos which successfully illustrate my frustrations. Although I have never done this, I often feel like I should share these with clients during kick-off meetings to not only humor them, but to help them understand the things we want to avoid during our engagement or any future engagements with other designers.

How a Web Design Goes Straight to Hell

The Oatmeal does an excellent job of sarcastically poking fun of everything in his distinctive, illustrative style. This particular comic caught my eye because I could relate to this all too common story: A client butchering your original design through constant and unneeded revisions.

The client has completely forgotten that they hired you, the web designer, to build them a great product.

The Process (a.k.a. Designing The Stop Sign Video)

This four minute video cleverly pokes fun of the design-by-committee process. With any project, I believe there should be a single leader in charge giving feedback; one who understands design and its process or one who trusts their designer to make the right decision for them.

Maybe we do pink [stop] signs in the female intersection zones and blue ones in the male ones.

What Is Spec Work?

Speculative work is one thing I loathe the most. It surprises me the most that some designers aren’t aware of what this is or that they may be contributing to the problem. If you have ever used 99designs, I am talking to you.

This two minute video clearly explains what spec work is and the negative impact it has on others and the industry. I could go on about it, but here are a few professional outlets which describe the problem and solutions:

• AIGA — Position on Spec Work
• ANTISPEC — I am a design hero
• Treehouse — To Spec or Not to Spec
• NO!SPEC — Info for designers

Could you ask several chefs to prepare your next meal for free and only pay for the best one?

Job Titles In The Web Industry

Whether you are in the web industry or not, you probably hear all these (sometimes foreign) terms thrown around: UX! UI! IT! SEO! More like, WTF?

Chris Coyier breaks down some of these terms so you can use them properly as well as understand what each role is responsible for.

Since they are out there and we use them, there should be some consistency to their definition.

How Much To Make An App

If a client has no understanding of what it takes to build a phone application, a first-time estimate may knock them off their seats. This simple to use estimator may help eliminate sticker shock.

I feel these estimates are pretty conservative, but at least clients will learn that it costs more than a couple of hundred dollars to build and design an application correctly.

Estimate the cost of an app easily using this handy tool.

As I have mentioned, I feel it is important as a professional designer to help educate others the importance of best practices in the industry. If you are a non-designer or are curious to learn more about the process of web design, I invite you to join me in March where I will cover these things and more.

I’m sure there are many other resources out there that I am missing, but these appealed to me the most because of its use of visuals and clear explanations. Adding a little humor helps connect others in understanding what is trying to be explained.

If you have a video or site you would like to share, please comment!