My Biggest Freelance Client Mistakes
If you are a freelancer, contract designer or design consultant, I think it’s safe to say that when most of us are starting out, we have no clue what were doing when it comes to dealing with clients on a one on one capacity. If you worked at an agency or in-house design team like I did you had an AE (account executive) or project manager to handle the one on one client meetings. They provided a buffer for all us designers to focus on the design rather than fielding clients emails and phone calls. However, once you become a one man/women design studio–client relations now falls on you.
The luxury of staying in your design bubble is gone and you are now entering the world of running a small business and directly handling clients needs yourself. It’s not hard to learn how to read and navigate your client interactions, it’s a learnt skill that you simply have not mastered, yet. It can be confusing and even frustrating in the beginning but I’m hoping that by sharing some of my biggest client mistakes with you, you will learn how to avoid the same mistakes. So here go…
Working without a contract
This is one you have probably heard a lot, and there are many different philosophies’s on the subject but in my early days, when I hadn’t yet learned to trust my gut about a shady client, using a contract would have saved me a lot of time, haggling and put more cash in my pocket. When you are just starting out learning how to navigate the tricky landscape that is the land of clients it can be overwhelming, which causes you to overlook a lot of little details.
The beauty of a contract is you can shape it any way you like, carefully laying out what the client can expect from you, the timeline of deliverables and the terms. This helps avoid any confusion later on as to what is to be handed over and what is not. It can also help to ensure your client adheres to the agreed upon a number of revisions (if this is not specified, it can be never ending), as well as keeping the client honest. It doesn’t happen often, but occasionally a client will try to slip something in without paying the extra cost for it, then argue with you about why it should have been included.
As you learn to navigate this new world of client relations you will learn to trust your instincts about people and may be more comfortable and confident dealing with new clients without the need of a contract. I have my regular clients that I no long need to worry about contracts with, we have a long-standing relationship built on our trust of one another. Today I tend to use contracts less and less as the majority of my new clients come to me from existing clients who can vouch for them. I have learned to listen my gut, and to trust it more regularly and I can usually tell from our first meeting whether or not a contract needs to be put in place with a new client or not. Don’t be afraid to a contract for your first year or two of freelancing. I wish I had implemented them from the beginning when I was just starting out.
Learn to screen your clients
Working with people can be tricky, working with people you don’t know can be even trickier. While learning to read people takes practice and you will become better at it over time, there are a few things you can do early on to help you avoid working with that over demanding client that thinks you only work for them. Or that client who has no idea what they want, but they’ll know it when they see it (4 months and hundreds of ideas later).
While it’s important to figure out what kinds of clients you want to work with, it’s more important to figure out what kind you don’t want to work with. You can do this coming up with a few questions to ask them in your initial meeting. Here are a few of the questions I use and why:
- Do you hire freelancers regularly?
It’s good to know if they have worked with freelancers in the past this tells me that they understand the process and require less hand-holding during the process. If they are new to the experience they will more than likely require a bit of design education in the process.
How closely have you worked with your designers in the past?
This tells me if they are an overbearing client who will likely want to tell me how to design the project from start to finish without considering my suggestions or if they will be more trusting of my expertise. - If you had to pick one, which is most important to you quality, price or speed?
This question is telling for many reasons if they are seeking quality (which I prefer) they are usually open to out of the box thinking and discovery. Price conscious clients usually mean they want the best design they can get for their price cap, and a client who just wants it done as fast as possible doesn’t care much about the design at all, they are just looking for a filler design to have “something” to show and want it as cheap as possible. - How often you need updates on project status?
If a client has been through the process before and understands the process takes time and the computer doesn’t just magically spit out a stellar design in a day. This helps me gauge whether or not they trust my skills and professionalism or if they think I’m just biding my time with freelance work until I can get a “real” job. Yes, I actually had someone say that to me. - What is the main purpose/goal of the project?
If the client can’t tell you what the goal of their own project is and what they are trying to achieve, how are they going to tell you important information you need to know to give them the best design possible? If their main focus is targeting women who are new mothers, you need to know that or the design will be absolutely useless to your client. - What does design mean to you?
If they say something like “we just need to pretty it up” they have no business being in charge of a company design project, It happens; a lot. If they say something like, “we really want our customers to understand how to do XYZ or how our process works…” they have a much better understanding and I will have no trouble communicating with them about the decisions I’ve made with the design.
These are questions that I use in our initial conversation that helps me decide if this client is a good fit for me to work with. Trust me when I tell you, there is nothing worst than working with a client who makes your job more difficult every step of the way, fight you on every decision. This will only make for a very long process that will more than likely result in the client ending up with a half-assed design that neither of you will be happy with.
Not Finding out the clients budget up front
You finally landed a meeting with that great client/company you’ve been looking for. Your excitement level is through the roof. In all the excitement at the possibilities, this may hold for you, you leave the meeting without knowing that all-important answer. What is the budget for this client/project and is it worth your time and effort?
Budgets can be a tricky thing sometimes. I’ve had clients I really wanted to work with who had virtually no budget for what they needed. I’ve also had clients who have budgets for days but only want to spend a percentage of it. And then you have the clients I couldn’t get away from, in the beginning, the kind who were simply shopping around looking a bargain.
I know what your thinking, “But I hate talking about money”. I hated discussing money to, but here’s the thing — if you want to be profitable and make a living from freelance work, money is a necessity and the quicker you get comfortable with discussing it the better off you will be. I always felt awkward about it and very unsure of what I should be charging, am I charging too little, or not enough? It was a conversation I was never comfortable with so if the client didn’t mention a budget, I didn’t ask.
I would go home excited about the prospect pour hours into my proposal to send back the client the next morning, only to receive an almost immediate response that said something like “That much?” After a few of these, it was clear the client wasn’t actually reading the proposal at all, they were just looking for that bottom line cost and it was more than they were willing to pay.
I had to learn the hard way, some potential clients just don’t see the value in design no matter how much experience is behind it. They view it as a necessity to their business, because everyone else is doing it, rather than as an asset that can help shape their company or product.
While design, in general, is more appreciated today that it was a decade ago, thank in part to companies like Apple. Many people still don’t see the true value in good design and will always expect to pay less than they should. Do yourself a favor, once the scope of the project is discussed, immediately follow up with a question about the budget. You will save yourself a lot of time and work if they are not willing to pay for what they are asking for.
Not discussing that the price is subject to change if the scope of work changes
This may seem like common sense, I know it did for me. If the client adds to the scope of work in the middle of an ongoing project; it seems natural that the cost of the project would also go up. But I can’t tell you how many times a client, typical a new client, shoots me an email halfway through the project to add in one more set of icons, a banner ad, a flyer or whatever thing they just realized they were going to need and expecting the price to remain the same. They figure, well since you’re already doing the work, just add this in real quick, it’s no biggie.
Only to get a phone call upon receiving the final invoice with a higher price than expected due to the extra work with a confused client as to why I am charging more, even though it’s listed in detail on the invoice. I’ve even been scrolled by a client for not making it clear that they would be charged “extra” for the extra work. I’ve lost out on a several hundred dollars for not making this clear up front and not wanting to get into a “thing” with the client about it. In the end, I sucked it up and took the loss because I felt like it was my responsibility for not communicating this to the client in the beginning or at the very least before I did the extra work.
After a few of these mishaps, I built this into my contracts making sure that the client knew, if the scope of work changed, they should also expect the price to change along with it. I don’t think all these clients were ignorant about adding to the agreed upon workload resulting in a new price point. A few were just being sneaky and hoping to get some extra work done for free. Some just honestly didn’t understand the process, and some just understood and had no problem paying for the extra work. But you never know which kind of client you will end up with, so it’s best to cover your bases up front.
Don’t become too available to your clients
I know this sounds like the opposite advice you should be hearing, but Being too available for your clients can cause a lot of unnecessary problems. You should absolutely take care of your clients and communicate with them throughout the project. What I’m talking about goes beyond the normal client communications. Let me explain…
In the beginning, I wanted my clients to know they could reach me at any time, and while most didn’t abuse this rule a few did. I would get sent an email at 10 o’clock at night and because I wasn’t at my computer or had my email shut off so I so focus on work I didn’t answer it. This would be followed by a panicked text saying something like “Are you there?????” followed by “I sent you an email, can you check it and get back me!!!!!” and god forbid I was sleeping because the unanswered texts were quickly followed by a phone call with the client upset that I didn’t respond to their prior attempts. If it was actually a project emergency that was time sensitive I understand, but a client feeling the need to bombard me with their “ideas” at all hours of the night is not ok.
I have a family and other responsibilities that require my attention outside of work. In this case, the client just didn’t get it. I had several conversations with them about appropriate hours to contact me regarding the project, sent several emails of a schedule and nothing phased them. I finally had to flat out tell them, if they wanted my undivided attention day and night 24/7 I would require a retainer fee of five-thousand dollars a month and sent them a contract. The ridiculous around the clock communication stopped promptly after that.
It’s important to set times and guidelines for client communication from the very beginning. Do wait until you get the client that thinks you work solely for them and they have the right to bother you whenever they want to.
Not discussing how important it is for the client to stick to the schedule
We all know how important it is to stick to the schedule agreed upon my the client, in order for the client to launch their product or service on time. It’s also something clients worry about a lot when hiring you. “Can you make it happen by this deadline?” But just as important, maybe even more important is discussing with the client the importance of their timeliness on delivering copy, revisions, images or any other elements needed for you to hit your deadline.
I once had a client I worked with regularly, however, my usual contact was out on vacation at the start of the project. I was assured the person stepping in was up to the task to get the project started in order to meet the required deadline. I had designed this companies annual report for the past two years with no problems what so ever, always hitting my deadline early. I left my initial meeting with my new point of contact who would be looking over the first draft, with all the copy and photos I need to start the project. A week later I sent over the first rough draft to make sure we were heading in the right direction and for them to go over the copy once again. My contact was supposed to get me the revisions one week later. The week came and went. The following Monday I sent an email asking if the revisions were ready for me. Nothing. The following day, I called and was forced to leave a voice mail. Again, nothing. That Friday I sent another email explaining the importance of her sticking to the deadlines we discussed to keep the project on schedule.
The second week, I finally received the revisions and I was now a week behind schedule. The burden of making up time feel on me. I made the deadline but just barely as that same scenario played out a couple more times over the duration of the project, all falling on me to make up the lost time. This resulted in me handing in work, that was not my best effort. Looking back at that report, all the things I could have done better immediately pop out at me.
You don’t have to go about these process the way I did, but the questions are important to ask. Find your own way to work them into client meetings or questionnaires. In the beginning, I felt like I was being too picky by asking such specific questions, but during the process, I realized it helps me to better understand my client’s individual needs and wants without guessing and getting it wrong. And at the end of the day, it’s about doing what’s best for your client and the project.
I hope these were helpful to you and if you have any questions get in touch with me on Twitter @hellodomeier
**This post first appeared on my blog Communicating Long-Form
