Making the Transition pt.7 – Knowing When to Say When
In this vid I discuss the need to set boundaries about what we offer to clients up front. I also talk about the ways to set these boundaries so that we don’t get caught working for free.
I would love to hear your thoughts on this topic. When is it ok to provide services up front to land a project? Do you educate the client?
This vidcast is sponsored by Cherrp and Solv Interactive.
I’ll pay you if i like it. Nice. Yea, I get emails like that from time to time (I know we all do!)
A lot of what is unnerving about this really came to light for me when a friend of mine told me about this idea how she wanted to start a website for people to donate money to pay off her debt, so that she could quit her job and travel.
When she said this, being the internet/social media/blog/marketing nerd that I am, I went off on a ton of ideas about travel blogging, and community – creating a brand around her and her travel that could fund this endeavor.
Her response was “no, i don’t want to work at it, i just want people to give me money. The whole point is that i’m not working. You should design it for me, and market it — and then… after I get enough to pay off all my debts, i’ll cut you in on a percentage!”
Ummm.. right.
She could see the look on my face saying “you have got to be kidding!”
She quickly followed up with “I’ve heard of people making a lot of money with stuff like this! You could get like a couple grand!”
Wow… a couple grand you say!!??!!? (yes, that is sarcasm)
I asked her “well, if you belive in this business venture and you really see a lucrative gain out of it, how about I quote you on the project and you invest that to get it off the ground. With all the money you make, you should recoup your investment in no time, right?”
Her: “I don’t have any money to invest right now!”
Me: “So you want me to invest money in your business?”
People asking for free work are really saying that they are not willing to invest their own money into a project and yet, believe that YOU should. THAT is complete insanity!!!!
I was able to state this pretty clear and dry to my friend and she understood how crazy what she was asking was. But, with possible clients I usually take a gentler approach.
I get them a quote on the work and let them know that I understand what an investment it can be, I offer to break the project into chunks so they could commit to doing an initial strategy meeting and concepting round – but if after that they arent happy with the direction, we can go our own ways. I offer to give them a quote for work they could get that will fit into their budget (if they will share that info with me.)
If course there was the time I went through this and got a message back saying their budget was $50. Hmmm…
First off excellent video and advice. I am not a designer so forgive me if I do not know what I’m talking about. As somebody that is not a designer I think that a lot of people want to see the product first because they just don’t want to pay a lot of money for something they might not like. I agree you should never work for free and I respect that clients can look at your portfolio and get an idea of your style. How do you come to a conclusion of a product that the client is happy with? By not showing them any design up front, does it cost you more time in the end editing and revising? What do you do if the client is totally unhappy with the final product? Throw it away and start from scratch or force the client to accept something they don’t like? I guess you can come up with a basic idea of what they want before you start the design but this still doesn’t give the client the satisfaction of knowing what they are paying for before they see anything. Isn’t it kind of like buying a car without driving it first?
Jonathon, I would have to disagree in comparing custom design work to a new Car purchase. If you drive a car and not like it, you can simply walk away. But if you consume a designers time at any extent, the designer is out 100%. If you expect a designer to spend any amount of creative time on a project in hope of compensation, this is when the situation falls into the category of SPEC work.
I understand that the client would love to see what their product will look like, especially when spending any amount of money. Who wouldn’t love this? But this is when a portfolio and work samples come into play.. You found the designer not the other way around. “Trust is crucial for this to work” While expectations should be set to a minimum.
The customer needs to do his or her research before consuming a professionals short amount of time. No matter the size of the company! The customer needs to understand that all projects are different on every level and require serious customer satisfaction. Nothing further should be expected from the client.
It is the designers job to make sure he or she asks all the right questions so that the end product is in every way what the client wanted. Also avoiding a project that is rejected 10-100% of the way. This is why most require 50% down.
-To make a design job successful takes energy from both sides of the party.
.-= [author]´s last blog ..m.briannotbryan.com is now mobile =-.
Yea, you can’t compare hiring a designer to a consumer product like a car.
Think more about professional services, like a lawyer, a hair stylist, a doctor. You don’t ask any of them to give you their service and only pay them if you win the case, look like a celebrity, or are cured. You ask for their service, their time and their expertise based on the work you know of them, and you agree to pay for that time.
Of course it is in NO professionals interest to deliver something the client isnt happy with – because our reputation is what brings us future clients. But, we are selling a custom tailored, dedicated, one-of-a-kind professional service, not a mass produced product.
.-= [author]´s last blog ..Inspirational Quotes for Freelancers =-.
Wow great comments here gang, thanks for taking the time to share your thoughts. It is cool to see good discussion as opposed to flaming.
Thanks for your questions Jonathan… I hope that Liz, and Brian’s responses were helpful. If you have more questions or would like to chat a bit more feel free to shoot me an email aaron@thisisaaronslife.com
Thanks for the responses. Liz I like that you compared it to services from a lawyer or hair stylist it puts the whole thing in a different perspective. If the client insisted on seeing the work first would you ever consider doing mockup or spec work for a fee such as a lawyer would charge for a consulting fee? What is the best solution as you would not want to turn a client away?
We turn down lots of strangers that want free work or just don’t understand how much creative work truly cost. (one of the hazards of a small town, I’m sorry ma’am but we can’t do a logo for $30) Most of the time people are very understanding when we explain to them the amount of hours that go into creating a custom piece for them. I think a lot of non-creatives think we walk around with a giant santa sack full of logos, websites, and brand strategies and we can just grab one whenever.
You’ll notice I said we’ve turned down lots of strangers, cause those are easy. The hardest part about knowing when to say when is with your friends. As soon as we launched we immediately had tons of friends approach us with projects that would “only take a minute”. These projects would then snowball into burning a days worth of work on revisions and seeing $50 out of the whole deal. I don’t think our friends didn’t intentionally respect out time, but again they just didn’t understand that when we’re helping them with something we’re essentially burning our time we have set aside for other (paying) clients.
After about a month of doing friend discounts and helping out buddies we decided to put and end to our discount system or rather discounts at all. In reality 30-40% of our clients are probably going to be people we know and giving away 30 percent of your income is just a bad business model. haha
We found out that friends forgive, and are also more likely to listen and understand when you describe the creative process. Some of them even find the money to start the project anyway.
Jonathan, Ive done plenty of consults with clients for free – some pan out, some don’t. But i wouldn’t consider doing design for free. Glad you mentioned the lawyer consult — it’s along the same lines. They may meet with you and give you some free advice, give you some glimpses into other experience they have that are similar to yours so you feel assured in hiring them… but, they aren’t going to say “ok, i’ll do the first day of trial for free and if it goes well you can start paying me.”
But, on another hand, like lawyers, I take on a pro-bono or charity client every year. This is one organization or startup that I see as remarkable and in need of my services, I usually work with them on trade, on a high discount or for free depending on their resources.
I once heard someone use the phrase “respect the art of business.” I think this video goes hand in hand with that quote.
Like, Aaron, I’ve done work on spec for those big, once in a life time sort of jobs and when time allowed – it paid off greatly for my business. I’ve also done spec work for clients who I trust, who have paid me in the past and I know will come through for me if I make them look good. And I’ve done spec work when it means I learn something from it that I can’t pay to learn anywhere else.
But money making jobs always get my attention first. If I’m not making money, then I’m not in a position where I can offer excellent service. If I don’t have cash, I don’t have access to the tools I need to make your product really great.
It’s important as a freelancer or a business owner to respect the art of business in order to assure that your business will flourish. By respecting your own business, other people will respect your business too.
Great post Aaron. Your video blogs are inspiring and helpful.