[LorEye]

I recently had trouble with a local realtor who was interested in a website. We met a few times to discuss what he would need, and what he was looking for. By our third meeting (free of charge, BTW) he said that his buddy was going to do it for him for free, and there was a website that had a free "build your own website" wizard. And they were going to use that.

I was pissed... and I even showed it a little. But I didn't know how to keep my cool and convince him to let me do his webpage without sounding desperate. I tried to tell him that this "build your own webpage" thing was very impersonal and unoriginal.

What else could I have said and done to keep this guy on the hook?

[vince]

The best thing that you can do is show him what you can offer and how it can improve his business...say for example...an italian restaurant is looking for a website redone...maybe they arent so much in need of a new design and they might become unmotivated if that is there only thing...but if you show them...hey look we can add a recipe of the week so that your customers will keep coming back to your site and this could improve your business via word of mouth...customers say to their friends, "hey have you heard of that italian place that has those awesome recipes online every week?"...friend "no...ill check it out...always looking for recipes.."

Something like that.

[Dusteh]

There is nothing you can do except ask them how much they value their business. Does a free, shoddily made impersonal website reflect the quality of their business? If their answer is yes, then fuck em.... the client does not deserve design work, or success.

[NIXONlive]

Designers & companys always talk them selves up, say how your a "PROFESSIONAL" and how what you could make would be 100x better then what they where about to "Waste" their time with. bla bla its how the whole industry works.

[pedge]

I have a sign behind my desk in my office which quotes Red Adair (he put out oil rig fires for those who don't know who he was (and he pegged it in 2004)) and it is just as relevant to our business...

If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur.

[bluesage]

I just suffered a similar event when a client told me he met a school buddy who would do it for free. harsh but life goes on...I always say its their loss not mine

[pgo]

You get what you pay for. If you pay nothing, you going to get the same.

[lucidcreations]

Originally Posted by pedge

I have a sign behind my desk in my office which quotes Red Adair (he put out oil rig fires for those who don't know who he was (and he pegged it in 2004)) and it is just as relevant to our business...

If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur.

I once quoted a client for a site who then went to a rival agency who made the same "sort of" site for half the price. A few months later they came back to us and said the site they'd had built was rubbish could we look at fixing it! I said no and gave them a quote for the the whole site to be designed and developed as per the previous estimate with a little added on top because of course my prices had gone up since year end. So because of their penny pinching (which we all do sometimes) they paid for the same site one and a half times.

[chazthetic]

Like what Vince said, you need to tell them why they should use you and not the cost effective alternative. How you can improve their customer experience and help to build their business, the value of their investment, etc. etc.

If they aren't interested after you've expressed all this, then they not that concerned with growing their business and you probably don't want them as a client anyway.

[Takeshy]

Hy, new guy here

This topic caught my attention because it remembered me of someone that did the same thing.

So the guy was looking for a very good site (in his opinion) but wasn't ready to pay what it worth. So I droped the deal and another fool was eagerly to step in. He did the site and there is where the troubles started. The guy got the cash and turned in a lousy site (horible) after the client turned to be the "client from hell" caling him at night, changes after changes, not paing the afterhours. Got a lot of bad input from everywhere so he decided to "invest" again into a new site, but old habits don't go this fast, he just trown in a few bucks. Not merelly what it worth. Again same story, new guy, new design, new horible design, new bad imput.

You would say that he had it enought? He went like this 4 times and spent more that he would have give in the first place to make it good, and the site is still looking shity.

The best thing you can do is to let him realise how important his business is and it will sufer do to his decisions. And if it started like "the neighbour's kid can do it for free" is a client that you don't really need to work with beacouse he will always consider that he overpayed and that he owns you.

Bye

[freelancr]

Originally Posted by pedge

I have a sign behind my desk in my office which quotes Red Adair (he put out oil rig fires for those who don't know who he was (and he pegged it in 2004)) and it is just as relevant to our business...

If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur.

cool quote