Forum Moderators: mack
after 10 sketches i have to admit i was sick of the "actually could you try a darker shade of green". now we have finally agreed on a design and i started coding, but its not at all a design i like. they want no sidebars, insist on drop down menus, crap color scheme, disastrous SEO (by refusing to let me insert keywords) etc.
in addition to that, i was so eager to get the design finished, i sketched things that i dont know how to code. im also dissapointed its taking more than three months to create a 10 page static website.
id like to hear how others deal with these issues?
but its not at all a design i like
That's the fate all (web-)designers face sooner or later. Better sooner. Taste is personal. Taste is unique. And even though there are some established design concepts, there will never be THE right approach.
However if you really, really are convinced that the choice of color is contraproductive, try to prove it. Suggest to make a micro survey. A test-run with different designs. But if he insists, then think of who is going to pay your bill after all...
As for refusing SEO: what have you contracted for? Design? Optimization? Both? again, suggest a test-run. Make one page the way he wants it, make a second page optimized, and consult the logfiles after a few weeks.
The first customer is the one where you learn the most!
after 10 sketches i have to admit i was sick of the "actually could you try a darker shade of green". now we have finally agreed on a design and i started coding, but its not at all a design i like.
It's a delicate situation, and it's very frustrating. I came up with what I thought was a nice concept. Showed it to a few people who agreed the design looked clean, professional. Client hates it. Wants something that your 13-year-old nephew could do. And since the client is paying as it is their site, I must concede.
You work hard to come up with something that is visualy pleasing, only to end up with something that is quite the opposite. Then you're supposed to put that in your portfolio to encourage more clients?
Right now, I'm waiting for approval on another concept I submitted to the client. I'm trying to take their suggestions/wishes in mind, and tweek them a bit to make it more professional and visually pleasing. Also keep trying to offer explainations of why I do certain things so that the client will understand. With hopes that they will eventually let go of their yearning for blinking text and fade-in/out effects.
I guess it's just what we have to deal with.
[webmasterworld.com...]
I came up with what I thought was a nice concept. Showed it to a few people who agreed the design looked clean, professional. Client hates it. Wants something that your 13-year-old nephew could do.
Heh! This has happened to me twice in the past few weeks. The first time, the client came to me with a page he found and wanted his page to look similar. I took several design elements from the page he gave me but developed his slightly differently. He took one look at my version and said, "But I wanted it to look like this other one!" And then proceeded to change it so it was nearly identical to someone else's work.
Then I designed a simple graphic for someone. Very basic, but it had some pretty common design elements in it. I gave it a teeny little flair so that it would be more than just a bunch of black and white text. A few days later, I saw what the client had done with it. He had opened photoshop and removed the one bit of flair, and then screwed with the fonts and sizing of the other wording so that it looked like ... "something that your 13-year-old nephew could do."
Oh well. I just have to remind myself that he's the one who has to be happy with the work. Reminds me a little of an old boss of mine, though, who liked to practice seagull management. (You know ... wait until you're done perfecting your work, then he flies in and throws feathers and bird droppings all over it.)
Very often what the want is not what we woudl idealy like to provide. We have to just go with the flow in those situations. Imagine you went into a car dealer, and told them your exact specification, then the sales guy starts telling you what he would want you to buy lol.
What we have to do is remember that the client knows their industry lot better than we do. Perhaps thay know what sort of image will perform better.
Alternativly send a copy of your ideal design to any company that is their competition, see if they will go with it :)
Mack.
The first client can be the hardest and you'll learn a great deal from the process so don't be disheartened. What you'll find as you put together more and more sites that you will become less concerned about the aesthetics and more concerned with delivering to your brief on time. You'll probably never stop liking webdesign but when isn't new territory any more it becomes work, 'bringing home the bread' as it were.
Who knows your next client may well be a dream come true and give you free reign ;)
Having said that - it is ot fair to you to have to do endless rounds of specs. One way we have overcome that fun trap - is to devise a contract that puts a maximum of how many original ideas you will present. After that, you may want to consider additional charges. Break your contract up into 3 parts - payment for the creative process up front (1/3rd), payment after creative has been approved (2nd 1/3rd) and payment upon completion of the work (final payment) I think you will find that clients will make a lot less of the 'gratutitous' changes if they know it will cost them and they will look more carefully at the proof itself instead of making one change here - one change there. Of course, the way you structure your contract should also be basedon your level of design experience/ability. Clients do not want to pay for your learning curve - so plan on billing accordingly. An experinced designer may take half the time to do something you are just learning - so you shoudl really charge based on the time you think it would take you if you already knew it - not adding "learning time" into the factor.
