Comments on: 10 Reasons to Not Work With a Freelance Client

By: Kawika

Kawika — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 05:23:48 +0000

Good rules. It’s hard to tell the good clients at the beginning from the bad ones.

By: Update – Links – Love – 5 | The Nexus

Update – Links – Love – 5 | The Nexus — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 21:08:09 +0000

[...] who graced these hollow walls with a great post and must read for people considering doing online freelance work and if you need any freelance work done give her a [...]

By: Jaymie L. Conrad

Jaymie L. Conrad — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 15:04:06 +0000

Haa….. Funny funny funny, but i like the 10 rules. It is kind of true on how to dealing with any requests. You got to detect the bad ones at the beginning. Thanks for putting them together and share the thought, smile.

Jaymie
Pacific Timesheet

By: Lori

Lori — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 19:07:01 +0000

Great list Kim. Unfortunately, many of these things describe about 75% of my clients. Curious how long you will “fix” a site after completion. My clients seem to think that if something breaks, it is my fault because I built their site, even though it was working fine for months or years. Hard not to get sucked in to that, even if my contract clearly states otherwise.

By: Barbara Swafford

Barbara Swafford — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 19:44:43 +0000

Hi Kim,

What a great look behind the scenes of freelancing. Being in business (in the real world) is very similar, however, with them you can knock on their door if they don’t pay – or lien their project. After reading this, I see doing business online has it’s own set of circumstances, but it also appears you’re learning how to weed out the ones who are only wasting your precious time.

Fabulous post. I’m bookmarking this for future reference.

By: Kim Woodbridge

Kim Woodbridge — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 19:16:13 +0000

Hi Sharon – I’ve had that happen too. The person is completely fine – great to work with and then all of a sudden there is an abrupt shift. I find it often accompanies receiving an invoice.

By: Kim Woodbridge

Kim Woodbridge — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 19:14:19 +0000

Hi Adam – That’s a good point and understandable. I try to get a feel for the person’s level of experience so I know how to present info to them. ASAP just really gets on my nerves – it makes me want to work slower.

By: Kim Woodbridge

Kim Woodbridge — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 19:12:31 +0000

Hi Andrea – I remember that one One of the people on this list is driving me up the wall today – I’m either going to start charging him to just email me or filter his emails to the trash.

By: Sharon Dexer

Sharon Dexer — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 14:22:04 +0000

Good post. There are those clients, that no matter how well you do in planning and communication at the very start of the project, turn into “that client” as the project progresses. How I long for that “magic client fortune teller ball” that alerts us to those potential challenging relationships.

Thanks again.

By: Adam

Adam — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 13:53:43 +0000

Haha, I can definitely sympathize with a couple of these. What I run into the most are people who aren’t familiar with the process and don’t really understand the amount of work that’s involved in making that “one last little change.” I’ll definitely keep these experiences in mind whenever I need the services of someone else… (*note to self, never use ASAP!) =) Thanks, Kim.

By: Andrea_R

Andrea_R — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 13:52:16 +0000

As always, excellent insights. I’ve thankfully never had all of these rolled into one clients, but I have had a lot of them rolled into a couple. Once I realized I could fire clients, it was great – and I’ve since become pickier and raised my rates to boot.

I should tell you about the guy who had a “great ideer”. In his design, he didn’t want “a lot of thsoe boxes”.

I passed.

By: Kim Woodbridge

Kim Woodbridge — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 13:39:36 +0000

I prefer the people who know exactly what they want then the ones who have a vague idea about wanting something. Without really knowing someone it’s difficult for me to direct them.

By: Kim Woodbridge

Kim Woodbridge — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 13:38:36 +0000

Hi Jeff – Yes! Intuition is very important – sometimes you just know the person is going to be a problem. I’m not able to cherry pick yet but I am sub-contracting for 3 people now, which gives me consistent work and makes me feel more at ease about turning people down. I’ve only been doing this full time for 2 months so I’m still not perfectly clear on finances.

And you are an amazing designer so I’m sure you get the best clients

By: Jeff Starr

Jeff Starr — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 00:10:27 +0000

I usually go with an intuitive gut-level instinct that seems to have served me well over the years. Fortunately, as demand increases, so does your ability to “cherry-pick” your clients. At first, I remember justifying signing with a few less-than-desirable (as in, run far away and never look back) clients just because I needed the work. These days, I have been blessed with top-quality people and mutually beneficial business relationships. Thanks for the post

By: Kim Woodbridge

Kim Woodbridge — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 19:33:44 +0000

Hi – Sometimes you have to do that. When I was trying to work out one site, I was trying to get an idea of the client’s goals for it. All he kept saying was that he wanted to make a lot of money. Well, don’t we all. But that isn’t what I can for him.

By: Love Poems & Love Quotes

Love Poems & Love Quotes — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 17:30:49 +0000

It’s really all about brainstorming before asking what you want. It’s so obvious, but once they figure it out bodabing bodaboom. LOL can be frustrating dealing with this at times.

By: קידום אתרים

קידום אתרים — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 09:46:13 +0000

Great points, we had a client who wanted an Internet site, but couldn’t say exactly what he wanted, he could only say he didn’t like anything we showed or offered him. After a while of not saying what he wants and continually saying what he doesn’t want we decided to part our ways.

By: (Anti) Social-Lists 6/21/09 | (Anti) Social Development

(Anti) Social-Lists 6/21/09 | (Anti) Social Development — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 04:01:45 +0000

[...] 10 Reasons to Not Work With a Freelance Client – This is a guest post I did for Donace over at The Nexus while he’s vacationing away somewhere These example are true and some are a little funny. [...]

By: Kim Woodbridge

Kim Woodbridge — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 03:01:27 +0000

Hi George – Thanks! Do you have a sample of your questionnaire? I’d really like to see it – that might be able to save me some time and it probably helps weed out people who aren’t that serious.

You can always visit my site if you liked the article

By: George Egonut

George Egonut — Sat, 20 Jun 2009 15:21:30 +0000

You make some really excellent points. For me, I have been able to filter most of Problem #1 with a standard design questionnaire that I fire off along with my first response to a design request. I usually include a minimum turnaround time in my first response as well, as well as a rush rate for moving that date up. I also ALWAYS use a formal contract, although it is more time consuming. That’s just my paranoia showing.

This was a great guest article! I’d like to see more from you in the future!