Recently I’ve been side-tracked by some unusual events in my life.   There was my first visit to the high court, swiftly followed by my first visit to a creditors meeting -  but that’s a story for another day. ..

So distracted was I that I missed the publication of my guest posting on Joe Scanlon’s  – Five Things.  Ironically, my five things article relates to common pitfalls in the business of web design and how they can be avoided.

So if you missed it, you can read it at Joe’s place or you can read it here:

5 Things you should know about web design

1. Meetings, meetings, meetings – how necessary are they?
In reality, it is eminently possible to design a business website without ever meeting the client face to face, however most clients want to meet at least once and this will enable you to get a better feel for their business and web requirements. If the budget for the job can afford travelling to meetings then fine, factor these into your costs.

In general, taking a website from brief to launch should not include more than three meetings:

1. Initial introduction and brief
2. Content meeting – mostly superfluous as it can all be done by email. But some clients find it difficult to assemble their content so a meeting at this stage may be useful.
3. Training meeting – Only if the job includes a content management system (CMS)

2. Set goals for your projects. Decide how long it will take to deliver and stick firmly to your milestones. Make sure that the client knows that they will be required to respond to design approval and requests for content within a reasonable timeframe in order to meet deadlines.
You may also want to limit the number of rounds of changes and charge for extra. Otherwise jobs can pile up and seem never-ending which is neither good for your client or for you.

3. Compile as detailed a brief as possible ensuring that your client knows exactly what they are getting from the outset. A client may approve your quote to complete a simple brochure site and once they see it begin to take shape they add more and more as they may not have been able to visualise the extent of their requirements from the start.
You need to be able to refer back to the original quote and let them see that they will be charged for the extra work.

4. You decide what you charge for each job based on your experience and the value you place on your work. Don’t try to compete with low cost newbies and don’t and let the client talk you down to the stage that you resent working on their project.
Nobody likes to feel that their work is not valued so don’t be afraid to walk away if the client’s budget is below what you charge. Recession or not, other jobs will come along and you will be glad that you’re not busy working for ‘el cheapo’ client when they do.

5. Juggling projects. If your budget allows it, try to outsource all or parts of some of your projects so that you can take on multiple projects. Just make sure that you can communicate well with your designer or developer and work on building a trusting relationship with them.
Use an online project management tool such as: http://teamworkpm.net/ or http://www.proworkflow.com/ to keep track of your projects or build one to suit your own requirements.