Please save me from this web design client

What does the client need. Are her changes reasonable. I know you don't want to build it, and I hate building citations but I still do them, my customers need them.

It is certainly OK to say this is an out of scope change, or even tell them why they do not need what they want.

She is your customer, you took her on, and if I hired you to do a website that needed some functionality, and you refused, I would fire you.

You need to manage expectations better and tell people up front the scope of work. If you step out of that scope of work, charge them for it.

I have a guy that has me change his background each month to see which drives more traffic. I cannot make him understand that he needs SEO (stubborn old ****), not a different background, but that is what he wants, and I do it. He thinks its a display ad, I guess., and if the color is right the site will get more traffic.

just send her an email with a new price line saying you will charge $xxx/h for being part of the conference call.

nonai said:

I posted yesterday about these useless conference calls. such a waste of time.

today we had another one for one hour. she is requesting a bunch things that 1) I dont know how to do 2) I dont want to do

the subject matter of the website is really exciting. it's about......ok, promise you won't get TOO excited..... it's about menopause. so fucking boring.
plus, in the amount of time it would take me to make this site, I could have SEOed a bunch of other sites and made 10x as much as she paid me.

I feel uncomfortable telling her "I dont want to do this"....because she might get mad, etc.

what do I do?

Please save me!

Click to expand...

OK.

I once got myself into this situation. I thought "oh I'll just outsource the bits I don't know how to do!" Big mistake.

My suggestion? Pay back her money, tell her to go to someone else and just insist she go to someone else. I had one client mess me around for 2 years. They'd come back, want radical changes, wanting to pay me less than minimal wage ("because we had a flat fee!") and then they'd stop replying to my emails and come back 6 months later claiming "I was sick" and if I didn't reply to their emails would get mad.

Yeah, no, if you don't know much about web design, take this problem client as a lesson that you have NO BUSINESS being a web developer and send 'em packing.

I think the reason you can't tell her is because she's hot, and you are playing a Don Juan with her
Just kidding, it's the way I pictured it at first.

My advice: Just go with the truth, but in a friendly way.. In a way that shows you understand her needs, but you ask her to understand yours too.. also mention the 10x profit you could do if you worked elswhere during this time you are loosing with her.

Best of luck!

I think maybe you should say - look my standard service I offer for Web Design is $x but now your asking for a more advanced Premium Service which is $X + $Y ... so you can take the $X price for that service -- or if you want me to continue then you need to pay more for the Premium Service.

Lesson learned for you -- when you quote a price make sure to detail what that price includes and include an option for any extra stuff that maybe required.

Pass on the job to someone (your friend, some member from BHW who would like to do it, whoever) who would bring some food home due to your kindness . Make someone happy and move on. Recommend him/her to the client and let them do business together. Open a thread about the available business and let one of the other members get it either free or for a small profit for you -- any thing that suits you, your client, and the new freelancer. Be open about it though on the forum as to why you are passing on that job and what's involved in it for everyone.

Do this every time you don't wish to do a particular job. Think of how much goodwill you'll create!


Or as someone suggests, outsource it (it still makes you the boss of the project).

HTH