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Any Advice for Starting a Web Design Business?
stizoked asks: "Although we both have full time jobs, my wife and I have been doing a little web design/development on the side for some extra cash. Since we've started, we've built up a nice little client list, one big enough for us to consider getting a little more serious about pursuing it as a business. Does anyone have any advice or experience that we can use to dodge young and stupid mistakes? Any advice on some open source project management software or other software that makes running a small business a little easier?"
Any Advice for Starting a Web Design Business?
yeah... dont !!
It's tough in the beginning. Heck, it's tough still.
;-)
To manage the projects I use a combination of Quicken and www.tutos.org.
Tutos allow you clients to login and view the progress your are making on their website.
A bonus for us is that we are also a small webhost so we provide the domain, the hosting, and the website all in one package. Most of our clients feel much better knowing they only deal with one team.
Here are some tips:
1) Get incorporated. I can't stress this enough!
2) Get insurance. You like your house right?
3) Give estimates first with a deadline. Without a deadline you will be in maintenance mode forever.
4) If things get too busy, you can always count on me to help you out
www.TTSIweb.com
Good luck!
Frank
This
Not about the technical or design parts of it, but about the Business parts of it. Assuming you are in the USA look up the Small Business Administration (www.sba.gov?) and go threw everything they have.
Another great resource is SCORE, which is the service corp of retired executives. My Grandfather used to work with them before he got too old. Its a lot of older folks who would love a chance to mentor someone young.
Oh and find a decent accountant.
Erlang Developer and podcaster
Develop your portfolio. Do some pages for your church, a favorite local charity, a group like the Lion's Club, or some club you are a member of. Do lots of them. Include links to your own company's page. Oh, and while you are at church/lion's club/etc., make sure that you say "Oh, and if I'm going to do this for the church, what can I do for you?" It's called networking.
Others suggested getting a corp right away. I actually would suggest that it's a bit premature at this stage. If you get into stuff with DB backends with client/customer data, then it makes sense. If you are doing puffery advertising type pages for local groups and businesses, hold off on the expense for a little while until you see if it is worth it.
What is preventing you from holding down your regular job as well as your new design jobs? Plenty of people who start new businesses wisely wind up working two full time jobs until the new business can support you. Or, segue into it. You work both, but your wife leaves her regular job to focus full time on the web work.
It's a rough environment to enter feet first these days. Anyone with a cracked copy of FrontPage fancies himself a web designer.
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
Get a deposit! Many a time have I spent putting together proposals, drafts, or even finished projects only to have the client do one of the following: Die, disappear, decide not to pay, or emigrate to China.
Linux, you magnificent bastard, I read the fucking manual!
It seems like everyone else is doing it.
-- ladies and gentlemen we are floating in space!
As other's have said. Don't. It's a losing proposition.
However, if you do persist in the notion that web design is a profitable small business, some points to consider.
First, always always always get the requirements in writing and have the customer sign off on them. When the customer changes their mind 75% through the project (which they always will) you can then legitimatly charge them more.
Second, charge what you're worth. Remember when doing charge sheets that unpaid documentation/beancounting will take up 40% or more of your time, have your prices reflect that.
Third, learn php and SQL. Webdev these days is generally not about static pages. If you can design your own implmentations of some of the more common applications, you can roll out projects and get a much higher return on your time. Prefabbed components are worth investing and coding in.
Mock up the entire website in pencil, and when you're showing it to the client, let the client "interact" with the environment.
In essence, don't do web design. It takes too much time, your customers take forever to pay, and it's not worth the aggrivation of keeping up with the various standards.
Get new clients
Sounds to me like you already have a business. I think that the most important thing is getting the word out. Since you already have a client list, you have a great start -- you have people who you have done work for in your community who can help you. I would suggest calling each and every one and letting them know that you are trying to turn this into a full time business. Ask them if they know of anyone who they know might be looking for web design.
Keep your existing clients.
Set up a quick php/mysql database or out look contact list with notes about each or your clients and the last time that they had work done.Set up an email to remind you three months from the last time you spoke to them, and give them a call. Tell them that you are just checking up, and seeing if they needed any updates to the site, etc. Make sure that you keep notes on the conversation that you have, so you can refer to the last conversation: "Oh, I tried that resturant that you reccomended, you were right, we love it." or "So how are those classes going?"
Advertise
It's expensive to get a full page advertisement in the local paper, but it might be worth it. It's not the only way, though: You can drive around and drop off mailers at small businesses, or offer to do a free seminar on how to use the internet to help your small business at the library or chamber of commerce or SBA, etc. It gets your name out and establishes you as a local "expert"
From what I understand, this is a very hard business to be in, with lots and lots of competition. You can do it, but your best product is your customer service and your best friend is word of mouth. Things like birthday cards help you stand out. Try as hard as possible to never to let anyone leave dissapointed with your service, or product: angry people talk a lot more that people who are satisfied, and it doesn't matter if they were wrong when they tell someone you "ripped them off", the person you told isn't going to take the chance.
good luck!RandomAndInteresting.comdefending the world from stupidity since 1979
Also, HOST! Once you've developed the site, that money's set, but if you also offer hosting (get a reseller hosting account somewhere), then you get that monthly check. The more you do, the more you get. A nice sideline that most webdev businesses forget, so the business goes elsewhere. Why send all of that money to someone else?
Geez,
I guess this guy never had a problem customer.
My advice?
Say "no" all the time.
Say "no" to people who want big sites for very little money, say no to people who say "I just want this eensy teensy weeensy little site, so I don't think I should pay all that much", say no to people who say "I've noticed that yahoo only charges $20 to make it myself per month, but I'd rather have someone who knows what they're doing manage it, but I'd like to keep the price pretty low."
Notice the pattern here?
You should say no to people who don't want to pay (much) money for their website.
You're not going to make money off of them, not unless you grow to a company making hundreds or thousands of websites a year, which will be a pain and probably require hiring on more people. You will make money by making a few (20-40) good websites and charging them a decent price for them.
Also, if people don't pay much for their website, they don't see it as all that valuable, and they don't put much time and effort into marketing it or involving it in their business. Which car would you willing spend more effort and money maintaining? a '89 Porsche, or an '89 Cavalier?
If they do see their website as valuable, then they see you as someone not valuable, because you're a chump who gives away good things for no cost. People who use their websites a lot will call you all the time, because they'll feel they're more important than you are.
And there are always customers where there is no "yes" price that makes it profitable. Unfortunately, there are crazy people in the world, and some of them somehow manage to run businesses. Even if they offer you what seems a nice tidy sum, run away, because in the end they will suck the life force from you.
Prospects who've said no to a quote generally don't call me back. They usually are shopping on price and aren't interested in the extras that our company offers -- like superior programming and customer service.
The second to last paragraph also is good from a sales standpoint, because people like it when you express genuine interest in what they do in their business -- it makes them feel that they're working with someone who will make a website that works for their business, not just a generic site.
I agree wholeheartedly with the final paragraph; unfortunately there are a lot of people who don't even like itching over the price.
Karma: Chevy Kavalierma.
Seriously. Accessibility is the next big thing, and the design practices that result (cleaner code, even if it lacks semantics), are worth it in the long run, especially for maintanence.
A basic overview
Designing With Web Standards
1) Don't.
2) If you really feel you must, work out a coherent, intelligent business plan--one you can take to the bank if necessary to borrow money against. That means 1, 2, and 3 year projections, profit and loss statements, capital and other expenses. Be serious about it. Pay yourself a salary. Know precisely what your monthly living expenses are and how much you need to earn toward them.
3) Be sure that business plan includes (a) an exhaustive study of your target market; and (b) some realistic projections about how you're going to reach that market. Your list of contacts may be the best in the world, but you'll starve if you rely on referrals.
4) How/why should people find and pick you rather than one of the bazillion and one other Web designers out there?
5) Where did you attend art/design school? Know anything about color theory? The color wheel? How color is perceived by a human viewing a monitor vs. a human viewing an actual sunset? How about navigation? Typography and typefaces? Accessibility? Web standards? Any background in fine arts? Advertising? Marketing? How about computers themselves? Networks? ISP's, hosts, e-mail? How does a moitor work? How does HTTP (vs HTML) work? Do you have concrete resources for getting to the information you don't know?
Best to know the answers to all this and more. People who pick up a mouse and a copy of Frontpage make truly unfortunate websites.
I'd have to say that if you haven't puzzled your way through all of this and a whole lot more, you're probably getting ready to waste a great deal of time and money.
I've actually had my business for almost three years, and I earn enough money to contribute my half to a two-income household--most months. I didn't thrive until I did my business plan. I know precisely how much work I need to do each month to survive, and I know how much selling and marketing I need to do to gain that work.
I hope this doesn't sound too grouchy. It is realistic.
Anne
DUCT TAPE: The Election Supervisors' Secret Weapon
- People that have a website with another company and want to go with someone cheaper and more responsive. These are a major hassle. We call them hostage situations because what you usually find is the that old company has the domain registered in their name and they're not hot to give it up. You end up spending hours and hours fighting registrars to get the domain or trying to convince the customer to change urls. If you do go for this business, find a helpful registrar to fight for you.
- People that have no idea what they want on a website. That's why they don't already have one. They also have little idea what it should cost. This sounds good, right? But they often know a nephew that can build them a crappy site for free, so they expect you to be slightly more expensive than that. Much more than $500 and they'll just keep waiting.
- Customers that want a very complex site. This sounds good, but you can easily get in over your head, or much worse, agree to something that just isn't going to work. They often have grand plans that involve using data or a service available somewhere else, usually violating the rights they have to the data or service.
- People that want to start a new company. 95% of these will die before a real launch, leaving you with unpaid account receivables.
The best customers we've found are churchs, realtors, friends with existing businesses and no sites, and non-profit organizations with budgets. We often barter with small companies and that works great. Some realtors' companies have a set budget for web sites and you can milk those.Find a profitable place to host accounts. Don't try to host them yourself. You'll hate the work. Go somewhere like Hurricane Electric or ValueWeb and let them do the majority of the work while you collect $5/month or less on the accounts. You'll be milking those accounts for several years without touching them.