12 Breeds of Clients and How to Work with Them
There are loads of different types of clients out there and chances are at some point you’ll get to meet all of them. So let’s take a look through some typical clients and see if you recognize a few of your own in there!
Client Breed #1: The Low-Tech Client
How to Spot One:
Looks confused and disoriented when discussing anything high-tech, calls rather than emails, wants everything to be faxed. The Low-tech client needs to go through everything twice to get it, but will then happily take your advice.
The Highs:
The Low-tech client will rely solely on your sage wisdom for all things technology related. They will look to you as your technology saviour and will stroke your ego with their reverence of your knowledge and advice.
The Lows:
The low-tech client will need to be handheld through everything from setting up their email to opening up PDFs. Charge accordingly. They can also be particularly frustrating if they decide to ‘work it out themselves’. A Low-tech client’s idea of how a website should work for example is often not pretty.
How to Work With One:
The low-tech client needs to be handheld. Make sure everything technical about a job is in writing for them to reread at their leisure. This will save you a lot of time explaining things repeatedly. It’s also best to just accept that you will not be using a lot of the technology that makes our lives easier these days (email, online project management etc) and should instead budget in time for phone calls, faxes and face to face meetings.
It is very easy to start to patronize your low-tech client unintentionally. As you can imagine, this can damage your relationship and even worse hurt their feelings. Make sure you balance the playing field by asking for their input in the areas they know about – their business. This will keep them happy stop them feeling the need to weigh in on your area of expertise – which can waste everybody’s time.
Finally if you work in technology, make sure that your Low-tech client knows how to use whatever product you give them!
Client Breed #2: The Disinterested Client
How To Spot One:
The uninterested client is a strange beast – where most clients can’t wait to get involved in your work, the uninterested client just wants things done with as little effort from them as possible. You’ll spot an uninterested client on first meeting when you ask them questions about their business and are met with the minimal response. The uninterested client will rarely provide requested information or materials and will often ask you to complete tasks outside your area of expertise because they “don’t have time”.
The Highs:
An uninterested client will give you a lot of creative freedom, mostly because they have no interest in being involved. Their insistence that you “take care of it” may broaden your skill set and your ability to delegate to outside contractors. You may also gain experience making it work when you don’t have the information or materials you need.
The Lows:
The uninterested client will ask you to take care of everything from copywriting (when you’re a web designer) to flyer design (when you’re a copywriter). Sadly they will often not realize that this should incur extra cost. The uninterested client sometimes marries their lack of interest with wanting things done a certain way producing a very hard to deal with client.
How to Work With One:
It is best to get into good habits early with your uninterested client. A freelancer must be pushy with an uninterested client, so get used to calling and emailing repeatedly. A friendly and humorous tone is a great help when trying to push them along. An uninterested client generally isn’t trying to be rude and unpleasant, most of the time they’re very stressed and crying out for a little help. If you can be straight with them that extra work costs extra money, either take on that extra work if you can or use it as an opportunity to outsource.
A uninterested client is a tricky client, but if you manage to take care of them they often become very loyal, happy to have someone that ‘takes care of business’. Just make sure you are straight about costs, and be clear with yourself that nagging is unavoidable.
Client Breed #3: The Hands-On Client
How To Spot One:
The hands-On client is a frustrated artist, as soon as they walk in the door they will be telling you about their skill as an artist, illustrator, photographer or writer. The hands-on client already has a very specific idea about what they want and usually has very little interest in your thoughts on the matter.
The Highs:
If you’re happy to just do exactly as they ask no matter what you might think of it, a hands-on client can be a good little earner. Almost always there is little confusion as to what the client wants to see and this can make these jobs easy.
The Lows:
If you feel you have an ethical responsibility to point out the flaws in your hands-on client’s directions, you are headed for conflict. Hands-on client’s secretly believe that they could do their job much better than you and that there is little or no specialist knowledge you could possibly impart.
One oddity about working with a hands-on client sometimes occurs when you give in your creative ambitions and agree to do it their way. All of a sudden your hands-on client may accuse you of making them do all the work or not doing your job. This can go as far as baulking on payment. Naturally this is highly infuriating.
How To Work With One:
When you find a hands-on client, the best thing to do is go with the flow. If you try to fight it you usually lose and the job winds up a lot harder than it needed to be. If your hands-on client knows exactly what they want, then power to them, recognise that and give it to them.
Often its a good idea to explicitly tell them that they seem to have a very specific idea of what they want and that you will be following their direction, however make it clear that if they would prefer; you are more than capable of doing it without their input.
Client Breed #4: The Paranoid Client
How To Spot One:
The legal papers come out almost immediately and are elaborate to say the least. A paranoid client will often not want to even discuss their project without getting you to sign a Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA) and be prepared for drafted agreement to be heavily pitched in their favour.
The Highs:
If you work with a paranoid client, any legal agreement you sign should also be protecting you. So as long as you don’t breach any part the agreements you sign you should get paid.
The Lows:
You MUST get any major legal agreements looked at by a lawyer (and not the lawyer that works for them). As you would imagine, this can cost a lot of money that your client may not be willing to pay. Often within these documents are a whole list of grounds for the client dismissing you without payment. Grounds might be that you miss a deadline for whatever reason (even if the paranoid client is at fault).
From personal experience, I have always found the most paranoid clients are the ones who seem to have the most problems as well. This happens because they are always on the lookout for evidence that they are being ripped off or taken advantage of. Needless to say this means that you can easily wind up trying to straighten our points of legality with them rather than doing your job.
How To Work With One:
It is not worth working with a paranoid client for a small or low paying job. The risks far outweigh any possible gains. Besides, a personalized legal agreement is very expensive, so if they’re willing to spend a large sum on protecting their interests they should be paying you equally well.
For a large job with a big client you may wish to consider going for it, but even then factor lawyer’s fees into your quote. Most companies have legal agreements because they want to protect themselves or sensitive projects, but some paranoid clients use them in a predatory way. Remember that the paranoid client paid more to be protected, so you should quote more to make sure you get a fair deal.
Client Breed #5: The Appreciative Client
How To Spot One:
The appreciative client will shower you with praise and make you feel special – gosh I love an appreciative client!
The Highs:
The appreciative client will make your life very easy as they’ll often pick the first version of the first draft and declare it perfect. They’re very enthusiastic and generally a delight to work with.
Even when the appreciative client does not like something they often word things in ways that make you happy to continue work on the project to get it pitch perfect.
The Lows:
They’ll make the rest of your clients look bad.
How To Work With One:
Sit back and enjoy the glory. Make sure you get them a very nice Christmas gift and throw in a freebie every now and then. An appreciative client is like gold to a freelancer, so do your best work and make them feel like a VIP.
Client Breed #6: The Get-a- Good-Deal Client
How To Spot One:
The get-a-good-deal client is a wheeler-dealer and believes that the price you first give is just a starting point for negotiations. You’ll know you have a get-a-good-deal client on your hands because agreeing on a price and job description always involves a bit of to and fro. Often times get-a-good-deal clients are successful entrepreneurial types who have haggled their way to wealth.
The Highs:
Get-a-good-deal clients are often great for getting repeat and referral work having their fingers in lots of pies and you can sometimes make deals that payoff well for you as well as them.
The Lows:
If you aren’t a good negotiator or you don’t recognise a get-a-good-deal client soon enough you can wind up feeling taken advantage of as they take whatever there is to be had. Unethical get-a-good-deal client’s are usually up for ‘no harm trying’ mentality that can see them trying to get out of paying for certain things or at their worst bullying you for more work or discounts.
How To Work With One:
The best way to deal with a get-a-good-deal client is to fight fire with fire so to speak. Taking a get-a-good-deal approach back on them usually negates their strengths and ensures that you cut a fair deal. This means coming in high and then lowering your prices and being very assertive on points of payment and workload.
Client Breed #7: The I’ll-Know-It -When-I-See-It Client
How To Spot One:
The I’ll-Know-It-When-I-See-It client shares much in common with the uninterested client except in a more frustrating way. Their indecisiveness and inability to articulate what they are after makes them one of the few clients that it is generally best to steer clear of.
The Highs:
If you can produce the “It” for this type of client you can possibly win them over and turn the I’ll-Know-It-When-I-See-It client into a very appreciative and trusting client who rejoices in having found someone who has their same ‘vision’.
The Lows:
If you don’t produce the “It” this type of client can quickly become highly frustrating as you stab franticly in the dark while worrying about blowing your budget and timeframe.
To make matters worse the I’ll-Know-It-When-I-See-It client often becomes agitated or unhappy with you if you don’t magically produce “It” leading to strained relations and a project that rapidly goes south.
How To Work With One:
In order to work with a I’ll-Know-It-When-I-See-It Client you need to remember two things:
- First be VERY clear with how much revisions cost. If you don’t do this you WILL blow your budget
- Second unless you can produce “It” you could be in for a rough project, accept this fact.
Client Breed #8: The Always-Urgent Client
How To Spot One:
All their emails are ‘highest priority’ and their couriers are always red-hot. They work on weekends and late into the night and think that everyone else does too. Additionally the always-urgent client often seems to think they are your only client and that their job should therefore be your highest priority as well as theirs.
The Highs:
Since there is never any room for prolonging a job the always-urgent client will usually okay jobs relatively quickly. They often won’t have time to okay a quote so you end up charging by the hour.
The always-urgent client generally knows when they are being unreasonable and will do their best to pay you quickly, which is handy for cash flow.
The Lows:
The always-urgent client adds stress to your life, and if you want to keep them you may need to work late nights or over the weekend. You may also endure repeat late night phone calls and nonchalant requests that you build websites, organise photoshoots and produce detailed illustrations in oh… say a few hours!
How To Work With One:
The always-urgent client must be taken with a grain of salt. Everything will be desperate so you must decide when it is worth the inconvenience to yourself and your other clients. You must make it clear to the always-urgent client when their requests are unreasonable, right from the beginning. As always, keeping this light-hearted and jokey is the way to go, thereby defusing situations where you might otherwise come off as aggressive.
The always-urgent client is similar to the disinterested client in that they both require extra care. You may need to chase up the always-urgent client if you know a job is coming up in order to give yourself more time and as with the disinterested client, if you take care of them when it counts they will be loyal to you.
A word of warning though, having multiple always-urgent clients can lead to severely stressful situations as everything is needed now, now, now! So unless you thrive on pressure, you are advised to limit the number of this type of client you engage.
Client Breed #9: The Decision-By- Committee Client
How To Spot One:
Usually inhabiting the world of large corporate clients, the decision-by-committee client can still be found in smaller operations where they share their decision making with a spouse, neighbour or dog. The decision-by-committee client is one who lacks a single point of authority and for which every decision must be approved by many people.
The Highs:
Since decision-by-committee clients don’t have anyone making firm decisions it is sometimes possible to just do whatever you think and sneak it through under the radar. This can easily backfire though, so be careful.
The Lows:
The decision-by-committee client at its worst is achingly slow to work with and when many people have thier pet peeves you can wind up with a highly inferior product to show for the work. Decision-by-committee client almost always reduce to the lowest common denominator and if there is one person who dominates they are usually the one person you wish *didn’t* dominate.
How To Work With One:
Unfortunately decision-by-committee clients are a fact of life when it comes to working with large corporate clients and this is one reason why it is important to charge high when dealing with the big guys.
It helps to be firm and quickly identify the stronger members of the committee and target them for responses while trying to win them over by conceding lesser points and sticking to your main guns.
Client Breed #10: The Doormat Client
How To Spot One:
The doormat client is the client who puts up with anything and just keeps coming back. They are usually very unassertive and seem to be content waiting for ages for you to get back to them or accepting less than perfect work.
The Highs:
The doormat client is often also very appreciative which is always nice. Its also relaxing to have a client who doesn’t mind waiting around.
The Lows:
Unfortunately doormat clients often bring out the worst in freelancers. Without the pressure of a potentially angry client a freelancer can easily become laissez-faire about their work and wind up taking advantage of the client’s passive nature.
How To Work With One:
The doormat client requires great discipline to make sure that you stick to your timeframes and deliver the goods. If your client doesn’t protect themselves then it is up to you to do so for them.
While you may wish to take advantage of their generous nature on occasions when you are stressed, you should try your best to treat them the same as every other client.
Client Breed #11: The Budget Client
How To Spot One:
Every client is on a budget, but some clients just seem that much tighter than the others. The budget client can be the result of doing a friend or relative a favour, or equally just a regular client who never has any cash.
The Highs:
Budget clients are sometimes appreciative of the work they are getting done so cheaply – though unfortunately this isn’t always the case.
The Lows:
Budget clients are cheap and at their worst still expect the same service and workload as their higher paying brethren. This makes them both annoying and bad for business.
Budget clients are at their worst when they exhibit traits from other clients such as ‘Always-Urgent’ or ‘Paranoid’, in which case its just not worth it.
How To Work With One:
Make sure your budget client realises they are on a budget and that therefore their work may not always be first priority and that you probably can’t get those extra changes or revisions in because it simply doesn’t make good business sense. If your budget client gets aggressive or manifests other negative traits, accept that they aren’t worth it and let them go.
Client Breed #12: The You-Should- Be-So-Lucky Client
How To Spot One:
The you-should-be-so-lucky client is much cooler than you and they know it. They generally have a cool but low paying project for you and are in an industry everyone wants to work in…think music, film and fashion industries in particular.
The Highs:
The right you-should-be-so-lucky client looks great in your portfolio, and your friends will think you’re cool. You’ll make some handy contacts and your professional credibility will probably benefit. You’ll also be hanging out with the cool kids – TAKE THAT HIGH SCHOOL!
The Lows:
You won’t be paid much and the you-should-be-so-lucky client will act like they’re doing you the favour, not the other way around. If you do enough jobs for a you-should-be-so-lucky client you will start getting jaded about the industry and feel mistreated for your efforts.
How To Work With One:
The you-should-be-so-lucky client can be a great asset to your portfolio, but that will be the main reason to do the job. Because everybody wants this type of job (until they’ve actually got some) there are many talented but green freelancers more than happy to work for almost nothing. If you are a student this can be a great thing to do, but for a seasoned freelancer it can impact your cash flow. So pick your you-should-be-so-lucky clients carefully and use them sparingly to impact your portfolio or break up the monotony of corporate jobs. And of course, make sure you enjoy being that damn cool!
So That’s Our List
Have we missed any clients? And which are you favorites …
Note: A few times a month we revisit some of our reader’s favorite posts from throughout the history of FreelanceSwitch. This article by Jack Knight was first published April 13th 2007, yet is just as relevant, fun, and full of useful information today.
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IME you tend to build up a portfolio of Low-Tech clients when you’re just starting out – the ‘friend-of-a-friend’ types who you do cheap work for to build up your portfolio – but they can become a major drain on resources when you start to take your business more seriously, so the quicker you can jettison them and move onto bigger clients, the better.
Brilliant post. So true. When I think of all the times I’ve got into trouble by treating one type of client the same as another type.
Deliciously true and categorised very well.
Definitely recommended reading for anyone in the IT business.
Interesting post, especially since most clients are actually a combination of one, two, or even three of the types you’ve written about.
Man I’m glad I found this site! Beem reading here for an hour now and all of is useful info and very recognizable. Thanks for a great resource, feed added to Newsfire
Nice post.
Indeed, you have missed one crucial client. The guy who started doing the work himself but has to attend to other jobs. Or as a corrolary, the client who initally had his son/neighbour’s kid/nephew in high school take a crack at it, and now wants you to do it because son/neighbour/newphew is off to college. And he wants you to not only do it for cheap (because his son/newphew etc. could do it anyways), but also doesn’t want you to scrap this horrendous code that’s already been done for ‘economical reasons’.
I’d label this client: “Everything is So Simple, Why Can’t you Do it in 2 days?” client.
I’ll list the cons:
- thinks that because he can understand the underlying concept of how an Access database works, he is well versed in db admin. And hence, doesn’t see that your 12 years of Oracle experience counts for anything that he couldn’t solve if he wasn’t so inclined to do.
- thinks that your reusing already written code (that most likely is not even a prototype but a completely unfunctioning mockup) will save you time and hence him money.
- will argue that your hourly rate is way too steep, because his newphew charged $12/hr… completely ignoring the fact that he or his newphew would do a task in tenfold the time you could and at 1 tenth the overall quality.
This kind of client is most likely a professional like a doctor (MD, Optometrist etc), a lawyer or some sort of hot shot consultant PhD in who knows what.
How to handle them:
These clients can be the cheap kind that wants the project done for practically free, the urgent kind who wants it done immediately, or maybe even both. The key is to ‘break’ them in by knowing your stuff. They are most easily impressed by a confident sounding voice over the phone explaining the myriads of aspects they haven’t considered. Once the ‘authority’ has been set, you can move on to the dealing methods of more traditional clients (like cheapo, and speedo).
I say this with all due respect, they can be great clients if they stop underestimating you. But that may take months or even years.
I’m sure you’ve seen these kinds of clients, so I’ll let you fill in the rest.
Totally agree. I’ve had all of them except the Doormat client. This is a good post; I have something similar here: http://www.3elevencreative.com/clients/
Here, okay:
http://wsu.edu/~brians/errors/disinterested.html
Nobody likes the Grammar Police.
This is an awesome list. Will refer to it often.
Great article. You’ve nailed it right on the head here. Ive been in this game for nearly two years now and come across all of these types. I can even evaluate them over the phone from a 5min conversation.
I personally find if your having to run a website through someone in marketing, or worse, a team of marketeers your in for a stressful time!
.
Coolest
Great post! My only disagreement is that with the ‘always urgent’ client you should not be “jokey”. I have had issues where they feel that I am not taking their urgent requests seriously. I do agree that you should use your own judgment as to how urgent the request is. However, I think you should state that you understand their needs and rather seriously explain that it ain’t gonna happen immediately.
Great Post! I totally agree. I wish I could send this to my Japanese clients.
You forgot The Indecisive Client who likes what you’re doing and then changes their mind, and then changes it again, and then decides to go back to the original idea, except different.
Don’t you just love clients???
great post and toons
I do embedded design and a lot of these ring familiar. A point to add for diagnosing the always-urgent client is that there is a different type where nothing is in fact urgent, but they talk of it as such. When you talk to them on tuesday, they anticipate getting you some critical specs wednesday and they need the project done by monday. Whenever you call to ask for the specs, don’t worry, sending them to you is the next thing on their list. It takes until the following tuesday until you actually receive any specifications, and the monday deadline vanished without a trace. You just kind of have to get used to this type, and understand that when they say something is urgent, don’t clear your schedule until they’ve actually acted as such.
Couldn’t stop reading. Great stuff. I have 3 current clients that are each described perfectly in this article. I particularly agree with your plans of attack for each breed.
I think one more should be added… and that’s the client who knows just enough to be stupidly dangerous to your work flow.
I get these on occasion and they are a serious thorn in my side. They are the folks who know all the acronyms (but not know the meanings), and always seem to have a “web guru” for a friend. What always boggles me is that if they did have a web guru for a friend, why are they coming to me? At any rate, they are likely the same folks who are liable to think Java and Javascript are closely related, or other similar misconceptions by the web-unsavvy.
With these sorts, I have to take extra caution to not tell them “too much” because, before you know it, in a few days I will get a call telling me to do, say for example, a dynamic content driven website in CSS instead of PHP because their web guru buddy told them it’s the new Web 2.0 trend. When I politely would say, “Sorry, it doesn’t work that way,” responses range from the befuddled to the mundane. I had one guy even walk out on a very large project like this, throwing insults and spouting off about going to “someone else who CAN do it”.
Good luck, sir.
A few things I disagree on: The Get-a- Good-Deal Client – Never give the illusion of haggling with your prices. Give a firm quote and stick to it. Otherwise, if the client talks to your other customers, they might be angry to learn that you pulled one over on them. Also, it’s just not professional. You don’t go to a professional (doctor, lawyer, plumber, mechanic, etc.) and haggle over their prices. Also, for Disinterested Clients and Always-Urgent Clients, DO NOT coddle them. It just enables the bad behavior. Do not answer their phone calls after hours or work for them on weekends. Treat them like your other customers. I have found that when I do that, 9 times out of 10 they will fall in line. In the end, don’t be afraid to lose clients. You need to lose the clients that won’t push your business to be its best and increase your reputation. Respect is 50/50 and your clients should respect you as much as you respect them. Otherwise, you need to end that relationship.
I completely agree. You don’t want to nourish bad behavior. Be stern, but polite. Like the dog-whisperer…:-)
Some good points Michelle, particularly about coddling clients. I know that my partner Cyan always keeps things in business hours and she gets harassed far less than I do (I have a terrible habit of doing whatever it takes
With haggling, I’m not so sure its black and white. Even in big business you get corporate negotiations (which is just haggling in nice clothes). I personally hate changing prices, but some clients just seem to need the feeling of having gotten in better than everyone else. What I like to do is not to haggle over prices but rather to add in an extra for them.
Still its a good point about what if your client talks to other customers. I’ll have to think more on that one, I’d always just followed Jack’s line of thought
I like to price my work competitively so when I’m asked to go lower I say, “I’m already working at 75% less of the average rate you’re going to run into.”
Also check out the article “How to Avoid Getting Screwed by New Clients (fishers and wolves)”
“Who has time? If you are an independent web designer today, not you. What about that new client who keeps calling and asking questions? You want the work, but you’re taxed for time. You may be unsure about the new client’s commitment level too. This is exactly where to start. Determine right away if the caller is a good client or one that falls into the category of fishers and wolves.” …
http://www.vainnotion.com/blog/2006/11/how-to-avoid-getting-screwed-by-new.htm
Brilliant list! I’ve had the experience with at least ten on the list. It all rings true!
I don’t know if this is an archetype or I just ‘got lucky’, but I have one who is an “emotional support” client. Communication is great, but I’m talking about I have one pop-up on my desktop every hour until the job is complete. He actually seems to be the ‘doormat’ type; I swear sometimes he is just paying me to have somebody to chat with!
Well, they say that experience is what you get immediately after you really needed it… This breakdown of client types is something I sorely could have used a couple of months ago..
My first (and thusfar only) freelance client, and he was a terrible mix of a few of the above – namely a “You-Should- Be-So-Lucky Client” (in that he refused to pay for the work itself, but was selling a share in his idea, which just was not convincing), mixed with a “I’ll-Know-It -When-I-See-It” (the number of full markup templates I created and then had to recreate to fit his horrific design sense), “Doormat” (as he was unwilling to pay for my time he was all too willing to let things slide), “Hand-On” (the number of times I had to revert to a backup after he had “just been looking at” my code), “Appreciative” (always verbally appreciative, but financially and actually nothing…)
And then, on top of all that, he was the “I’m Not Going To Pay For It” kind of client as well… Even now, four months later and with a letter from him where he promised me a set figure for work to that date, he is still refusing to pay a measly fee.
Now, all I need is a bit more practice handling all these client types…
I have one to add, though it may be a small town thing.
The “I will not admit to you that my wife makes all my decisions for me” client.
The ones (and in my experience they are way too common) who ask for work, love the result, but at the end of the day have to run it past their wife even though she has nothing to do with his company at all. She NEVER likes it, often demanding he go somewhere else and that he refuses to pay for work to date.
The only way we have found that works is to ask every client first if they will be the final person making the final decision and will tick off the job once it is done.
I had a similar client, except it was the husband making the “behind the scenes” decisions, with the wife as the spokesperson for the duo. She authorized a large web development job, which I promptly started. Unfortunately, after a sizable amount of development, I called to arrange a meeting and got, “oh, I’m sorry…my husband doesn’t want to go ahead with the project”. Major lesson learned on this one – I don’t do ANYTHING without a clear scope statement and at least a 1/3 deposit. That way, the client has skin in the game – and whoever is writing the checks is on board! No exceptions to this rule, even if there was a prior good history or a seemingly sweet project!
One word. Priceless.
Fantastic list and great business advice.
Great article, spot on!
Great article. I work with a lot low tech clients and this article speaks true of them.
Brilliant Article Guys, Well Done…
Excellent! ive forwarded that to my sales manager lol
Excellent Article thanks for the effort ..
I can relate to every breed that you mentioned, and as said in a previous comment clients can be a combination of a number of those breeds ..
For example a client of mine was a Decision-by-committee Client where the committee consisted of a I’ll-Know-it-When-I-See-It Client , a Paranoid Client and a Hands-On Client !!
Great, informative list! Add one more item:
“The Client Who Can’t Carry On A Conversation.” This is the client who, after asking you a question and your giving a clear, detailed answer, just sits there, saying nothing. You end up having to articulate a response for him based on his eyebrow position.
Umm, why does every panel have “The idea” in it? It’s confusing and pointless, and not at all obvious what is intended. If you are trying to show the guy on the right tell the guy on the left about what he’s going to do, you are doing a very poor job of it. Try switching the two – it’d make more sense.
“The idea” here is in intended as a statement of shock, surprise, and annoyance. It’s a figure of speech and is a funny way of portraying the designer/developer’s reaction. You may have just misunderstood it, but I think it’s pretty clear and amusing.
I agree that the character repeating “The idea!” in every panel weakens the cartoons. The foolish statement of the client on the left is really all we need; we can imagine our own reactions to it. And an imagined reaction–like a noisy crash that happens offscreen–is much funnier than one that is spelled out, as it is here. Doing it twelve times in a row just compounds the offense, moving it from unnecessary to annoying.
That aside, I’ll join those who say this is a brilliant post.
Excellent list! I recognize many of my clients here!
To the person who suggested adding the “Everything is So Simple, Why Can’t you Do it in 2 days?” Client above, you’re dead on, but you forgot to list the “Pros” of this client: at least you don’t have to worry about coming up with the overall design/look’n'feel, since it’s already in place. You may have to completely RE-DO it with proper code, recreating layered graphics in Photoshop (since they’ll only provide you with a final .gif/.jpg to work with), etc, but at least the general layout is done already.
Thank you for clearing up what I’ve been finding out. I’mprinting it out for future referrals – an exercise for each client – what are you?
One other type of client that can be a joy is one who wants to learn everything he/she can – not just to save money, but because he/she truly wants to understand what’s going on. They are appreciative and can be fun to work with. They don’t mind paying out what it takes to get to where they want and will stay your client forever.
The downside? Well, if you depend on clients for future income, this type of client won’t be a big money maker later unless he/she starts a totally new project.
Great article. You’ve nailed it right on the head here.
Clients? Who needs ‘em.
Great article! The advice is helpful as is the dialogue on the blog. I’m glad I found this as a resource. Because this is really good and helpful, I don’t want a few minor spelling points to detract from it. I am not an expert myself, but here are a few points you may want to consider. (1) “saviour” and “favour” are British variants. If the author is British great! If not, it can come off as pretentious and should generally be avoided. (2) “organise” (The Always-Urgent Client) and “realises” (the Budget Client) look like they should be “organize” and “realize”. Great article and dialogue! I’m looking to get into freelance works and I think this will be a good resource. Thanks!
http://rajasandhu.com/graphic_design_rates/graphic_design_rates.html
I LOVE IT!
And I think I’ve encountered all of these types, except maybe the ‘Doormat’ (I could only be so lucky).
One I would add is definitely the ‘Hurry Up & Wait’ client. You know, the one that needs to see design edits by tomorrow, then disappears for 2 months afterward only to come back with more changes that are due in an hour. Of course, in the meantime, you’d taken on 3 more projects…
Great work! I am still consulting, although no longer in the IT field, and all the types still ring true. I will pass this list along to my business partner who’s new at working with clients and could use a heads up. Thanks
True
I think I have bipolar clients. Fell out o favour with client breed#4/ #6 earlier today. Presenting to client breed#1/ #7 on Monday morning
Thanks, this was fun; but gray type on a gray background is a low-legibility design trend that really cannot end soon enough for me.
I really like it. I recognize here many of my past clients. Good job.
You missed the “Pesky Client.” The client that sends WAY too many emails, asks way too many questions, wants way too many answers… and after the job is done STILL bombards your inbox with 2 or 3 emails a day. I have one of those now and still haven’t figured out to deal with them!
During the years I learned one thing: it doesn’t matter if it’s easy or it’s hard to work for a certain client, all that’s matter is to have a 100% satisfied client at the collaboration’s end.
Great list. I’ll be tempted to give my clients links to this page and ask them to classify themselves, though I guess that wouldn’t be appropriate.
I agree that the indecisive client who always changes their mind needs to be added. I’ve had a few of those, and in my experience the best thing to do is to warn them upfront “OK, now we’re going to nail down the design. One more round of revisions and then I need you to finalize this. No changes once we go to building.” Of course, they always ask for changes anyway
….but at least then you can say “Fine, but it’s going to be more difficult to change this now at this stage, that’s going to cost you!”
Haha, Benek! Wouldn’t it be great if we could have the clients honestly categorize themselves according to this list…so we could avoid the bad ones like the plague!!
Great article! I have dealt with all of these multiple times over my 9 year career (need to grammar/tense check it though).
While some may enjoy the challenge in working with a “difficult” client, I have entered the age where I seek only those magically delicious ones, that you have classified as “The Appreciative” ones.
In my qualifying interviews, I admit that’s what I’m looking for and if I see the signs of any of the other 11, I pretty much refer the work to someone else. Life is too short to be a doormat, and that’s pretty much how the rest of the categories end up making me feel.
Terrific overview; now maybe someone could turn this into a chart, kind of like the zodiac, which we could use to see how the various types match up with our own selves!
Shawna liking the purple is HILARIOUS. Happens so much.
Oh, I just HAD to add one, since I deal with this type quite a bit – enough that for me, it merits its own category…
http://www.jeangoodwyn.com/others-blogged/12-breeds-of-client/
This is a great article and very helpful when taking on new clients of any type.
What about the “client who has always liked your work now blames you for their own mistakes”
Yeah, those clients should be avoided more than the “see it” clients of course you have no idea they will turn on you until some years later.
ehmm… nice post…
could you put anchors for each client section? Number 11 is my most latest client, and I want to email my friends with the link
oh and, I am already hanging out with the cool kids. TAKE THAT OLD MAN/WOMAN/PERSON! HIGH SCHOOL ROCKS!
The I’ll-Know-It -When-I-See-It Client
As a graphic designer I can seriously relate to many (if not all) of the above, but this one is definately the most frequent for me… The “it”… Oh god, the “it”…. *wacks head in table*
Recently I had a logo project for a I’ll Know_It_When_I _See_It client.
Near the end of the project, I finally learned how to handle it. Give them a lot of rough concepts. Send them one at a time and ask for feedback each step of the way. To tie it up, I had her come to my office and sit with me in front of the computer. By this time, we already had determined that we were headed on the right track. At my computer, she was able to see the color combination’s and rearrange the proportions. We just played with it until she saw what she wanted. After reading this article, I have to admit there is a little bit of I’ll_Know_It_When_I_See_It in me.
Great list, thanks for sharing! One my biggest clients is of the urgent type… everything is rush rush, top priority. But I’ve figured out her priorization method. Things are extremely urgent, very urgent, kind of urgent and just plain urgent. This helps me decide where to put it in my schedule. Perhaps other clients have a similar system, if you just look for it.
This really makes me want to see a “12 Breeds of Designer” post.
with the hands on client i have the way to diffuse the assessment of “making them do all the work”
at the first meet where you’re talking about what they want in the project, as they get into nutsy boltsy aspects (as opposed to you telling them how you’ll approach it) give them a little ego boost”
and if they have or not, they’ll tell you.
The hardest part with this guy is swallowing creative pride and “just doing what they want” . . . takes practice, but it can be done.
One of the biggest benefits of the ‘Budget” client is that you can negotiate cost for freedom. I have actually given clients work for next to $nothing in exchange for 100% creative freedom to execute the project as I see fit. If they are *really* on a budget, they can appreciate such an offer. And it’s good for your portfolio and your spirit sometimes!
Great article! I passed it along to all my staff as required reading.
Thanks!
Great article, I really like it. My only issue with going with the flow for the hands-on client is when they are wrong. Currently, I’m dealing with one who wants things that I won’t put my name to, such as non-standard web fonts. I’m giving in to her less critical demands. However, anything that could hurt my credibility as a designer, I just won’t do. One thing that goes a long way in dealing with a client that insists on something that is very wrong: I tell them that IF I did do it for them, I won’t put my name on it. No link to their site from mine, nothing in my portfolio, my name won’t be on the site, I wash my hands of it. That tends to really get their attention as to the magnitude of the mistake they are insisting happen.
Wow… all I have to say is AMEN!
I have forwarded this article to every designer friend I know… please, please keep it here for every, even after the internet is gone. It is brilliant advice, well written, and spot on!
Okay… so that wasn’t all I had to say.
I always run a mile from #3 (The Hands-On Client), because they inevitably realise, after you have bent over backwards to implement their lousy ideas, just how lousy they are… but it’s never their fault that the ideas don’t work. : ((
Someone else above has probably already said this, but this so applies to working non-freelance also. Very useful.
Just a warning I had a hands on client – oh I’ve done some work in tv, so let them take the lead. Then when it comes time to pay the bill, they decide they’re not happy and not paying.
This is great…It applies in the same way to my architecture clients!
“I laughed so hard, I cried…”
(Well not really – but this IS classic material).
It’s kind of funny when you realize that your Doormat Client was referred to you by your Always Urgent Client… quite the unusual dynamic.
I received the link to your blog from a friend just five minutes ago, and I’m so glad I did. You’re getting favorited. Thanks for being here!
WOW, this has been a great post.
I retired from design build contracting 10 yrs ago and I think you missed the group B and C type to each of the above. They are the ones, in group B that you figure out in time and are good happy customers and will be [ or their friends will be] good customers the next time and they pay their bills, all’s well.
Then there is group c of each heading group; you do all the same exercises and they don’t pay you anyway.
This is my life. What’s tricky is not working with more than one of any type of client at a time. Except for number 5 which I’ll take any day o fthe week. I think most of my clients are appreciative but they have too many other issues to deal with before realizing it!
I think your use of “disinterested” is perfectly acceptable, in spite of what some curmudgeon at Washington State University says:
http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/disinterested
I have another type of client – The Stalker.
There are no pros for this one – only cons. It is the extreme version of the Always Urgent Client. They call incessantly, send multiple emails about the same issue, and generally behave in an extremely obsessive manner. The only way to deal with them is to fire him/her as a client.
This happened to me last year, and the client was a woman that thought the world revolved around her. After 8 crazy sounding voice-mails in one day (I work from home in graphic design), my husband confirmed my belief that she was way off her rocker. That and the 10 emails she sent me that day about a minor issue that she was having a major mental breakdown over (sentence change on her website), I got rid of her.
No client is worth that kind of harassment! Luckily I’ve only had one so far!
Erin McCall
Sunlit Media | Bright Ideas by Design
http://www.sunlit-media.com
“…believes that the price you first give is just a starting point for negotiations.”
this isn’t a belief, it’s a fact.
welcome to capitalism; enjoy your stay.
Jack,
Thanks. Really. It’s so nice to know that while often working alone, we’re not alone in dealing with people.
One client type that is encountered occasionally, which is kind of a mix, is what I call the “Brown Eyes” client.
You know the type. The kind that has an extremely urgent deadline, like Monday and it’s Friday afternoon. Needs some 30 hours worth of work, and “doesn’t care what it costs” when you tell them your rates, including weekend “emergency” rates.
So you quote them real quick, then they go, “Well I’m sure it’s worth it but I only have $500!”
Yeah, OK. Good luck finding something for that that meets your deadline.
I came back to this page because I had a friend who needs a website for his band, and asked me “How difficult is it to make a webpage?”.
In turn, since he is the guitarist of the band, I asked: “how hard is it to play a guitar?”.
He replied with “Oh, playing a guitar is really difficult, web design, can’t be that difficult…
..
The idea!
I don’ .. see … how it is so difficult to understand… there are good and bad guitarists, correct? I’m sure he understands that! In the same way, there are good and bad web designers.
So… I just told him, since it can’t be that difficult, he should just go ahead and try to design a page himself.
Best of luck for him.
ah thats the story of my life
this is a great site. you make some really good points here. nice stuff.
too “Luisa” ^^^.
coming from someone that has studied classical guitar for several years ( 18 years ), and web design ( 9 years ), and programming ( 10 years ), and owns his own business doing so. I can tell you in fact, designing a good web site is not nearly as difficult as playing an instrument very well.
sorry to bust your bubble.
that should be your next topic on here, it’s one thing to label clients, but what about the people that do the work?
cheers,
Ken:
I think you yourself give away your bias by stating that you’ve studied one for 18 years, and the other for only 10. All things being equal, it’s only natural that where you are after 8 supplementary years is more difficult.
That being said, I do play an instrument as well, and I find it difficult to compare the two. They are different faculties.
But I say this: in my equally decade long career of web development, I’ve gone from naive to hardened to sophisticated. And these days, few are the pages I see that have code that I consider good and clean. Even fewer are the sites that I look at and think are as good as what my graphics guy produces.
Web design is text based redaction so the entry level is extremely low, but that really doesn’t mean anyone can make *good* pages.
Great analysis, Jack!
I think you should add a sub-section to “The Get-a-Good-Deal Client” called “Shameless-Manipulator” client.
Fingers in too many pies. Contacts everywhere. And always willing to get everything for free if you appear gullible enough. They typically say: “I know XYZ big-shot, I run n corporations and I have N projects waiting – but all that only if you give me a 60% discount – come on, don’t tell me you don’t use the latest pirated Dreamweaver. Of course everyone does. And you will surely have templates ready as well. Don’t con me. You can finish this work in half-a-day. If we were to charge like you, we would have been living in mansions. blah blah” And then when you finally finish the project and ask for that last 10-25%, they’ll take you for a beer or a burger (depending on their estimate of your straightforwardness and your perceived value) at the latest hip joint and try for one last time to skip that payment. They’ll talk about your hopes and aspirations, your beliefs, your “core values” in life, your ambitions, crap! All for that last instalment. It need not be big money. Even $100-$200 is enough incentive for that kind of behavior.
Luckily, as with many here, I had to face such specimens only a few times. Now, the moment I realize someone is roughly around that area, I make a quick excuse and get out for good – “urgent work” or “too many projects”.
There will be at least one hour-long bargain which will involve “society”, “principles”, “practices”, “oh! come on!” and what not.
I recommend the same strategy – just get the hell out of there.
Safest.
My $0.02.
Joe
God this really happens!! This post reminded me all the clients I worked with…
Good that there was only 12, 13 is very bad.
Number 13 is the one who gets a quote (preferably not in writing), for a set amount of work. Like style changes only, or integrating a style into a cms.
After a deposit is made, the claim slowly comes to the surface that the quote was actually for a completed finished site. A $600.00 quote is supposed to become a $1,800.00 job. Along the way is a lot of talk about all kinds of things wanted down the road…then the extra work is slowly entered in as an expectation, along with, “I was perfectly clear from the beginning that this is what I wanted, you are unethical!”
As a follow up to this post, I wrote a guide for consumers of the freelancer market, a brief guide to “breeds of freelancer”. Check it at: http://www.andyzhang.com/2007/05/01/breeds-of-freelancer/
Wow. This post has been VERY helpful. Right now I’m dealing with a number 7 client. Very frustrating like your post says. Some clients expect the sun, moon, and stars, and want it all for next to nothing. Never mind the fact that they think you have all week to sit around wait for their response. Time to rework my contract and to turn work down when I know the client is a #7 and they don’t want to cough up the money to pay for quality work. GREAT JOB!
You forgot one type – the psycho client – I think they are magnetically attracted to me
Or maybe you bring the psycho out of them.
I love this article! I look it up each time I get a new client…to suss them out and for a laugh…very good read!
exceptional. i’ve worked with a broad array of ‘em!
hit the nail right on all 12 heads… well done! i’ve worked with all of these clients over the years.
Excellent. Over the years, I’ve worked with at least one in each category. One of my clients is currently a “Low Tech-Hands On-Paranoid” mix (otherwise known as the client from hell).
You forgot to mention the best client of all: the Digital Ninjas!
They are well established in the digital media industry, work on badass projects and look for honest, reliable freelancers to outsource work to. They know what they’re talking about so there is no bullshit on either side, they have no problem paying a decent rate for a decent freelancer, and everything tends to run smoothly and efficiently.
They are hard to find, even harder to get in with, but once you build a relationship you’ll wish all clients were like them.
In defense of some clients, there are a lot of cowboy coders / sloppy joe designers, and generally pants freelancers around who take advantage of the lack of standards to fob people off with sub standard work.. would be cool to read your thoughts on that.
Bless your heart and keep on preaching the gospel of freelancing.
Wonderful post, I was looking for something like this in a while. I remember that most of the clients for http://www.hotelpro.ro (subdomain pages for hotels and lodging in Romania) are hotel owners who match the first type – low tech – and, in a strange way, they are also the uninterested type – or at least, most of them.
Compared to that, on Rentacoder I’ve met the more … “let’s make some websites at low costs” types, I guess it’s because it’s a freelancers website.
I stumbled over this with a thumbs up and added it to my bookmarks in Firefox, also.
Great article, once again.
The Ego-Stroker
This client butters you up with compliments and “you-are-the-only-person-for-this-job” ego boosters, giving you high hopes of appropriate pay and reasonable deadlines. In this stage they make the job sound simple and harmless and they seem like a star Client. But in reality, they have been sitting on this job for months and have very little to offer you, between budget, timing and rewards. When you ask preliminary questions, such as “so what is the deadline?” or “what are the deliverables” they change the subject, take your curiosity as a resounding “yes, I’ll do it no matter what!” and you are somehow sucked into a vortex of insanity without any further info. The project description ends up being far more complex than the Client ever described, and you work long nights and weekends to live up to the compliments they gave you in the beginning. In fact, you feel obligated to do so because they seemed, for a moment, to be an Appreciative Client. Could also be called the “Deceptive Client.”
Dealing with one today.
Great list.
Thank you for posting this, a friend of mine pointed it out.
I have trouble dealing with the low tech and disinterested client, but your advice on dealing with them will help me IMMENSELY and will hopefully stop my inadvertent hurting of feelings (I always feel bad when I do that)
I do think one of the above commenters had a great idea about the Urgent.. but not.. client. I’ve had a few of those. I also agree with not joking with real urgent clients. And sometimes you DO have to be the bad guy when being nice doesn’t work when telling a client that something is unacceptable. I try not to do that too often, but some clients need the newspaper smack to the nose.
haha can you fax it to me
You forgot two:
(1) The “tortured yet inept artist with no technological ability who micro-manages everything and then forgets to tell you they have no decision making power because they were supposed to report to committee” client.
(2) The “doesn’t tell you various other designers worked on the exact same project and all quite rather quickly” client.
Oddly enough… I’ve had one of these this year. If you ever see them coming… Run. Fast. Very fast. Lock the doors, close the blinds, avoid them as if they were the plague because they are the design equivalent.
I have had my fair share of most of these clients and I can just sum it up by saying you maybe get a ratio of about 2 great clients to about 8 that vary in degrees of a pain in the as* is it just the fact that most clients these days have a computer and therefore think that it takes us 5 minutes to design and amend, the hardest to work with are the artists with not techy knowledge as you are their artwork and it does get very frustrating for both as they constantly change their minds. I am happy to say that I’m now realising which clients to avoid from the beginning and instead of trying to manage my projects to the clients time frame (which is never really the deadline) I now just sit back, take it easy and they seem to appreciate me more when I do have the time to amend and tweak their designs!
I had such a laugh at this one! Always knew SOMEONE, SOMEDAY would categorise clients and client types. They make more sense now. Well done!
I have a few clients like these!:)
Great job!
Perfect list, I agree that a tech-savvy one should be listed. I also think there are a lot of bad freelancers out there trying to take advantage of people too. I don’t blame some clients for being paranoid!
hahaha! how did i miss this post?
Hilarious. I’m reminded of what Jim Rohn said: “If you make a sale, you can make a living. If you make an investment of time and good service in a customer, you can make a fortune.”
Clients like these sure do make that tough.
NICE JOB!
Wonderful article, I’ve dealt with most of those types, and atleast a few that were combinations of half of them (usually the most negative 2 or 3.)
One little note: “straighten our points of legality” probably was supposed to be “straighten out points of legality.”
Hi. This article was very informative, both from a service provider and client’s point of view. I think that the different ‘breeds’ of clients you’ve discussed, are equally applicable to the outsourcing industry, of which I am a part. There are a lot of freelance outsourcers who could really benefit from this guide. However, along with this article, I also found the following resource an additional citation of what’s required to really work things out with a client: http://beta.resourcepad.com/articles/Customer_Services__Support_Getting_It_Right/54
Using both articles in conjunction can, I feel, really help any prospective freelance service provider out there.
Nice overview of client profiles. I’m working with a 1-3-7-9 hybrid at the moment. I did it as a favor for a colleague. It won’t happen again.
Hmm. I have one that’s close to the decision-by-committee client, but not quite. I’m working directly with the person who supports the decision-maker. So my contact will pass along a question or request, and I’ll try to have a discussion about the advantages and drawbacks of one or another approach, and then leave each meeting not knowing whether the decision maker is going to even be told what I had to say. I’ll get the same question asked several different ways on different occasions, so I know some of what I’m saying isn’t making it back up to the top. Very frustrating.
Fantastic article! Having worked with quite a few of these types of clients, i would have to say the disinterested (No.2) client is definitely the hardest type to work with, although its usually on these types of clients that you learn the most as a freelancer!
Wow this article gives me more informations..I really love reading this one in fact I read it twice coz its so so nice… I have client ask for a cheaper price and hes always demanding, so I decide to drop him.
This is maybe helpful to me thanks and Very nice article though.
Very nice article. I have dealt with several of them so far.
Great article. There are all kinds out there.
So true!!!
I especially agree with what you’ve written about the appreciative client…!
I’m just starting out, and so I am doing tonnes of work for very low prices so everyone tends to be appreciative – probably to make sure I don’t get upset about the lack of money!
EGO-INFLATION always works!
I have had many in-house Always Extremely Urgent Clients. They expect their work to bump other in-house clients. They also don’t meet their own deadlines to get me information yet expect their final deadline to hold. Frustrating.
Many clients fit more than one profile, in my experience. The “hands-on” client is the worst – bar none. Believe it or not, some of the worst hands-on clients I’ve had have been software engineers tasked with the management of outsourced design. They’re not in charge of the project, per se, but they’re in charge of your involvement somehow. Drunk with power and overcome with repressed ambition, they have given me some of the most absurd revision instructions I’ve ever heard. Beyond specific and well into “Are you kidding?” I’ve found that my client base composition starts to look more the way I want it to when I get blunt with people and tell them, simply, to let me handle the design. Let me do my job. You do your job, let me do mine. When they don’t get it, we part ways and I never shed a tear because, coincidentally, these hands-on people are almost always coincidentally budget clients as well.
Excellent post!
No matter which client type you have to deal with, they always think design is easy. The truest and most important principle in our industry is:
“IN DESIGN, NOTHING IS EASY”
We should simply ban the word “EASY” from our agents, producers, and account manager’s vocabulary.
This article is great!
I have slowly figured it out after firing a “Always-Urgent Client” who acted so condencending and like I couldn’t do anything right and a “Hands-On Client” who would edit the site and mess things up then we would have to fix it.
My life is so much more peaceful.
Now I just have to tackle raising my rates so that I am not giving away the store.
Anyone have a form letter that I can tweak?
So so so damn true man! The “it” thing was too good!
There is one more type of client whom I encountered recently. What name should be given to them? you decide it.
There was a client who wanted to give some touch up to a web template which she created in Adobe Illustrator( As you may be aware of, adobe illustrator is a vector based software which is not usually used for designing web template). All she wanted to was to give some finishing touches. I told her that I will have to recreate that template in Adobe Photoshop (which is specially designed for template designing.) So I designed that template in Photoshop and gave it some professional touches. But she did not like it, why? Well she said she was looking for the same design she created in Illustrator and wants some minor changes. What minor changes ? she never told me that and kept asking to give it some “professional touches” …………………
What will you call that kind of client?
Good post. I found something similar and thought I’d share:
http://weirdblog.wordpress.com/2007/02/01/web-design-dealing-with-client-personalities/
It is from a freelance Web Designer perspective and how to deal with the different personalities you run into. Enjoy!
Cheers,
-Eric
Brilliant list! I’ve had the experience with at least ten on the list.Very usefull article….
“Design by committee”… hehe… think LAW FIRM.
It’s amazing how accurate this is! I’ll distinguish my clients into breeds now =)
I was laughing the whole time I read this. Clients always seem to be a mix of these things and you’ve captured the different characteristics so well. I once had a client tell me during the first meeting “I’m very smart. I have a 165IQ, so don’t try to put anything over on me.” She was so much trouble! Learned never to deal with people that wear their IQ on their sleeve like that.
so… if i get a cross breed of #7 & #9 what should i do? run fast in the opposite direction? is there a way to deal with it?
The Observers book of Web Clients – spot-on!
thanks
very accurate
lots of good additions in the comments as well
i’d add one to the list
Engineer/Scientist
i work with a number of smaller tech companies and have direct contact with the engineers.
it is often their belief that there is a logical, scientifically verifiable solution to everthing including the benifits of pantone 314 vs 315 (btw, engineers love greenish blue hues).
Great article! The worst client in my opinion is I’ll-Know-It -When-I-See-It, and the best one is the Appreciative Client (of course!). Unfortunatelly I seem to be only getting the former ones.
Wonderful post.
As an illustrator for many years, I’ve come across almost all of the client types. There’s a corollary to some of the “Always-Urgent” clients. They have you stay up all night to get it done for tomorrow. . .
and come back to you in a week and a half for “a few small changes”.
The adage “there’s never time to do it right – but always time to do it over” fits these clients exactly.
i like it, very good list.
i work with many different types of client too and most unfortunately fall into the “paranoid” category. They fit your example category type almost exactly.
Great! I was laughing all the way through…well…at least until I got to the pushover client. I have a bit of a guilty conscious now, but I appreciate your honesty.
I am surprised you were willing to admit only stuff I would admit.
Anyway…I gotta vent….Please read this….
***One more client you forgot***
The “SNEAKY”…or What I would like to call the “PULL-THE-WOOL-OVER-YOU” client….or the confusing client…or the scam client (but he did pay me so that’s not it)…
The We-Have-a-Deal-No-We-Don’t-Game-That’s what it was!!!
I thought I was the only freelancer (I currently am a writer aspiring to be a designer) who ever wrote about bad clients. I have a blog on Writing.com I started not too long ago and one of the entries is things that make a writer-or in your case designer-mad (to put it mildly).
I mean, I always heard so much about what p*sses clients off…but…(pardon my slang English) …when do we ever here about what p*sses writers off? I have one client that I could not figure out for the life in me.
Perhaps I am the paranoid one…but…well…I felt like he was trying to pull the wool over my eyes. I mean (and I am taking a big risk that he is going to see this)…he would state his terms in a project posting one way, and well then he would change it slightly…although he did make his first payment pretty fast…
***The confusion and frustration starts here…(like what the %?@#?)***
He wrote on the project description posted on site that…I was supposed to get up to TWO WEEKS from project award date to complete it.
Well…low and behold as soon as he awarded me the project he starts RUSHING me. Again, I realize I could be the paranoid one, but come on I felt a little uneasy, and I still do.
I did get it done in four days, and was happy he paid me but what was the deal? I have other details to add but I don’t want to give it away.
Anyway…all I can say is did you ever have a client pay you a decent wage (and I deserve it because I don’t even charge the average rate!)…and then all of the sudden…he says something stupid like can you do 856 pages for like 600 dollars?
I couldn’t tell if he was serious or joking, but that is way less than a dollar per page! I even tried to get rid of this guy and even said he was the worst client I ever worked for because I really didn’t want to work for him any more.
Then he starts all of the sudden kissing *ss and then he says he will pay me 600 now for 139 pages, which is a halfway reasonable price…but NOT less than a dollar per page?? I mean…CONFUSING!
He’s like…yeah you’re good enough to get paid that much the first time…kind a like going on one good date with someone and then the rest of the relationship is living hell.
I laughed all the way through this-well until I got to the pushover client. I do appreciate your honesty. But I do have a story of banter to make up for all those feelings of guilt.
Okay I really have to share what I just wrote about a month ago. I was reluctant to post it because I was thinking what would happen if a potential client say, but then I explained in one of my entries that I think writers should be able to have a bad day too.
It’s at the following link:
Things that P*ss a Writer Off
http://www.writing.com/main/books/item_id/1400116
Also…about a client…(discreetly of course)…
Pendulum-Swing-Type -I-Didn’t-know-how-to-Read-Type-of Client
I had about six different names (other than swear words) that I could called him within a week. He says in the project description I am going to get about three weeks to do the assignment, but then…all of the sudden he’s rushing me…so….the Pendulum-Swinging Nice Guy Turned Into the following: “Get a Bad Vibe” client
But I dealt with it, and the weird thing was-He still PAID Me. I couldn’t figure that one out. So to me he then became the following The “Confusing” Client
((I think He probably only paid me because something inside of me says to make sure it’s an even exchange and not to give him the assignment until I talk to him, kinda like in those rescue movies.)
Then for some stupid reason, just because after the first payment he gave me 20.00 extra I offered to do one site for free (page copy) and stupid me assumed that it was only 5 pages like the rest.
Then he played a few more roles as follows:
Then the Pull-the-Wool-over-Me (or tried to, but I wouldn’t let him!)
Then the Wheel-and-Deal client (tried to scam me by saying oh..ha 2000 for 4,000 pages…
Then…he says “I’m giving you a lot of work here” and then he disconnected from the Internet (and that was pretty much
That was when I said to him he was the “Worst Client I ever Had”, and I quit- (after the 5 free pages I thought he was going to send me turned to 50-no 100 pages!)
But then…it gets better…
All of the sudden he’s so apologetic and he is kissing my rear (in the e-mail) and he says he gave me a nice review on the bidding site.
He’s lucky he did or I would have wrote the bidding site, and then he awarded me another project and then said all of the sudden he’d give me a certain price which was more than I had asked for.
(After I wanted to quite he was all of the sudden being a total “Apologetic *b*tt-Kisser” Type…so now What?! )
Then, of course, the next phase which kind a half didn’t surprise me as soon as I hand in the work I don’t hear from him but yet when he was waiting for it he was hounding me every day though I was working to the bone.
Then the “Deliquent” Client (Disappears for two days)
He did pay me because this time I kissed his backside because I needed money. But I am wondering what is really with this person. I think I should get rid of him. I am also going to read the other article on this site about “Top Ten Reasons I May-” (wait a minute!). It should be “Top Ten Signs I AM Charging TOO LITTLE! Too little to put up with this dirt, especially after finding out the average freelance made between 30,000 and 50,000???
Even if some days I have a bad attitude..other than probably this poorly-formatted post..I am generally a very good writer!!
Great list. I will refer to it often…if only to remind myself that I’m not the only one dealing with these guys. Thanks for taking the time to write it!
A great list, not just for designers.
A suggestion from my friend, a sound engineer: The Hyper-Interested Client.
Similar to a cross between a Low-Tech and Hands-On Client, this person understands that they don’t understand, and wants you to explain every. step. of. the. process.
Pros: They may also be an Appreciative Client, if you can stay patient or gently coerce them away.
Cons: They can slow you down and turn into a Hands-On Client if they’re not very “Low-Tech.”
great post, very informative.
http://www.goinggreenresources.com
with box I even for the caught it huge tree sweet, still there. with a work
I hadn’t realized it until now, but my very first boss two years ago was an interesting mix of low-tech, uninterested, always-urgent, and I’l-know-it-when-I-see-it. As you can imagine, it was very difficult working for her sometimes as I often was given many different ambitious projects to start with little direction and a very hazy idea of where I was going. However, working with her wasn’t always the pits. I was lucky enough from the beginning to always do my best work and after a month or so had gotten a feel for her standards and thought processes and had also discovered how to use my own skills to make up for whatever she lacked. Through this, I was able to somehow always produce “it”, no matter how vague her beginning descriptions. I think it is important to note that while having a know-it-see-it boss or client can be extremely frustrating at first, through effective communication and patience you can learn to think of things from their perspective and deliver the product that they want.
My experience with that boss taught me much more than I’ve learned in school or at my other job (I should mention I worked at that job when I was 17 years old…I’m 19 now). I became much more self motivated because she was uninterested, I learned to abide by deadlines and prioritize and politely refuse because she was always urgent, I was able to gain office recognition for my knowledge of technology and ability to increase productivity because she was low-tech, and I learned to read between the lines and analyze instructions more thoroughly because she never quite knew what she was looking for. I’ve taken these skills to other settings and the responses have been amazing, just from the few skills I learned from what would probably be classified as a nightmare client.
Ha! Loved this article. My first paid client was a number 7, the “I’ll know it when I see it”. I was so worried that everyone was going to be like that! I was given an initial sketch as far as what they had in mind; the only thing the end product had in common was the colour scheme. I learned enormously about how to deal with a client, though! The next one was such a relief!
u aint got angry clients ,stressed ,a anxious, confused clients
This article is such a neat gift to anyone interfacing with clients! I was laughing hard as I read through the types of clients and how they operate.. As freelance designers we often find that clients make us think that we are “the problem”… and understood that we can be and sometimes are… but the article above so beautifully reminds me not to become too guilty and bashful and instead to also realize that “the problem” could really have to do with the “type of client” at hand
… now I’ll be walking around categorizing clients… and I just hope I don’t come out uncontrollably laughing at one when I realize that they fit one of the above funny moulds … LOL! OMG I can’t stop! LOL!
Excellent synopsis. I seem to be a magnet for the “I’ll know it when I see it” client. I give all my clients a questionaire to get a feel for what the like and don’t like which helps with this a little bit, but not enough!
What will you do with Clients like this?
http://thetoptenme.wordpress.com/2008/07/11/10-things-your-difficult-clients-say-remind-you-of-dilbert/
I recently had an experience with a client that prompts me to wonder if a new category is needed. I propose the following:
1. Cerberus (The dog/client from hell.)
2. The client you’d expect to find has been interred in a mental asylum.
3. The client that is really a shaved chimpanzee.
I think you are missing the dissapearing client. This is the one that gets you started on a project to dissapear for months and leave the project hanging only to come back and ask to have everything done for their launch tomorrow.
Pros: When identified, you will be able to take on more projects than you can since this client will leave enough room to work.
Cons: If done incorrectly, the above issue can backfire. Also, once they appear it will break your whole timetable as you will now have to refit them into your schedule.
How to work with them: State dates clearly as well as what happens when they or yourself misses a deadline. What I usually do is after a period of time, defined according to each client, of limbo, I put the project on a waiting list and when a client decides to come back they go into the schedule as a standby. Think of it as a airplane standby in which you get a sit if someone doesn’t show up. In other words, they get the time I’ve allotted for other dissapearing client that has just dissapeard.
Oh my god. This is BY FAR, THE MOST amazing HILARIOUS article I’ve read so far. I’ve had my share of the types you mention here, and also their mixed types.
From now on, as for managing my client relationships, you’ve made my life easier. A couple of beers (or an equivalent drink) on you. Thank you very much, I’ll reread this thing for a long time.
Hi. This page is a resource I use often
There is, however, one client type missing. The “I’ve done a little investigation myself and someone told me about….” type. The type that puts forward a constant myriad of unrelated, stupid questions (even after the site is finished) about how to do something and for a budget, just because they heard about it somewhere. Aaaargh! Eg. “Can we use Joomla instead because then we can have online enquiry forms?”. It takes a long time to answer such questions. Eventually, I just reiterated that Iif you simply tell me what it is you want to achieve then together we can find the right solution. But looking at the micro without the macro is no go.
Brilliant!
Wow this list is dead on. Great job. I have had every single one of these customers and had to learn some things the hard way, but I think it would be good to refer back to this with any new client so I can be prepared with how to approach the job. Thanks!
Thank You!
My current hands-on client makes me want to cry. Cry like a little girl who dropped her ice cream on the pavement.
Interesting post. it can be very useful.
Great post! I worked as a programmer for years and have come across clients in pretty much every category. The thing that surprised me when I left IT for life as a dressmaker for flamenco artists is that these client categories still apply .. Well, I’ve always said that there really isn’t that much of a difference between the two jobs
OMG, I’ve had like all of these!!! My favorite one is the I’ll know it when i see it. I just remind them daily about how the process works but some are so persistent. It’s like, you know you’re still paying monthly for this, why not just let me do my job! Aghh!
Here are some experiences with each type of client which I’d like to share with other freelancers:
The Low-Tech Client: I’ve had a client ask me to PRINT OUT a website I designed for them. Does that count?
The Uninterested Client: These clients have made me become a better copywriter, web developer (originally I was just a GRAPHIC designer), and print broker. Not sure if that’s a good thing.
The Hands-On Client: One such client was also a freelance designer (read: really he was just a musician, but in his mind owning a copy of Photoshop qualified him as a designer). He was very nitpicky and always asked me to change fonts, colors, or rearrange entire compositions. Of course, I’d always get sent examples of how he would do it. He was so hands-on, in fact, that even when he acted as my agent for clients in his area, he would tell me to change my designs before even showing anything those clients. Needless to say, I don’t work with this person anymore.
The Paranoid Client: I was designing a web app that made heavy use of their huge database, so this client was worried about the privacy and security of the system’s users. Even after adding this to the written agreement, the client would still ask “but there’s STILL a chance somebody could go in and see that information, right?” This paranoia led to my business partner getting some work to build an in-house web server running from their office.
The Appreciative Client: These clients are awesome, but they lead me to question whether my work is really that good or if they just have really low standards
The Get-A-Good-Deal Client: I worked out an agreement with one client to design a logo. Everything was agreed upon, including the fee. By the way, this was a verbal agreement over the phone. When it came time to collect, the client was only willing to pay slightly less, claiming that I had said a different (read: lower) price over the phone. I don’t make mistakes like that, nor would I forget something like that. Instead of calling him a liar and losing out on all of that money, I took a small pay cut. I really look at this as my own fault as it should have been on paper. Kudos to him for backing me into a corner. Nicely played.
The I’ll-Know-It-When-I-See-It Client: I was designing a logo for a cell phone retail store but the client just wasn’t happy with anything I delivered. He kept asking me for draft after draft and, being eager to have ANY work, I supplied draft after draft. This client actually used the words “I’ll know it when I see it,” to justify the constant revisions. No logo was ever chosen and the client went elsewhere for his logo. The only bright side was that I made a profit brokering the printing of the collateral with this new logo on it.
The Always-Urgent Client: There was client with whom every project was delivered in less than 24 hours. Sometimes this client would call me well after midnight expecting it the next morning. One such project was hand-delivered at 5 in the morning at the client’s house (I still hadn’t slept since I had been working all night on the project). He moved far away from me a few weeks after that
The Decision-By-Committee Client: One thing I hate more than anything is when clients involve their spouses in the design process. It doesn’t matter how well you think you did, if their spouse doesn’t like it, you’ve got to start over. On one website design project, a client even handed the phone over to his wife to chew me out for not giving him more credit on the website (it was for a record label).
The Doormat Client: These can be dangerous and cause you to develop some terrible habits. The guilt from slacking off on these clients has made me treat them the best as they’re probably my most loyal.
The Budget Client: A client, and his business manager, asked me to consider changing our payment terms from ‘due immediately upon completion’ to ‘net 30′. This seemed reasonable, so I agreed. Unfortunately, the tab grew and grew, which leads me to…
The You-Should-Be-So-Lucky Client: After a VERY long time, I politely asked for payment on the balance in full. At first they were also polite. But after a more assertive second request, they practically begged me to sue them in as many words. They felt I was being unreasonable because they had brought me so many new clients. Thing is, those clients didn’t owe me money. By the way, this was a music industry client. After some back and forth I got sick of it and informed them I didn’t care about the balance anymore. I was too disgusted to even deal with them. This decision was made because we only had a verbal agreement. And even though my records of emails, phone calls, and projects were meticulous, none of the correspondence mentioned a promise of payment. This was December of last year. I ‘fired’ them that December and have since spent all of 2008 doing no freelance work at all. Last I heard of these guys, their business was doing terribly and they haven’t released any music this year. Karma is a bitch.
Freelance Switch and Jack have hit the nail on the head. I have been working full time and also in the last year or so begun freelancing as well. It goes without saying that my days are filled with all sorts of clients. From the clients at my full time job, which I believe we have at least one of each of all the above, to the freelance work, where there are a few from above, my life can be very hectic! What a great post! I have always just tried to treat each client the same but as I have grown in my career I have seen where each client has to be treated a little differently. Thanks for the advice on how to handle each type of client. I know it will come in handy down the road.
*laughs out loud* Oh, I can so relate. I have encountered all twelve breeds.
Now I just need to think about which breed *I* am!
Wow… so true. Appreciative clients. Ahh… let us sit and reflect on their blessed ways.
Great article. I wish I read this before I dealt with all of the types described here. I have it bookmarked for reference.
clients are just we know them…we know them don’t we?
good stuff blogged
this is just so true. very good article. good stuff. thanks.
I have learned through the years .. that clients are a little like cars … you would not drive a Ferrari the same way you would for example drive a Volkswagen Beetle … each client has its quirks … this article goes someway to expressing those quirks … thanks …
What about the Ill pay you later client, disappears from his phone and email and always has an excuse. I think he goes along with the disinterested client.
Well done post. Thanks for sharing.
The client who asks for a “print out” may actually be savvy. It never ceases to amaze me how many designers think that their wonderful yellow text on black background doesn’t need different styles for print. Much as it should be, paper isn’t dead yet.
As for the “never ending” client… support contracts. Charge an annual fee or a time-based fee with an up front retainer. When your “warranty” period on the work expires, respond to queries with “We can take care of that, but you’ll need a contract. Should I send you an invoice for a support retainer?” A surprising number of clients will agree. The ones who don’t can get the kid across the street to bork up their site. [Speaking of which, keep a backup of your work, so you can unbork it quickly. Don't agree to support something screwed up by someone else without looking at it very, very carefully.]
There are lots of comments hare that amount to “scope creep”, where the project you wind up doing is bigger than the project you quoted on. This is not the client’s fault! You need a contract, quotation, or statement of work that clearly defines the work you’re quoting on, how many revisions it includes, etc. Then you need the discipline to relate deliverables to the quote, as in “here’s the second of the five revisions you have available”, working up to “here is the fifth and final revision to the design…” Not only does this help the client focus on getting the job done, it gives you the ability to charge more if the changes continue.
Sigh, so true. Thanks for the article, this is a great list.
I met them all, but the type I hate the most is I’ll Know it when I see it client. You are right, you are stabbing in the dark, you give them tons of conceptual design alternatives, all they say is Nah, not what I’m looking for. My solution for that is get the client to list out reference sites that they ‘think’ is what they are looking for. Try to force to point out why they like those sites. That way, at least you have clearer outline of what you will be designing for them. That’s from my personal experience.
“you forgot a client,” “the text is too light,” “I disagree with #X,” What kind of clients are we?
Just recently I finished a small project for a client. This client was a mix of The Decision-By- Committee Client and The I’ll-Know-It -When-I-See-It Client. What a combo! MAKE sure you have a CLEAR understanding of what they are looking for; for that matter, make sure your clients have a CLEAR understanding of what they are looking for. I have personally dealt with most of these, but by far this combination had to be the most frustrating. In the end the client was happy with what I produced, but getting to that point was a long and painful process for both parties.
Very funny : Very true. I recognised myself there a few times. I have booked to reada second time.
Don’t forget the High tech client. Everything is either a conference call which you are logged into but no one else if there followed up with no line meetings again involving someware that barely works
I got an amazing combo for one of my first interesting coorporate image gigs. 3,5,7,8,9, all bundled up into one. My initial contact was a delight to work with. Not just appreciative of my work but critical. I think an overzealous “let me have your children” type is ego pumping but does not give you enough of a critical perspective sometimes. So, things start out great, then the cient enthusiastically tells me they need the whole package in under two weeks, as they have a business fair preselection coming up. I let him of with a “warning” letting him know this is not enough time to revise the work and he says we can polish it later. He also gave me a pretty clear idea of what he wanted, giving enough wiggle room.
Then enter the other partners in the company, each with differing, even rivaling ideas…but being partners, they seemed to agree that all their ideas should be considered and included in the design. The first of these, the appreciative one, loved my first draft. I even crosschecked later with an experienced pro and pointed immediately at that first draft as being more interesting and accomplished than the final outcome. Now the partner pool had quite the mix. Those with ideas, the aspiring designer…, and so and so on. Key moments here:
1. having an entire coorporate image package in two weeks time…while undergoing revisions from 7 different people, none of which shared the vision or where even aware of the brief given to me by the person who first contacted me.
2. accepting to produce an initial, not polished enough logo design…with personal business cards, stationery, and such, which turned into “just something for show, we’ll change everything again later, but we need to pass corrections on this one as well”
3. letting the client “be right” as the majority voted against my initial design proposal, which as stated, had a stronger concept and branding potential than the final outcome. I had a clear brief and objective given me initially, and it showed. I was later spun around by the 7 partners each with different ideals, and while I do like the outcome, as did they and mostly anyone I’ve shown it to, my advisor, girlfriend and I knew, it showed.
The low-tech clients are HORRIBLE!
How about the “I know a little bit about building web sites so will interrupt you as you talk with things like ‘Uh-huh, valid html yes yes…’ and ‘But we need keywords for SEO, don’t we?’” Aaaaargh.
I had one client who was a I-NEED-YOU-24/7-BUT-I-CAN’T-PAY-FOR-ALL-THOSE-HOURS-SO-I’M-KEEPING-YOU-ON-STANDBY-BUT-BILL-ME-ONLY-FOR-THE-HOURS-THAT-YOU-WORK. Fits in the Budget and Always-Urgent types of client. But I stayed a bit longer because he was also the appreciative type.
Great Article!
Here’s a tip for you…
As a business owner, you can FIRE your clients that are more trouble than they’re worth.
I’m not afraid to fire a client that pisses me off or is difficult work with, and I’ve fired three difficult clients because I was just plain tired of dealing with the relationship and it wasn’t worth the energy anymore.
I felt much better afterwards.
Holy crap this is amazing. You nailed it, I’ve had every single of of these clients. Lately I’ve been especially frustrated with the hands-on clients and the design by committee
Recently I’ve had a couple examples of the Extreme Control Freak client – sort of combining the worst of the Hands-On and You-Should-Be-So-Lucky client. It tends to be engineers or other professionals. They have a deadly combination: technical knowledge plus testosterone. That means they’re always right, no matter how stupid or wrong they are about something. Sound familiar? Curiously, the low-tech client can sometimes still have this ECF personality, too.
One particular item in the article struck home – I have tried to patiently explain to clients why something just doesn’t work, looks very bad, is not at all appropriate for the web, bad for usability, etc. I had felt that as a professional, it was my duty to inform the customer. But the chances of this working are extremely low, and I may very well do less of it – you can’t teach a moron. And I can certainly avoid putting these really stupid sites into my portfolio.
Essentially, this type of client gets obsessive-compulsive about some Brilliant Idea they have, and even death would not deter them. Since you can count on millions of revisions, charge them up the you-know-what if you can detect their personality in advance.
I had fun reading this post. #12 Breeds are what I hate the most.
Did you look at my client list before writing this? It sure seems like it.
Great job! I loved it!
May I suggest “The Disappearing Client.”
How You Spot One: They’re engaged and enthusiastic for the first several weeks but then get caught up with other stuff. When you call to check in they reassure you that everything’s fine but they’re really busy etc etc.
We’ve had a couple of these who have already paid a fair chunk of their fees but never get around to providing the content to finish and launch their sites.
Great post!!
this pretty much covers all of my clients who all have at least 2-3 of the traits
It looks like we got all of those types already… There is one more type, the most annoying one: “Not Paying Client”… there were quite a few clients that were very happy with the service until one day they disappeared not paying for the last batch of retouched images.
Hilarious. Brilliant.
Great list, I’m thinking of sharing this at work as we can sometimes be our own worst client for internal projects.
Brilliant… I have found that regardless of who you are working with good documentation, being upfront about cost, and making sure communication is in place usually takes care of a lot if not all problems. Me and my crew recently embarked on automating our entire process by developing an online application that takes you from square one… The estimate through the proposal and out the other side. I can’t tell you how it’s changed my companies life. And, it keeps everything in writing..! Very important when dealing with projects… especially if you are small and don’t have legal power.
a superb post and some great follow ups! many thanks
Client Breed #13
The Houdini
This client is in a rush, bombards you with information for a website that needed to go live yesterday. You agree fees and get started on the template. You get hourly phone calls with additional requirements and checks on progress.
You post the first pages onto a test website … and the client disappears off the face of the earth.
Emails are never given a reply.
Their phone is either engaged, or on voice mail.
After a few weeks you send an invoice – suddenly Houdini re-appears, he’s angry and he won’t pay.
The highs:
Sending a County Court Judgement.
The lows:
Kicking yourself for not getting a deposit up front.
Great list — thanks!
Here’s #6 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R2a8TRSgzZY
The “Make it like that” client –
this is a guy who knows just enough about tech to be able to point at someone else’s project and ask you to emulate it, having absolutely no idea how much work may be involved, and always underestimating how long and how much it should cost to get done. The “Make it like that” client never seems to understand why things aren’t simple and obvious. “Just do it like that site…” Not realizing there may be huge, elaborate back end systems and teams of people behind the site he thinks can so-easily be copied for a tiny cost.
The “Piece of the action client”
This client makes you think their venture is successful and when you get into the details you realize the only resource the client has is an inflated and grandiose idea of how magnificent a return the project will generate and therefore is offering you the “privilege” of getting a “piece of the action” instead of actually being paid for your work.
Great post I think I worked with at least 8 out of 12. This puts things into perspective.
Perfect post.. i will print it out and send to one of my clients who are: decision-by-committee client + The Hands-On Client
In this blog information is better than in 99 procent books
An excellent and accurate analysis!
Great article.I particularly like Client Breed #5 with:”Sit back and enjoy the glory. Make sure you get them a very nice Christmas gift and throw in a freebie every now and then.”
Thanks for taking the time to put this together! @saps –> the disappearing client, LOL! Many of those around these days especially in time of recession!
I don’t know about you all, but i think registering your company and getting out of the free-lance world is a better idea. That way you can charge more for work, and come as a company (if you have the resources!)
Good luck everyone and thanks again for a good read. Will be coming back here for sure!
This completely made my day. Currently in proposal mode for a client that wants a website for 200….sigh.
I love this post. My boyfriend’s a web designer and forwarded this to me at work – it’s been doing the rounds at the office and someone from Oz, sent it back to me sent me this morning! Running on online business, I come up against similar personalities. This post inspired me to write an article http://www.boudoirbabe.co.uk/findperfectgift/2008/03/who-needs-customers-like-statler-and.html
If a happy customer tells one friend, an unhappy customer will tell everybody!
The crux of it is that business would not exist without customers. If you have customers, you have to have customer service.
Excellent. Over the years, I’ve worked with at least one in each category.Great tips .It worth to try some of this methodes.
freelancers must have that kind of communication level where he can manage the clients idiology
I’m not sure how to describe my most common client. It is the type that takes a long time to decide even the simpliest things, and then divides this time by three and comes up with deadline for execution. Two weeks for deciding if the price quota is fine and two days when he wants everything ready:)
“The division by three client” ?
highs: he can count
Of course I know that this behavior is the extend of lack of knowlegde about design, not acting on purpouse or lack of respect for designer, but still…
VeryGood. Thanks!
Today I had a meeting with a dreamer
This is exactly what I’ve been looking for. The content is perfectly categorized and the humor (not to mention ridiculously good content) kept me reading until the end.
It gets even more interesting is when you get a mixture of those traits in the same client…
Thanks!
ICorp’s “Piece of the action client” is one I’ve encountered (I’m a web app developer) more than a few times, and deserves a place on this list. The last time it happened, the guy engaged me in a chatty phone conversation for about an hour, and the moment it was clear I was not interested in his project on a partnership basis, he couldn’t wrap the call up soon enough.
Regarding another post about casting blame on others, I have one friend to whom I no longer give encouragement (“Geez, I don’t know; it’s not something I know about”) because when something doesn’t work out, she will blame it on whoever agreed with her. Unfortunately with clients, you won’t know this behavior the first time around.
I’m actually working with a “You-should-be-so-lucky” client right now. It’s frustrating to say the least. Hopefully everything will pull through just fine and I’ll have something new to add to my portfolio. The sooner the better.
I’ve come across many “piece of the action clients” on start-up business’ – normally ecommerce projects. Unless they have a business plan and can produce a cashflow forecast, I give them a wide berth.
The houdiini client is one I try to avoid, but with website design and development being so competitive in kent, you tend to try and keep the team as busy as possible. The ‘houdini’s’ pop up with a a fairly tight brief to begin with and push for a fixed quote and a very tight deadline. I’ve had to threaten 3 of them with LBA letters.
I had one “Make it like that” client – a mobile phone company in Leicester who wanted to carbon copy of a major high street brand. Our design concept was so close – he panicked and made so many changes, I pulled out and gave him a refund and vowed to avoid “Make it like that” clients again.
THANK YOU. A brilliant review of client behavior.
Haha, as a software developer I’ve encountered quite a few of these clients, but also in my facet of translator, though in this latter case not all types apply in the same way.
For example, the “low tech” client sends you the original by fax and expects the translation to be sent through the post, which makes you wonder how he managed to find you on the Internet in the first place.
Luckily, the I’ll-Know-It -When-I-See-It Client does not exist in translation (it does in software development), but I found a more curious beast: The I-Know-Better-Than-You-Though-I-Do-Not-Speak-The-Language Client. I had one recently that blasted my translation as complete rubbish because I needed a whole sentence -one and a half lines- in Spanish to translate a title of “one” word from German, despite the fact the he did not speak German. He did not realize that the “one” word (3/4 of a line long) was in reality a composite word, made up of seven different words, and expressing a *very* complex meaning. I only managed to get paid when I posted my translation of this word on a translator’s site, and asked fellow translators to confirm the translation, after which I sent him the link so that he could verify it.
Once we got a client that wanted us to make 2 websites just for some kind of publicity. We rejected it inmediately.
Later on we did some research and we found out that it was the best decision.
Sometimes you’ve got play it by ear…
Awesome,
It reminds me of my various clients and i’m comparing them (in my thoughts) with the types described above !
Great post, pretty much had all these! Also just wrote this:
10 of your clients favourite sayings
What an excellent article! I am currently working with client breed #4: The paranoid client and your description is them down to a tee. Alarm bells were going off throughout the initial pitching process and I should have followed my gut and not taken the job. After they pulled apart my initial contract wanting the most ridiculous changes I got it seriously beefed up to protect me. Half way through the project they wanted me to sign another contract which was riddled with stuff that trumps my initial contract.
RUN AWAY from this type of client no matter what the size of the job
Thanks so much for the very nice write up!I recently came across your blog and have been reading along. I thought I would leave my first comment. I don’t know what to say except that I have enjoyed reading. Nice blog. I will keep visiting this blog very often.
We also need to consider the ‘no communication’ client…
I recently had one client who would not communicate with me for weeks at a time, yet expect all previous work to be done. Obviously, there were issues along the way that kept bottlenecking the project, however they REFUSED to communicate in a timely manner.
Case in point…I had numerous questions into the head programmer…no answer for THREE WEEKS. Come to find out that his wife had given birth to their first child (I congratulated him), and noone saw fit to inform me. I finally began to think my client had skipped town…
Out of sight, out of mind seems to be common among clients. Communication is a KEY element in freelancing, on both sides of the fence. Without it, you might as well dig your molars out with a spoon.
Just my two cents…
How about the “I want it to look exactly like the PSD and function exactly like eBay for a few hundred bucks, like I told you yesterday and the day before that, and the day before that, and the day before that” client?
What about the “I’ll pay you when I feel like it because I’m a big customer.” guy.
I’ve had every one of these clients, and every one of the “forgotten” breeds mentioned above and in the links to other client lists, and also have had several other types of clients nobody has mentioned yet. I’ll write them up when/if I get time. Basically I now realize that I am a psycho magnet (as I just posted on another board not 3 days ago!). : )
There is a mixture of this info on the oatmeal.
http://theoatmeal.com/comics/design_hell
Right now I’m with sheng, dealing with the same mixed type of client.
How about the “well informed client”? This one is a pleasure to work with because they read up on SEO, Web Dev, Social Netoworks and bounce ideas off you, which can be very inspiring. As long as the developer keeps on his toes and knows his onions they’ll get along fine. If he’s a blagger then the client will spot a fake a mile away.
Great article.
I like the well informed client, however as freelancers, we need to be careful that this sort of client doesnt slide into the i-know-better-than-you client. When you get into headbutting with a i-know-better-than-you client, or at least a i-THINK-i-know-better-than-you client, nightmares insue.
Heres one…how about the i-have-a-new-idea client. I have had two particular clients in the past that will go away on some retreat, only to come back, supposedly refreshed and completely change the direction of their site, causing no end of changes and redos. Then, a couple months later, gone again, only to come back and change directions again!!!!
Sometimes I think we need to sit our clients down and have a stern talk with them LOL
What I love is when they reverse decisions, so you end up building something, deleting it and then putting it back. I’ve had to do that up to 3 times before. At that point, I’m done playing games.
Fantastic post! Just in time to save my sanity too! I’ve had one too many of those “I’ll-Know-It -When-I-See-It” clients lately!
Ha! I can relate to this a lot in my web design days. It’s so much better working in-house!
Clients are like a box of chocolates… you never know what you’re going to get…
I love this post. How about a mock post like ” 12 breeds of freelancers….”
I wonder what type I am…
The “know it when I see it” client.
A client who when asked a series of questions about the creative brief, refuses to give answers of any quality, and ends up saying “sorry to be vague, but I’ll know it when I see it”.
Expensive, irritating and dangerous – avoid like the plague…unless of course they have a bottomless pit of money and are willing to give you a major shareholding in it!
This was so useful, found a reference for a new client type I had not dealt with before; The Hands on Client, was not sure how to handle him and was getting frustrated and blood pressure was going up but this makes things so clear, seems so obvious now.
Will definitely use this to identify each client from now on hopefully making my life much easier.
Thank you for such a great post.
Roflcopter at this list – sad but true. I almost snorted tea out of my nose at the coffeehouse at which I’m working.
My clinents is very similar. It applies in the same way to my architecture clients
I’ve gotten plenty of low tech clients, for sure. With a male friend who was also technologically minded, he ended up offending similar low tech clients, but I found that I did not. I’m not sure if it’s the difference in personality of being female, or what. I also found that while female low tech clients preferred my male friend, more female low tech clients disrespected me, as if I didn’t know at all what I was doing, even though they also had no idea. Low tech clients can also be quite enthusiastic if you teach them something new, and they can then turn into clients that love everything you do.
I was always very very good at client relations and I only had one problem client, which was a bigger corporation who felt that by me confirming the details of the project (you want this to be pantone process black, right?) that I was being condescending.
I tend to be able to produce work fast, so the in a rush client is always a good fit for me. I tend to be able to make nice things, although minimalistic, quickly, so I also can work well for a low budget client. Due to my fine arts background, I would greatly please clients who wanted a little more than they should’ve been asking for from a digital typesetter working at a print shop. They would then become return clients because they could get what they needed there at the shop without having the added cost of a separate designer.
I do not work with clients that do not have some ideas of what they want, and I make that very clear right away. Reference pictures, color ideas, font ideas, shape ideas even are mandatory for me to begin work.
Once, I did have two very reputable fashion photographers commission me for retouching photos for their portfolio, and I was given the photos, and then never received payment for me to start the projects. I’m not sure if they expected me to just work for free, or if they were hoping I would, but they never responded to emails and phone calls I made to remind them they had to make a deposit for me to begin work. Once this happened twice, I determined I had to begin working a different way. I’m in the process of redefining everything I do from the ground up, because I really do prefer freelancing to working in a company.
Great post.
As an SEO i didn’t interacted with client till now.
But your words are excellent and gave a a great idea to do that in future without error.
Thanks for your posting.
I am working with only three clients this week and they all fit into 9 of the twelve.= freelance hell!
I m not working as freelancer but these rules are simply can applied on any business development.
The most important bad client your forgot is the all the above “bipolar client”. Who is hot on your trail one min, lost the next, thinks he knows what he is talking about, thinks he knows what he wants, micro manages one week, the one that states he is the captain of the this ship than must have approval the next, the one that paranoid of being burnt, so is unwilling to give up cash, the one who does not do his homework or read any of the emails you send, on the other hand wants to know what your strategy is every time you speak to him, the one who’s uncles brother’s, cousins, uncle did some of the work already and has left you to clean up his mess, at the same time allows the uncles brother’s, cousins, uncle to monitor your work in progress or relies on his expertise to override your experience, the one who wants a good deal and when he gets changes the project completely, so your left to rewrite the proposal 10 times over and over, the one who never is prepared for meetings, hard to get a hold of but expects your full attention when he calls just as your ready to head out for your son’s baseball game, on a Sat. morning, the one who knowledge of having a website means he will instantly have new clients knocking at his door, the client who does not factor in marketing, seo, management, email services, content development, security, payment gateways, graphic design, hosting, domain registration and when you present him with the proposal that details all of his requirements plus what you need to publish a website he thinks your selling him services he does not need, the client who wants what he has been told can be done, when in fact nothing like that exsists, the client, who sends you tasks to complete when he has not even signed a contract yet, the client who has the interest of what your doing, like an elephant has the interest for driving a car, but than during what should have been a simple phone progress update decides he wants to every detail about something that is irrelevent to your conversation, or goes on rambling about how he knows something about nothing, the client who is over involved and underskilled, than decides your lack of experience is forcing him to fire you mid stream, because his brothers uncles, cousins, uncle told them they would finish the job for free.
I think that sums the all around nightmare client… oh yeh his payments are always late or always a hassle, because he has something to say or complain about, but at the time said everything was great, now he does not want to pay you.
What a fantastic article – lots to think about and take on board especially with our Microsoft Project Clients!
Fabulous post!
I’ve worked for some of these but I never really knew what to call them. Now, I have an easy-to-reference list to come back to.
Please, bear my children.
Your insight on the “you should be so lucky client” is right on! I am a newby and feel used and abused by one of these. My fault….I trusted them!
i think the rules are competible with all the businesses all we need to do is implement them.
The one who never is prepared for meetings, hard to get a hold of but expects your full attention when he calls just as your ready to head out for your son’s baseball game!!
its was great 2 read above all ….keep it up ….shaykh gowher -architect.
Great, interesting post, especially as most clients are a combination of 1, 2, or even 3 of the types you’ve written the article about
Your article is spot on and a grerat tool in knowing how to deal with the various types of prospective customers out there.
I would like to distribute the article to students of mine who have a marketing some offline services to local businesses to prepare them in what to expect. Thanks and keep the great stuff coming.
Great post and I loved your ideas for handling different breeds.
Just one thought.. do we sometimes create the breeds of clients we get by the way we treat and respond to them? And if we get that right can we turn lions into lambs?
Great Article – very insightful. Offers some great tips on dealing with different personality types as potential clients – especially the more difficult ones.
Brilliant post. I’ve unfortunately met several clients that are of hybrid breeds! I’m still relatively new to this but the problem sometimes is how to respond to some requests…but it’s all about experience, I guess
Such a excellent post, and you have covered a broad spectrum and breeds of clients and how to work with them, fantastic advice. LT
The 12 breeds and the rules are compatible with all the businesses and business clients you may come across Enjoyed your post Cheers
Brilliant piece!
This made me walk down memory lane – not a pleasant one though – remembering each type of the breeds of clients you listed here which I have had the “displeasure” of serving!
I think in my 10 years as a freelancer, I have come across clients who are a mix of several breeds, all nicely rolled into 1 client!
I have worked with clients who showed traits you highlighted in Client Breed #3 (The Hands-On Client), Client Breed #4 (The Paranoid Client) and Client Breed #7 (The I’ll-Know-It -When-I-See-It Client).
So much fun! Not.
Your tips on how to work with one are very handy!
I enjoyed reading this – much appreciated.
Thanks for useful information. I am working as supportor and consultant.. I always have some problem with my client.
Clients are always looking for more and we are trying our best to provide our services.
That was fun a read! I recognize myself in at least two of the categories, hehe.
It’s funny though because this topic seems to be more popular among creative freelancers than for freelancing management consultants.
When things go wrong its always easier to blame the client. Things didn’t work out? Don’t worry, the client is an idiot!!
I guess one could also take the other side and create a bunch of stereotypes about web designers…I could come up with a few.
What about clients that many of them rolled into one?!
Clients are always looking for more and there are definitely at least 12 breeds of them
We constantly try to apease them.
lolll you made me laugh thanks for sharing!
Combo clients are the worst. Especially the Paranoid Always Urgent Budget Client.
I come across the “Budget Client” often and still can’t understand why they cannot understand the value in good design and branding. If done well, it can make a huge difference in the success of their business — priceless.
Great post.. too good for my business
this also works for animation. i have one client who has ticked all those points in just one week time. this is just one person, can you imagine? sometimes you just have to put a stop on things, than rot inside trying to get what they want. if they know what they want, also stating that they can do those work you did much faster, then why hire anyone in the first place? maybe some people are just bored, looking for conflicts to fill their empty days.. i dont know..
Heh, that was a good laugh…
My worst “low-tech” client asked me to make him a small website in English and Spanish, and e-mail it to him. So I created the pages, zipped everything & sent him the complete site. Then he refused to pay because “what I had sent him was not a website” (apparently he did not know how to unzip the files).
After that aspect was cleared, be refused to pay because “he did not see the pages in Internet”. Apparently nobody had told him that he needed a domain name and a server. Eventually I bought a domain name, hired a low-cost hosting & published everything on the hosting site so as to get paid – which he did.
But he kept coming back because he changed the pages locally & could not understand why “in Internet” the pages did not change… 8(
Fantastic post! Just in time to save my sanity too! I’ve had one too many of those “I’ll-Know-It -When-I-See-It” clients lately!
Love this, very funny, yet very true. Brilliant.
Fantastic! Thanks for giving a name and delving into the types of people we all deal with. Great reference.
The only type of client left out is the one that starts crying. Literally. Yes, it was a woman. Very unprofessional. And thank God this happened only once in 11 years. I guess it works with her husband and family, so she thought it would work with me. She was also the Chinese Water Torture type of client, another type of client not on the list. THIS worked. I caved in just to make her go away.
Great list here and the best part is that not only you have categorized the clients but also given simple tips on how to handle such clients.
However, there was another interesting similar post which was great fun as well…check here:
http://www.graphicdesignblog.org/graphic-designers-client-personalities/
The titles given to the clients here are really interesting.
haha quality, i do alot of freelance and unfortuntely i always seem to get the always urgent client, wouldnt mind a few door mats
This is so true! Love it!
So I should design stuff for clients that want something unbelievably cheap and it will get me better jobs as I include it inside my portfolio?
I think you missed one, “the client who doesn’t pay a single invoice on time”. There’s unfortunately way too many of them in my life.
I love this article. I have it bookmarked and refer to it every so often. Good tips, and humorous too! My favorite client (being cynical here) is the one that has you change many times, the design or even the direction they are going and wonder why YOU aren’t getting anything done! I just fired a client like this. She didn’t want to pay me. I posted all 24 seal logos, 12 web banners, 15 logo concepts – a finished piece, and website design (a custom wordpress theme!) on my website and sent a link to those responsible for the payment. I received money, and she got another graphic designer to abuse!
Bottom line don’t be afraid to fire the client and have a clause for this in your contract….you do have a contract don’t you?
I know I’m late, but this is the BEST round up of clients types ever!!
This is now bookmarked, and may become a print out for my corkboard…lol (=^_^=)
“Uninterested” is correct in context. “Disinterested” doesn’t mean what you meant here. Disinterested means unselfishly motivated: eg he was a disinterested helper of others.
Man I got a lot of laugh’s. Thanks!
Jean, I have 3 sponge” clients as well.
Calling me after my estimate was too high for them to have me walk them through the software. Either during my billable hours that they don’t wan to pay or late on Saturday night.
Mailing me their DIY attempts with an intern on the weekend. “Get back to me when you are at home, I need your opinion.” This was not a friend either.
Or for legal advice when they contracted another designer. “Do I have the right to … from another designer.” During your work hours that you cannot bill for.
Great article! The worst client in my opinion is I’ll-Know-It -When-I-See-It, and the best one is the Appreciative Client (of course!). Unfortunatelly I seem to be only getting the former ones.
My warm congrats honestly! Never believed that I would find such useful article on the web. Usually I don’t post comments, but guys you deserve warm congrats. I had almost all the kind of clients mentioned, and many times the combinations of clients, are simply scary. Lately had some stingy – hands-on-clients, and not only they wouldn’t pay what should be paid, but also they wanted to make the work like they wanted. Simply sacked.
Thanks once more! Keep up the good work!
This was great. I liked that you showed a positive way to manage the client so that the client/designer exchange is a win/win. Thank you… I will keep this in mind when submitting estimates. The truth is that it’s rare that we’re side-blinded by the type of client, and more that we do not even the playing field. Thank you again.
You definitely provide some great advice on how to deal with the possible different clients you can possibly have. For someone who is newer to search engine optimization and hasn’t had experience with these types of customers this would be a great reference to read for sure.
Commitee’s making design decisions will increase your work load tenfold. One piece of advice offered to me at one time was to provide a solution that pleases all commitee members. This will of course ensure the result is non professional and ineffective as a functioning graphic that works for their important requirement.
I found that by just chatting nicely regarding all their instructions using your professional knowledge in order to inform them dutifully whilst not undermining their demands may help to create a listening platform.
But also just lightly mention the saying that “a camel is a horse designed by a commitee”. It always gets them to get off their high horse trying to get in there competing and flexing leadership behaviours to design and run the graphic designers work. It saves the design job being reduced to a little ego football being flung around willy nilly by players that are merely adhering to their own personal criteria.
Wow I just ran across this article and even though it was written almost four years ago I still get some good laughs out of how accurate some of this is.
We all suffer from problem clients. However, sometimes the problem is not with the client but our ability to work with them.
Sooo true, I can see all these different clients in my business right now!
This is a great list, that I feel should include the “can’t decide client”… this is the one that pays a deposit on the job, you work hard on a great design and show it to them and then they simply mull it over. Forever. The job just… stagnates. For months.
I have one client who has literally been mulling over his website design for over 18 months. He keeps emailing me saying that they’re working on the copy and will have some changes in “a while”. That’s a very open-ended term. It’s especially frustrating when the design is fantastic and you can’t wait to put it in your portfolio of working sites, but the most you can do is just show a screen grab. (sigh…)
Great advice on how to deal with different clients. I’ve come across at least one of each of these kinds. Unfortunately, I seem to attract “The Always-Urgent” clients more than any other kind. One client wanted an entire social network built in less than two weeks time!
Miranda – I have a “talent” for attracting that types of clients as well – sometimes I think they’re the only ones that exists. Usually it’s a combination of the two – “always urgent” and something else – either “hands-on” or anything else. Just to keep things interesting!
Spot-on! I think you’ve managed to gather in a list all breeds of clients, I can’t think of anymore specific types – my absolute all-time favorite (NOT) client is the hands-on client. I am more than happy to do whatever they hire me to consult for. ALONE, thank you very much…That’s why my favorite client to work for is the one that wants to see things get done but lives me alone and gets on my case. Win/win – they get what they want: results and $$$ and I get what I want: to be left to my own devices to do my job and $$$. Win/win!
Great article! I have recognized many of my clients…ah, I’m an architect!!!
Love this! Super funny but sadly, people are like this. It’s cool to come and read about it like this. Makes me feel a lot better about some of those clients.
Great post. I work with every one of these types in our company. At least now it’s clear what I’m up against and an idea of how to deal with them.
Thanks.
Lol! I’ve worked with plenty of these clients especially the low tech and the disinterested client. I’ve really enjoyed this post.
I have encountered all of these types. I looked up this article. Because I’m dealing with a major pain in the butt client. Where im actually scared to talk to now because im going to flip out. I have banned him from calling my phone. He is only allowed to email me once an hour. Only skype me twice an hour. And he uses every one of these allowances to the utmost.
Anyhow you missed one. The “I just got a GREAT idea” this will make me rich..please spend the next 4 an half hours giving me a quote on this. Please be sure to think about every aspect of my project and do all the work on how this will actually work for me. And once you do… i will NOT do the project but will definitely come back in a week from now with a new great idea and i will definitely want you to spend three hours on figuring it all out for me ..and please be sure to give me cheapest quote for this project..that i will not do once i realize its been done before many times or it was not a good idea..because some silly reason like its illegal or not sustainable. which i could have easily figured out on my own if i would have spent three seconds googling this before contacting you.
Awesome article and great illustrations! Thanks for posting this.
Great article, The-you-should-be-so-lucky client is what I have now and its just too funny. They get back to me when they feel like it and not when I need them to so a 2 week project has turned into 6 months. It’s a good thing I demand payment up front other wise I’d be out of pocket!
This was great info! Thanks!
What about the client who can’t make up her mind? Or the client who will ask the painter his opinion about the plumbing and try to make the plumber do it? Run into a couple like that. Have a client right now that has already cost me 2 weeks of work because I didn’t stipulate in our agreement an exact start date.
Working in Paris for 5 years now and I hate these types of client.
Thank you so much! I thoroughly enjoyed this post. I was just thinking about my favourite and worst clients. Bookmarking this one!
Bookmarking this great post. Thanks.
I think the doormat clients are the most beneficial to work with, considering the minimal amount of work put in and they still keep coming back.
Those illustrations were hilarious! I’ve definitely had a few of those types of clients, haha!
Where’s the I know it all client ?
You know, those that want to tell you how to do your job and have a hard time taking in your professional advice?
yes, that’s the one I’ve got right now!
Same Here …. Mr. Know it all Client…. you wish you never started this project
in my experience they are easy to spot, always get into meeting with client before signing contract even before sending quote… try to explain web technology to them little bit that how there website will work etc
No Matter how big project they have its really not worth it!
Nice list and comics, maybe a good idea to print out and have a quick reference list when appropriate.
Isn’t it fun that we find ourselves working with almost all of them? A lot of take aways in this post. Thankfully, we have an active community here that adds on more types of clients along the way. This is very very useful esp for newbies
This is a nice list of information.
thanks for this post! Love it!
Very well articulated. I enjoyed the simplicity of your thoughts spread across the different client types. Will surely share this with my entire sales org!
Thx,
Ani
Hilarious! To the Point! Refreshing are my headlines
I too have experienced some of these clients one time or the other in my freelancing days. But one thing to take away is how you choose to deal with it. You have to learn to think like a business person and also learn the psychological aspect of human interaction. It’s not an exact science but we’ll keep learning along the way.
you forgot the nitpicking, controlling client. the one that has no taste but thinks they know it all and with each decision they make the project worse, uglier and ultimately less successful
I recently started graphics designing. So far most of my customers keep making me start, i edit a few times then they cancel! And all those hours of work go to nothing! I am getting cheated like this many times over. Now I am just pissed. I missing something here? Is there some policy that you make with customers so you dont get ripped off like that that I dont know about? If someone could reply to me, it would be really great.
Lol, so true. I can recognise many of these and yes the .i know it when I see it is by far the most frustrating client. And the disinterested equally so but for very different reasons.
Thanks for the laugh – I found your site while taking a break from pulling out my hair by searching for “how to ask for more money when the client keeps changing the job,” which unfortunately you aren’t telling me here, but I appreciate the field guide to clients nevertheless.
I originally charged what I thought was a fairly hefty price for a job I’m currently working on, but I didn’t realize that I would be dealing with a combination Hands-On/Decision by Committee client – a move-this-down-here/get-rid-of-that/make-that-white-instead-of-orange/put-that-in-the-center type client – and every change has to be sent back for approval by the committee. Do you think it would be advisable to put a form on my website that, in addition to asking for job details for a quote, would also include these 12 categories and the requirement that they check which one(s) they are? Hands-on and Decision by Committee clients get a 50% surcharge.
How about the – “I think I’m a designer and know what I’m doing already, here’s what I can make in Word, cool huh?” client? I have one right now who is driving me up the wall. She wants me to put in this exact text, so I do, and then she tells me that there is just too much text and that it looks “busy.” We’ve gone round and round with this and I’m to the point where I want to throw my computer at a wall (BTW this is for a nonprofit, so I’m doing this for free) and it’s eating up all my time just changing stupid text! I’ve done exactly what she wanted each time, and she still sends it back with changes, and her wording makes it seem like I’m the one coming up with the text and I should feel like a fool! Gah!
Yeah I like those too, or how about “My secretary can do this in PowerPoint, what’s taking you so long?
Haha yes! – I see some of my clients in there too!
…What about the type who takes forever to come up with text, images, revisons etc and the project stretches out so long, you almost forget when it began? What do you do in that case if its done for a fixed price?
I have worked in construction for several years. I realize construction can be very different from what you are asking, but in a way it is not different at all.
We always bid, or quote our jobs prior to beginning the project. How I get around revisions, etc is make is clear in writing that any additional scope of work, unaccounted for in the bid will be additional. As the job progresses I make sure to remind them so they understand exactly what they are asking of me and what I expect in return.
Getting the money from them, that’s another ordeal all together!
Perfect, perfect characterization of the Budget Client, #11. My favorite part of that is how they will still feel like they deserve all the same attention and revisions as anyone else… and unless it’s perfect, they won’t even hand over that meager budget. nice post!
I have worked with every one of these clients. Being an entrepreneur you get to work with all kinds. I have learned over time to market to particular types of clients I would like but it isn’t fail proof. Great tips!
Hi
You forgot the “I don’t understand terms and conditions – client”. These are clients like that are very hard to work with. “Oh I haven’t paid the 60% deposit you require but really I need my logo by tomorrow.” These for me are part of the most frustrating ones and are hard to deal with as they have no respect for the fact that you are running a proper business. Anyone else had a few of those [hopefully not many]?
Nice article.
What about the client that gave you the content, wasn’t finalized and is constantly changing it? Every version is, can you add a “s” to this letter. Can you delete this, can you bold this text, can you change this paragraph to this, etc. Or the ones with the worse sense of design and asks you to centre everything, move it this way and thinks there ideas are actually good.
I agree! Currently Im working with a client who have a really bad design sense and he said his design is much better and can give more impact to their customer to see. Well in my opinion if you think that you are good enough why do you actually hire a graphic designer on the first place? clients sometimes we want to love them, but they just making it hard.
Nailed it! This is pure gold. We have every single one of these clients at one point or another. From now on this is going to be our Bible when considering new projects.
What about the client that doesn’t really like what you did but months later uses a very similar logo on her website ! Starts out via a ‘friend of a friend’. Not worth arguing about I must be good if it was worth copying. Lets call it cheating. Because I never charged her anything it had no value – completely my fault. The moral of the story is ALWAYS have a contract.
Wonderful, amazing article here! but…eh…can you just change that one headline to be “uninterested” instead of “disinterested”…sorry to be an anal jerk…the whole rest of the article uses the correct word. Headlines do get away from us sometimes.
I stumbled on this somehow…not sure how….but these types of clients sound like that of a home renovation construction company client-base! I’ll-know-it-when-I-see-it are the absolute worst!!! Exhausting.
Hilarious and SO accurate. As a freelance designer I’ve experienced all of these clients. Thanks for the post.
You saved my brain. I thought it was all me…I work with the combo of disinterested client and I’ll know it When I see it clients, yes plural, one is disinterested and both are know it when they see it. I feel much better knowing that these two come as a “class”.
Nailed it!!
You really nailed it again amigo continue the great work I generally
get fun from your own blogposts! ? !
Spot on, we’ve all had (and been to some extent!) at least one of these in the past
Lovely article!!!
Enjoyed reading it… and had a good laugh too!!
Fun way of learning about not so fun clients!
LOL!:-P