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When making a website, it is very important to consider branding. If you want the website to be memorable and recognizable to it’s visitors, there needs to be a level of consistency and impact across the whole site. To do this, I have a few suggestions to follow below:

1. Logo and Favicon: Designing a logo can be very difficult, but it is incredibly important. The logo will serve as a reminder to your user, wherever in your site they may be, that they are on YOUR site. Any print materials that reference the website should also have that logo to help your users with that association. If you are designing a logo yourself, try doing it in black and white first, then add color, because it should be able to stand on it’s own without color. Keep it simple too. Some of the most recognizable logos (like IBM or Apple) couldn’t get any simpler. Once you’ve done that, don’t forget to create a favicon! The favicon is that tiny 16×16 pixel icon that shows up in your favorites/bookmarks list, browser tabs, and sometimes the URL textbox too. To turn any square icon into a favicon, use this favicon generator. Then, include the following in your head:

<link rel="shortcut icon" href="images/favicon.ico">

2. Color Scheme: Picking a color scheme is really important for your branding. You want to select a small set of colors that remain consistent across your website, logo, and any print materials that are related to the website. I’d suggest first selecting a single color and then if it is easier for you, you can use color scheme generators that are available for free online. There are tons out there, but I’ve found a few for you here: Color Scheme Designer, Color Schemer, or Color Toy.

3. WWW Redirect: This phrase refers to how your website appears whenever you market it off the website, as well as the actual URL you actively use to point to your website. Any website can be written as both http://www.yourdomain.com OR http://yourdomain.com. Any user can type either one, and you’ll end up at the same place. However, it is important to select one and stick with it for two reasons. One, as I’ve mentioned in a previous post about SEO, I explained that search engines can actually see those two different URLs as two different websites, which reduces your traffic, which reduces your search results. Two, selecting one of these will help your users remember the site, and reduce any confusion with the less computer literate. FYI, here’s how you force your website to use the www version or the non-www version:

Insert the following into your .htaccess file:

The WWW Version (http://www.yourdomain.com):

Options +FollowSymLinks
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^yourdomain.com [NC]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.yourdomain.com/$1 [L,R=301]

The Non-WWW Version (http://yourdomain.com

Options +FollowSymLinks
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^www\.yourdomain\.com$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://yourdomain.com/$1 [R=301,L]

In both cases, remember to replace "yourdomain" with your actual domain name.

Well, that’s all for now. Good luck!

Finding clients, especially when you are new to the web design business, can be both incredibly easy and difficult. It is easy because there are actually a lot of people out there in need of web design services. Small businesses are leaving the yellow pages en masse for the web, and most of them aren’t very web savvy. However, because most of them aren’t web savvy, they can be incredibly difficult to work with. So really, the better question is, how do you find good web design clients.

First let’s figure out some places you can look for any web design clients at all, and then we’ll tackle weeding out the bad ones.

• Craigslist: That’s right, depending on the city you are in, you’ll probably see several posts a day related to web design and graphic design. The other good thing is that you don’t even have to limit yourself by city if you are alright working remotely. The only warning I give for that is that not being able to meet clients in person can cause some issues.
• Guru.com: Guru, whose office happens to be right next to my employer, College Prowler, is an online marketplace for freelancers and employers. I personally have never used it, and it does have a few fees mixed in there, but if you are looking to do contract work for the majority if your income, you’ll need all the help you can get, and this one is definitely worth it. There are other sites out there like this one too, just look around a bit.
• An Online Portfolio: Make sure you have examples of your own work available to people. Then advertise this by passing out business cards, purchasing online advertising spots, or linking to it from sites you’ve already worked on. Just having something ready to go shows potential clients that you are viable, and will encourage them to reach out to you instead of you reaching out to them.
• Business Cards: Making as many connections as you can is always a great idea. The more clients you meet, the more people in the web business you deal with, the better. So go mingle, and pass out a nice business card to everyone you can. They might pass it on to someone they know. A majority of my clients have come through word of mouth and other connections I have, as compared to searching myself on websites like Craigslist and Guru.

But that is really only half the problem. You’ve really got to be able to weed out the bad clients, the ones that will be a pain to work with. Trust me on this one, for every good client you find, you’ll run into two or three bad ones. So now just a few suggestions to clean out the grime.

• If your client tries to swindle you down to a pay rate way below your average, or is incredibly surprised at “how high” you charge for your services, then keep in mind they don’t seem to value your work enough. Web designers can charge anywhere between $30 and $100 an hour in my experience. If they think that $30 is absurdly high, make it clear to them that is isn’t, and if they don’t understand, then drop them!
• Make sure they have an idea of what they actually want. When clients don’t know what they want, then it’ll be very difficult to produce anything they like (at which point they blame you). Then let’s pretend you magically figure out what they want, they are just as liable to change it up on you and request alterations all the time. Either don’t sign with this client, or if you do, make sure you are charging an hourly rate instead of a flat rate, so you get paid for your iterations.
• Often times, small business owners are looking to get on the web, but they have little expertise with computers or the web at all. This will make communication difficult, and you’ll often find them nitpicking over minute details that in reality are not important. You probably won’t get screwed over here, it’ll just be a huge hassle.
• If a potential client doesn’t email you back for 5 days, then that means they are probably disorganized or bad at communicating. Either way, this could be quite dangerous. Set up a strict communication schedule, or ensure that if anything falls to the wayside, that they’ll recognize when it is their fault.

Those are just a few suggestions for weeding out the bad clients, so you can keep the good ones around. Got any other questions? Let me know, and maybe I’ll have a few suggestions for ya!

So I’m not going to pretend that I’m an expert at freelancing, because I’m certainly not. However, I do have some experience, and I think after your first few times doing freelance work, you learn a whole lot. So I figured I’d offer up some advice to those of you who may be getting into the freelance web design or graphic design business.

1. The most important thing you can do for a freelance job is write a contract! A simple one page contract can go a long way in encouraging both you and your client to abide by specified timelines, payment dates, etc. In all likelihood you’ll never even need to threaten your client with breach of contract, but it is nice just to have the comfort. You should write you contract in a way that indicates a timeline for the project. This will encourage you to keep on top of your work, as well as make sure your client provides any materials that you need in a timely manner. It also makes sure you can’t get screwed over if they “aren’t happy” in the end (you’d be surprised how much people will try to reduce the price after you’ve already agreed on something). Clients also have the tendency to ask for something, agree on a price, and then ask for more without wanting to pay more. For these reasons specifically, ALWAYS get a contract written up and signed before you begin any work. (For sample contracts, check this out (make sure to edit this to apply to YOUR situation!), or if you’d like, shoot me an email and I can give you some advice).

2. Make sure your client is aware of their responsibilities (because even though you are the freelancer, they almost always need to provide you with something). The best way of doing this is to include deadlines for the client as well as yourself in the contract. These deadlines are often dates that you need content by to finish the website, or logo materials to work on the designs. Timeliness of your client’s deliverables will affect the timeliness of yours.

3. Ask your client for a list of websites that they like, with details of why they like them. Getting this information will help you understand the design aesthetic that your client appreciates, and give you an idea of how they might want their users to work through their website. It might also be helpful to sit down with them as they discuss this, and even ask them to visit their competitor’s websites if you are working with a business.

4. Make mock-ups before you start coding anything. When presenting mock-ups to your clients make sure to do four things. First, always make multiple options. Presenting one looks cocky and stingy. When you present multiple designs, ask for critiques (both positive and negative) on all of the design possibilities, but have them pick one. Then incorporate those critiques into the final design. Second, present your mock-ups in PDF format. PDFs are by far the most professional way to send documents. Sending Photoshop or Illustrator files is unprofessional, and they can rarely be opened by clients. Sending jpegs/gifs is lame because then your client is opening up your design in random programs. Keep it consistent with PDFs. Third, use “lorem ipsum” dummy text. It fills the page realistically without requiring actual content from your client or you. It isn’t worth wasting your time coming up with realistic content, just make it look good while you are working on the mock-ups. Fourth, it helps to present your mock-ups in a browser window skin. This will help your client imagine what the website will really look like live to their users. Looking at the design outside of a skin is like looking at a photograph outside of a frame. Sure there is information there, and sure it might look good, but it sends a much different message in the frame.

5. Figure out ahead of time how your client will be updating their content. There are many possibilities including you updating your client’s content, the client using a content management system, or if the client using Dreamweaver or plain markup after you tutor them. These three options will most likely impact how your code the website.

6. Find out what other things you can do for your client on top of their website! There is no better place for more business than the people you already do business with. Many clients just getting into the web also need help with other graphic design needs (such as logos, letter heads, business cards, etc.) or will want you to do updates on their site, or SEO work for their site. This extra work leads to extra cash. Just make sure to include it all in the contract from the start.

7. Get a feel for your client’s expected website users. If you have a good feel for the people that will be using the website you design and/or create, then you’ll be able to do an infinitely better job at creating the website.

Got any other questions? Let me know!