The creative niche and IT as a whole are quite competitive. As a result, getting a good web design client is a hassle on its own. When you check on most freelancer platforms, you will see many professional web designers, all executing their services professionally. This creates a competitive market, making it hard to get the best web design clients. However, this doesn’t imply that you cannot get good clients looking for great web designers. With the tips shared in this write-up, you can be sure to land web design clients, whether you are a freelancer, an agency, or an entire company. Keep reading to find out more.
What you should look out for in a web design client
While getting web design clients is the ultimate goal, it is important to get a good client who will give you an easy time to handle the project and collaborate professionally and seamlessly. Therefore, before you start searching for your next web design client, check out the following characteristics of a good web design client first.
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Clear and realistic requirements
Collaborating with a client who understands the basic and technical requirements for their project should be among your top concerns. In any case, working with a web design client who keeps changing the requirements every now and then can be hectic. You will be spending your time and other useful resources on one project, especially if the budget is fixed.
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Good communication
When working on a project on web designing, the least you could want is to move to the next phase without the approval of the client, only to have your client ask you to redo the already done phase. It is, therefore, crucial for the client to communicate effectively and give updates throughout the project’s progress to save your time as a web designer and to save their time as well.
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Pays on time
As a web designer, you are in business, and you use your skills and knowledge to deliver your work in a professional manner. It is, therefore, good for a web design client to appreciate the time, skills, and knowledge they are using to design their web by paying promptly. Some freelance platforms have a section where you can review the past history of clients to determine if they always pay on time.
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Open to suggestion
Sometimes, web designing requires extra creativity and improvements here and there to make it look better. Therefore, a good web design client needs to understand that as a professional web designer, you understand the best tools and practices that can enhance their web design, thus giving you room to do better but stick to the original plan.
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Respect your time and boundaries
Get a web design client who believes in your expertise and is professional enough to understand that you have other clients and schedules. Therefore, the client should be open to discussing with you the appropriate timeline you are likely to complete the task without pushing you to the wall.
How to get the best web design client
As an expert web designer searching for that good client, use the following tips effectively, and you will for sure land your next big client for web designing.
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Enhance your social media presence and engagement
Social media is quite a huge platform where people connect and interact. Social media accounts speak more about your professionalism, interests, and passions. In fact, you can build brand identity through social media platforms.
As a web designer, you don’t need to have all social media platforms. Depending on your potential audience, you can pick a platform that will help you reach and connect to more clients. Some of the best social media platforms that can help you grow your career in web design include the following:
- Instagram – through Instagram, you can showcase your web design creative ideas, thus attracting potential clients searching for your services.
- Twitter – Through Twitter, you can connect easily with other experts in web designing, marketing professionals, and developers, among many others. This will help you create a good network that can help you get your next big project.
- LinkedIn – Apparently, this is a professional social media platform that will help you showcase your expertise in web design and connect with potential clients. You only need to tailor your profile to showcase your expertise in the web design field and keep the account active through related posts to attract more clients.
- Facebook– Facebook is a social networking platform worth trying. Even if you are just beginning your web designing journey, you can always start creating a social connection that can turn into a big network team that will open lucrative opportunities to land your next big web design client.
- TikTok – Through TikTok, you can create creative video content showcasing your expertise in web design. What’s more, you can learn from other experts through tips and tricks posted daily on the platform. This will enable you to create your brand and, at the same time, learn a lot.
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Create engaging and educative content
As a web designer, you have great knowledge and skills that others are yearning to master. In fact, some may even offer to pay good money to acquire such knowledge and learn technical skills about web designing.
Therefore, start writing captivating, informative, and educative blogs about web design and promote all this content through different platforms, especially your social media platforms. With no time, you will attract those who want to learn about web design and clients looking hire web designers, too.
As you craft web design content, you can consider the following approaches:
Blog posts – Blogs are a great way to attract an online audience. Potential clients can approach you through your informative blog posts. In your blogs, include your past work and contact details, enabling clients to get you easily.
eBook– An e-book plays a key role in generating leads for your business. In an e-book, unlike blog posts, you can cover more, including a responsive design, logo designs, and other elements that make a web design attractive and functional.
Guest posts – As you start your journey as a web designer, consider guest posting informative content on reputable blogs.
Podcast – Podcasts are audio files of specific content. As a web designer, you can record such podcasts as you interview experts in web design and post the recordings to your potential audience.
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Join freelance platforms
There are many freelance platforms you can join to get great clients. Fiverr and Upwork, for instance, are among the best sites to hire developers and competitive freelancing platforms you can use to source web design clients.
It is okay to start the web designing journey with low rates. As you build your profile, you can increase the rates depending on your experience level and past projects you have handled.
Other competitive freelancing platforms you can find web design clients include the following:
AwesomeWeb – This platform is designed specifically for graphic designers. The screening process of AwesomeWeb is quite seamless compared to other marketplaces. However, you must have adequate skills and knowledge in the design space to be part of the team.
Toptal – Toptal is a promising marketplace where you can land your web design clients. However, the screening process is quite in-depth. You must prove that you have the capability, skills, & knowledge to deliver the desired results. Nonetheless, the costs are quite high, meaning you will get clients who are willing to pay more as long as you deliver the required results.
Behance – While Behance plays the role of a creative jobs board, there is an active section where companies and agencies post jobs that vary widely. As a web designer looking for clients, you can easily land some good clients from this platform.
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Develop well-crafted proposals
Of course, you should think of an idea that makes you stand out from the many web designers to win jobs. The clients often want to read details about you and why they should hire you and not any other web designer.
If you are a creative writer, you can write your proposal from scratch, maintaining a high level of uniqueness. Still, you can opt to use a predefined partnership proposal template. In any case, your proposal should include the following details:
Personal information
- Cover
- Costs you charge per project
- Job challenges and potential solutions
- Experience level
- Timeline
- testimonials
- References
The proposal should show the client that you understand the dynamics of the web design field well, including the industry-related insights and trends. Think of the possible questions the client might want to hear their solutions and include them in the proposal.
Again, use easy-to-comprehend language and grammar, ensuring the client can easily interpret what you are trying to communicate. For each project, craft and tailor the proposal to meet what the client wants in their job description. You should not cut and paste proposals for every client you are targeting.
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Send a Cold Email
Cold emails can get you that dream web design client. While it may seem something unattainable, it works in some instances, especially when tailored professionally and appropriately.
When writing a cold email, keep the following in mind:
Connect with a potential client beforehand – Before you start writing a cold email, do some research and find an opportunity to connect with a potential client. This can be via a networking event or even social media platforms. Knowing a client before helps build trust between the two parties.
Tailor your cold email based on the client’s business – You should be able to prove to the client that you understand their business operations, preferences, and brand as a whole. This will help capture the client’s attention. Once you have the client’s attention, you can then describe why you are a perfect fit for their business needs, giving reasons why the client needs to hire you.
Follow up: Once you send your cold email, you shouldn’t stop there. If you don’t hear from the client, maybe they are busy or held up with some unavoidable circumstances, and they haven’t seen the email. Be sure to follow up, reminding the client if you can accord your web design services to their business.
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Create a professional network
Networking is a key element for every web designer. Through networking, you get to meet new people who can, in turn, introduce you to new opportunities or people who can give you job opportunities.
There are many ways you can network as a web designer. Among the many ways you can create and grow your network include the following:
- Contacting old clients
If you have collaborated with other web design clients before, it is quite easy to contact them for more work or to ask for referrals. Especially if you deliver unmatched services, the clients are likely to offer you more job or connect you to other clients who wants your services.
- Attend web design industry events
Of course, there are those events related to web design tasks. Attending such events will give you a chance to meet and interact with other experts in the same field. It is through these interactions that you get to meet potential clients or even future clients who will need your web design and web development services. Besides, you can learn other tips and hacks on how to navigate through the web design industry as you grow your profile and portfolio for future projects.
- Work with other web designers
Sometimes, it can be tough to work as a solo web designer. As a way of growing your network, you can get other web designers and work with them. Still, you can reach out to other professionals, such as content writers whose job is to create web design-related content. These content writers can help you get in touch with web design clients easily.
What’s more, you can actually work with web developers whose main focus is to build websites and not create web designs. These are the people who will connect you to web design clients effortlessly.
- Ask for Referrals
Still, you can reach out to people in the web design field and ask them to refer you to potential clients looking for web designers. Besides, past clients can also help refer your services to other clients. Family and friends can also help you get potential web design clients by referring them to your services.
- Join an Agency
Apart from working with other web design experts, you can join an agency whose main service is designing websites for clients. Working with an agency is advantageous because you get endless opportunities without struggling much. Besides, you get to learn tips and hacks for getting good clients and approaches you can use to deliver good results.
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Create a website to capture leads and promote your work
As a web designer, you need something you can show your clients. Besides, building your own website will prove to clients that you have the potential to deliver the services they are looking for.
As you build your own website, do your best because this is something that sells your skills and capabilities to potential clients.
Questions to ask your web design client before working for them
Asking your web design client the following questions will enable you to have an easy time and process when handling their project. Ideally, you will know what the client wants in a better way
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Who is your potential customer?
Knowing the customer base of your web design client will enable you to design the website and tailor it to interest the target audience. Besides, knowing the customer base for your web design client can help you do research on what they prefer in a product and what puts them off in a product. As a result, you will deliver something that will add value to the client’s business.
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What are the dynamics of your business?
These are more of the features the client might want included in the web design. Sometimes, you don’t just assume after getting a basic detail that you already know what you need to deliver. Go a step higher and prompt the client to give you finer details of their business to help you tailor the web design to meet all the objectives.
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Who are your competitors?
Knowing the client’s competitors will give you a leeway to know what to do to stay ahead of them. After all, your client’s objectives are to stay ahead of the competition as a way of scaling their business higher. You can then check the competitor’s way of operating, design, and social media engagements, among other elements.
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Which features do you want in your websites?
Sometimes, the features you should include in a web design based on the nature of the client’s business may sound obvious. However, sometimes a client might want more or less of the basic features, sometimes advancements here and there. Therefore, make an effort to have your web design client explain the wide range of features they prefer in their web design.
Conclusion
Every web designer yearns to get good clients to build their brand and grow their career. While the process can be a bit hard, especially as a beginner, taking simple steps and using the approaches explored in this guide will always bear fruits. However, the number one rule is don’t underestimate your capabilities, and you will become the top web designer every client wants.
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Written by:
Stuti Dhruv
Stuti Dhruv is a Senior Consultant at Aalpha Information Systems, specializing in pre-sales and advising clients on the latest technology trends. With years of experience in the IT industry, she helps businesses harness the power of technology for growth and success.
Stuti Dhruv is a Senior Consultant at Aalpha Information Systems, specializing in pre-sales and advising clients on the latest technology trends. With years of experience in the IT industry, she helps businesses harness the power of technology for growth and success.