If you work with clients today’s episode is for you! We get into some great discussion about how to develop meaningful, positive relationships with your clients. Learn how to attract the best quality of clients, how to retain your favourite clients, and how to avoid any potential client headaches early on in the relationship.

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Meet Your Hosts

The Honest Designers Show started when our founder Tom found he was regularly chatting and sharing tips with top designers; Ian Barnard, Lisa Glanz and Dustin Lee. We soon organised a weekly call where we would help each other with areas we were struggling with and try to give each other actionable feedback. Soon we realised that the collective experience of the group was proving so valuable for each of us, that we thought ‘why not share these conversations with the world?’.

And so, The Honest Designers Show was born! This podcast is an insight into how to succeed in the creative industry, as well as giving you a totally transparent, under the hood look at some of the tougher, less glamorous hurdles to overcome! We also tend to get a little goofy along the way, so this is a chance to get to know each of us a little better :). We’ve loved recording this show for you, and we hope that you find value and enjoyment in listening to it.

SHOW NOTES

In this episode we talk about the relationship between designer and client. Specifically, we look at how to establish a positive relationship, choose the right clients and avoid any headaches in the process!

[1.00] Why clients get a bad rap within the design community.
[2.00] Communication is crucial when it comes to clients.
[3.00] Clients can often make or break a project and how enjoyable it is.
[3.45] Lisa’s experience of fostering a great client relationship.
[5.00] Why client’s are just people, and why relationships matter.
[6.00] How long-term client relationships build and get better over time.
[6.50] When you really know your client, they begin to trust you more.
[7.30] Dustin had bad clients early on, but why he blames himself.
[8.30] Great client relationships = more recommendations.
[8.55] Why referrals lead to higher quality clients.
[9.40] Why you should have an idea of how you want the relationship to pan out over time.
[11.00] Face to face interaction and an initial honest meeting can really help.
[12.00] Why you should outline crucial details of your client relationships in writing.
[13.40] Being completely transparent with your clients, from the start.
[14.45] Ian’s builder strikes again!
[15.45] Using an initial gesture to disarm people.
[16.50] Why you should think about customer service when dealing with your clients.
[17.20] Doing nice gestures to impress your clients.
[18.00] Why Lisa was practically a therapist for some of her past clients!
[19.00] Try to make your clients day.
[19.30] Keeping balance, and establishing your limits.
[20.10] Point out when you’ve gone above and beyond for your client. They may not realise otherwise
[21.50] Why you should never neglect deadlines. They are important!
[22.30] Why you should sometimes hold back work though.
[23.40] Realise that your client isn’t a designer, learn to talk their language.
[24.50] Don’t assume your client has any design knowledge.
[26.00] Explaining why you made design decisions.
[27.00] Hand-holding your clients to lead them through a project.
[27.45] Don’t feel shy to lead a project. You are the expert.
[28.30] Why it’s so important to care
[29.30] The importance of getting a crystal clear design brief
[31.00] Being clear on what both parties want
[32.20] Getting your client to think emotively about the type of design they want
[35.40] You’ll start to see patterns after interviewing a lot of clients
[36.00] Defining your ideal type of client
[37.00] Why you should be looking for long-term clients
[37.50] Why you don’t want a string of ‘one night stands’
[39.40] Lisa wishes she’d known more in the early days
[40.40] When you should dump a bad client or toxic client relationships
[42.00] Analyse when you may be at fault, to grow as a designer
[43.00] Dustin is now the client, so seeing things from the other side
[44.50] Dustin being sneaky and pretending to be a client, to spy on how the best companies deal with clients
[47.30] Closing advice from the four of us

The Honest Designers Show Podcast

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