How to come out and Survive an Unresponsive Web design Client? – A Useful Guide
It is obvious to every business person, especially in the web-based industry to come across both reliable and unresponsive clients. Although most of the clients are reliable and responsive, there is still some who are unresponsive, regardless of how many times ever you follow with. Such situations may become disgusting, particularly when you are in the middle of the project, without knowing what to do next to complete it. However, such situations must be managed and faced. Especially, such unresponsive clients may leave many small, medium companies and freelancers feel disappointed.
To come out of such situations and handle your unresponsive clients and survive in the web design industry, here is a guide for you:
1. Everything appears to be perfect: : Got the project and clients is happy with your performance. You get all your emails answered immediately and get all your questions cleared. Then what else would go wrong? It is uncertain with anyone that a good responsive client may unexpectedly stop responding, however, you try to have all means of communication available with you rather just believing one mode of communication, email.
2. When do you actually realize your client may be a flake? : Most of the freelancers or small companies, of course, take quite some time to realize that their client is a flake. Although your client is fast in responding, sometimes it may happen that they vanish for a long time without answering your mail or calls. This may, of course, disappoint you and discourage too in proceeding with the project. But still, try to give your client enough time to get back and waiting even till the end of your workday, however, keep your follow up.
3. There could be some source still left out: Although you are fed up communicating your client by all means and still did not get a proper answer, try to analyze your communication, as there may be still some hope for communicating him. Maybe your client is more of a phone person than checking emails. Therefore, try to find
some possible source to communicate with him.
4. Setting your communication boundaries: There must be some ultimate solution for this prolonged situation with unresponsive clients to come to an end. You must try to express your expectations from your client when you get frustrated. This may rather get you a solution, as you must remember the fact that your client, either you as a freelancer or a small or medium business is not your boss, rather you are contracted to work together for the completion of the project on time.
5. Try to manage your expectations right from the beginning: It is always better to make it clear to your clients about what your expectations are and how serious you are about having responsive communication and instant feedback to take the project to successful completion on time. You must have a perfect plan for better
communication, which would certainly avoid the chances of your client turn unresponsive. Clients can never be predicted to be perfect and always responsive. However, it is your responsibility to know how to fix such a troubling situation and get the project completed successfully.
6. Getting your project paid is very important. Besides all your hard work, if the client is not willing to pay for what you\’ve done is a really embarrassing situation. In order to not get into such a situation, you\’ve to set your project milestones in such a way that both the parties interest are safeguarded. Always try to get a good portion as advance or set milestones in between accordingly. Especially if it’s a web design and development project, you can end up in a situation where you\’d have completed the project and the client is not responding. The client might have approved the initial web design mock and you have started the development of the same, without knowing that the client has left the project. Always make an agreement to pay until the portion completed, if the project is cancelled by the client.