7 Deadly Sins of Contract Web Design

Posted by Sarah Koszty on March 18, 2009, 7:55 AM EDT

It has taken many years at Hard-Knocks University in order for me to put this list together. I hope that my mistakes will enlighten others and afford new designers the ability to be as effective and professional as possible.

Contract web design isn't easy - we don't do it for the money or fame, we do it because we love the work and we're proud of each and every creation. While starting your own business or providing freelance services can be exciting at first, there are many pitfalls and hidden bombs ready to go off at a moment's notice. So be prepared and be smart about your business practices.

1. Lack of a Contract

This can seem like a no-brainer to some, but for others this lesson comes the hard way.

While designing a site for a friend,  I thought to myself, "I'm not going to make my friend sign a contract. They'll appreciate that." The truth is, my friend had no idea the pain and anguish they were putting me through while I developed their website.

Contracts are to protect yourself as well as those you are working with. They outline fee rates, schedules for deliverables and most importantly, they make sure you get paid should anything go awry.

Basic items to include in a contract:

1. Work to be done in a detailed list, outlining everything you intend to provide your client.

2. The amount of time this work will take (don't forget to take your estimate and double it - this is to protect you, should you encounter any bugs during development that extend the development time).
3. Your fees for the time estimated.
4. Any non-disclosure statements such as:
   1. No SEO support (I personally consider this part of a maintenance agreement)
   2. Email accounts
   3. Domain name and hosting
   4. Rate schedule for change orders
   5. When you expect to start development contingent on design agreement (Artwork Sign-Off)
   6. Explicitly state you offer no guarantees for items not listed in the contract

2. Lack of Art Sign-Off

Art sign-off forms are a godsend. Really - they are.

An Art Sign-Off form is the piece of paper a client signs when they agree to your proposed design work, which initiates the development of their website. When a customer comes back to you, three weeks later, and says they never agreed to having their website in blue, yellow or green tones - you can whip out your art sign-off form and present it to them nicely.

It's not about proving the client wrong. Rather, it is having the proper documentation to support your efforts and design.

3. Lack of Change Order Requests

It can range from changing artwork, updating content on a website or something as trivial as adjusting the site's color scheme from red to blue - but it all adds up. Worst of all, your client doesn't understand the implications of requesting such changes on the fly.

Change Order Request forms work in conjunction with the Contract and Art Sign-Off forms. If you were required to give a deadline for your work and the client has decided to change their logo design, the content on their site or even their entire design, it is crucial to document the requested changes to any artwork or development that was already agreed upon. Document the amount of time it will take to complete the changes and present the Charge Order Request to your client to inform them of the fees and time needed associated with the changes. This paper is also amended (attached) to the original contract for record keeping.

With most every Change Order Request, the contracted deadline date will not be met. This document allows you to track and note when the contract was modified and allows you to provide documentation to your clients as to why the contracted date of delivery can not be met.

Lastly, every Change Order Request is a request for additional work. This means that you are entitled to extra compensation for every change based on the amount of time it will take to complete the new work. However, you must have signed written approval from your client in order for the Change Order to be valid.

4. Obtaining Domains and Hosting on Behalf of Your Clients (or worse, hosting sites yourself)

Most clients who want a website can hardly use a computer (at least in my experience). So guiding them to a Domain Name provider is difficult.

We as small business owners think we can charge extra for domain name registration, hosting and setting all these things up for our clients - but it's a ticking time bomb waiting to go off.

Eventually your client is going to realize that although they own their web domain, it has been registered to someone else. Should they want to make changes to their domain registration, they can't.

Now, there are many safeguards to put in place to ensure that clients are able to modify and access their domain and hosting accounts - but my point is: Why bother going through all the extra work? Instead, set aside an afternoon where you can sit at the computer with your client and walk them through the registration process. By doing these things together, you're building a relationship with your client and allowing them to take part in the website creation process.

And, a final word on hosting sites yourself - don't! Chances are you're a designer, not a system administrator - unless you want to spend time setting up Apache, Mail Clients, Permissions, Groups and Users, etc., etc. - stick to what you love and are good at!

5. Not Releasing Art / Flash / Raw files

This is a tough one for designers starting out in the business. All artwork must be released to the client.

Withholding artwork so you have exclusive rights to business card orders, additional marketing materials, etc., ends with the client making ugly business cards from rasterized versions of your work taken from the website.

This is simply bad practice. If you would like to charge more for raw art files, outline that in your contract.

6. Requiring Clients to Contact You for Basic Content Changes

With all the open source solutions available these days, it is unethical to limit your clients to a static HTML website, which requires that you be notified should any changes need to be made to any of the content (and thus you get to charge, again, for services which were not really needed - you were just greedy).

Based on the clients need's, you can set up a WordPress or ExpressionEngine blog, a Joomla or Mambo CMS system - or even a ConcourseConnect site that would allow them to have a community with blogs, wikis, reviews and personal profile pages (yes, a shameless plug here, but can you blame me?).

Set up something your client can use to change their marketing message, content and even images without having to depend on you. Frankly, you don't want to make these changes anyway - they're too small to make a profit from and they only lead to you breaking away from other work to meet the needs of existing clients.

7. Allowing Clients to See Unfinished Work

While clients are eager to see the progress on their newly commissioned pieces of art - I highly doubt that any great artist would not allow their clients to see any of their unfinished work - so. Why? Because it gives clients the wrong impression about the development process, and leads to unneeded change order requests.

How does this happen? If you're like myself, you tend to get the nuts and bolts in place before you start making your site look remotely "pretty". Clients, on the other hand, think that you're hard at work making something look one way, and have no idea the amount of effort it takes to get a site ready to be "skinned". So while you have the best intentions at heart to allow your clients to see unfinished work - when they see their website for the first time they are thinking to themselves that they just gave away thousands of dollars to someone who has no idea what they are doing.

Worse, clients then try to change things - before the work is done.

Save yourself the headache. Finish the design before you allow clients to view the site for the first time (which can also be noted in the contract). They will be happier in the long run (and so will you!).

In Conclusion...

Website design is not always easy - but it's a job of passion. Designers do not get into this industry for the sake of making millions of dollars or international celebrity (okay, maybe some do). We offer our services to clients and we owe it to ourselves to make the contract work as smooth and painless as possible. In a World Wide Web full of IE6 bugs, open source solutions, custom development work and organic optimization techniques - the last thing we need to worry about is covering our back-sides.