1. Outsource Everything
Outsourcing can bring you sanity and sanity is worth the investment. Also, by investing actual money into a project you are more likely to invest the hours and hours of time it takes to make your outsourced solution really come to life and produce results and returns for you!
If you’re truly passionate about web design then you probably never stop thinking about ways to implement a new or innovative web site solution. This is the reason you have close to 30+ website ideas queued up. This is also the reason why you feel tense! Like any creator in the design world you’re not satisfied until your visions become reality. What to do? Outsource!
This is the quickest way to see idea after idea come to life is to outsource. However it can get costly very fast so be sure to choose your ideas wisely and if it’s a project be sure that you are not outsourcing over your client’s budget — of course. To save money, do as much of the work as you can before you outsource the remainder of the project. Also, by having a hand in the production of the project you establish an accurate shared vision for your outsourced buddies.
The BEST outsourcing automation practice is to build a preferred list of vendors that you have built up relationships with — Ultimately, not only will you be able to better communicate estimates, production times and abilities to your clients but this will automate outsourcing all together.
2. E-mail Rules/Automation
Most e-mail applications offer a way for you to filter your e-mail by applying rules. However, desktop clients are far more powerful than any web based e-mail clients we have come across. Yes, even more powerful than GMAIL… far more powerful. Regardless, Here are a few things you can do using Microsoft Outlook rules to automate your e-mail:
- Automate your Filling - as soon as e-mail comes it is automatically categorized in its respective folder hierarchy. This allows you to keep all your client e-mails in their respective folders which allows you to have quick access to a history of e-mails regarding each client.
- Automatically color coordinate e-mails & assign them into categories
- Automatically mark e-mails for follow up - You can automatically mark e-mails from a specific person / domain / category / etc. for follow up or urgent message or whatever you want (rules are very flexible).
- Automatically send specific template e-mails - This can be very useful if you receive e-mails with the same subject or text in the body. You can set your Outlook to send a specific e-mail template based on the text in the subject or body of the e-mail. This is great if you have people contacting you for a variety of services / products and your e-mail can automatically understand which product / service and automatically send them the template e-mail you’ve setup.
- Auto send re-occurring e-mails - it’s always better to contact your clients before they have to contact you. Also, if you have any reoccurring costs such as hosting, monthly maintenance or subscription costs that you bill them then you can setup an e-mail that sends them a reminder a week before their payment is due.
View our comparative review of Microsoft Outlook & GMAIL for more e-mail mastery!
3. Content Distribution
When you post information to your website it should reach beyond the pages automatically. Here are a few ways to achieve this:
- RSS Feeds
- E-mail updates / Auto Newsletter - A newsletter that sends the content of the month all in one post automatically
- Widgets - transform your blog/website into a widget for others to post on their blogs/websites/desktops.
- Technorati.com -
- MyBlogLog.com
- Automatic Newsletter -
- Digg.com
- Facebook RSS/Blog Application
4. Project Management
- There are some features of a project management solution that allow you to get your projects under control in a quasi-automated process mainly because they offer a collaboration environment — a central online place where the client and the web professionals review and contribute towards a project’s completion. Also, the better the user interface is then the more automated (and enjoyable) the project becomes. User Interface also affects your client’s perception of the credibility of your company. Along with User Interface there are a few other key features that make a project management solution truly great.
- Collaboration Environment
- Great User Interface
- Hosted on Your Own Web Server
- Free Opensource Solution or one time fee stay away from monthly costs — yes this means NO Basecamp! Read on about why Basecamp is a poor choice.
5. Product / Service Lifecycle
- Create flowcharts & numbered lists to outline the lifecycle/process of each product and service. Ideally, try to construct a process that encapsulates multiple products and services. However, there are times that this just isn’t possible. For example, an e-commerce site will have a different lifecycle than a basic website.
- If you are unable to fit all your products and services in the same lifecycle try to at least have the same stages, where the steps in each stage differ.In the following example you can encapsulate a majority of types of website products and service lifecycles:
- Explore
- Legal
- Research
- Planning
- Production
- Performance
6. Only Choose Professional Clients
One major factor we can’t control in the website lifecycle is the client. Like most industries there are clients that pay very little but demand a lot. More often than not these clients are rude and disrespectful in their communications. Also, they are less willing to provide payment and not as prompt when you need them to supply content. I’m sure you don’t need me to tell you to stay away from these clients but hwo can you discern from a potential disaster of a client to professional client? Well we’ve written an entire article entitled ‘Client Science’ where you can read on but for the purpose of cleint automation we reccomend that before you accept a project have the following in already in place:
- Exit Stratigies built into the project contract
- Written demands of the client with deadlines
- Clear & Concise (we recommend visual flowcharts) documentation that shows the client the website process upfront. This can alleviate and perhaps eliminate the client’s concerns about the integrity of the company they are investing their money into.
With These three structural aspects in place you can hopefully avoid frustrated/mean clients or at least of a way to ditch them and have a clean legal break.
7. Schedule Regular Meetings Until Project Completion
Simply put, have a regular meeting with those involved in a project to keep everyone orientated, moving and on the same page.
8. Training Videos
Part of a product/service lifecycle is the post-production follow up or benchmark. Some technical products may require a forum with customer service moderators. However, there are a majority of website solutions such as a content management solution that can be covered in a training video and can save you a lot of time dealing with the client after project completion. Also, the client feels even better about their investment realizing that you thought about their needs further than simply handing off the project after completion.
9. Write Client Deadlines Into the Contract
If the client’s project is time sensitive and part of the project’s timeline depends on the client then hold them accountable. If they need to give you content then demand that it’s turned in by a certain date or else full payment is required and you will have no penalty if the project is delayed for any number of days, rather than just the number of days they delayed you. Another motivator for the client is to specify in the contract that if they do not act promptly with their responsibilities then you will retain their initial deposit even if you choose to exit the contract free and clear.
10. Focus Heavily on Projects That Are User-Driven
Any client website or concept websites internal to the company should be created in a way that allows content to be dynamically updated by a client or website member. This will cut almost all of your maintenance and your website will be highly automated. Clients more often than not prefer control over their investment and have a web designer that is a bottleneck. If you’re greedy and demand that your company must do the updates then your risk losing your client to a more technically versed or at least an ethical company willing to give the power to the client. Besides, who really wants to be in the middle of creating new projects and then have to switch focus to past projects all of a sudden because a client contacted you to make a seemingly simple change… which will more than likely take a couple hours after going back and forth with the client.
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