Ignore The Ego
A nasty trend is floating around the web world these days and it ain’t pretty – it’s the all inclusive “Ego”.
While I’m definitely guilty of this from time to time (and who isn’t?) it seems to be a common thread in all of the freelance and development blogs I subscribe to. How many times have you seen posts entitled:
- How To Say No
- How To Fire A Client
- Why Your Design/Development Sucks
- Why The Client Sucks
- How to Spot Bad Clients
and so on and so forth? What ever happened to the client always being right and giving something a little extra?
Client Education
I think the business world has finally realized that the client isn’t always right, and that’s ok. But instead of telling the client no, you should always try to give them some kind of yes. A negative will always turn someone off from you, so it’s best to give a positive right after.
For example, if a client asks for a fancy splash page, please do tell them no. But instead of just “no”, how about:
A splash page turns many users off from your website and they often leave immediately. How about some kind of animated banner on the homepage instead?
Not only does this educated the client on why you’re saying no, but it gives them a positive in the way of offering a similar alternative.
You Suck
I admit, I’m guilty of this. But I’ve seen as to why. I’m picky. I’ve been doing what I’ve been doing for as long as I can remember and have worked hard to become one of the best at what I do (at least I think so). Therefor, when I see other developers’ work, I judge immediately.
What we don’t realize is that, even if we are better than the next person, there’s always someone better than us. We should be nurturing those noobie developers, or those with bad code (or design) and teaching them the correct way of doing things, instead of bashing them. Also, your way may not be the right or only way either.
Shank The Client
We like to think we’re awesome freelancers. And we are. But somewhere along the way we lost that “pleasing the client” attitude and we don’t allow the client to get away with anything. While we probably don’t rip the client off, we don’t give anything extra. Our emails and calls are brief. We charge extra for everything, because hey, time is money right?
I have a couple of clients that I go way, way, way out of my way for. I’ll make minor changes to the site, give extra long consulting time and generally try to be there when they need me. As a result, they don’t freak if I make a mistake and blow up the site without a backup (because they know I’ll fix it ASAP). They always come to me for more work, even if I charge more than the extra guy. They know they can count on me.
But strangely enough, I don’t offer this level of service to all of my clients, and I’m not sure why. Most of the clients I have, I send them a quote, they send me deposit and files and I send them a site. That’s it. Perhaps it’s because I’m slammed with work and can’t offer extras to every client, or perhaps some clients are more friendly and I feel more at ease with them.
We should aim to go that extra mile, otherwise we’re just a robot churning out code and designs, and clients can always find more robots either.
The Big-Headed Egos
Some of the worst egos I’ve seen have been from the “experts”. Fine, you’re famous. You’re all that and a piece of cake. But who helped you to get where you are? The majority of it was blood, sweat and tears – but what about those lowly developers you’re so rude to, did they not buy your materials and support you? What about those clients you brush off?
It’s important to realize that no matter how “big” you get, you’ll always have clients. Even movie stars have clients! (The people who watch the movies). Get a big ego and you’ll quickly lose those clients – and your fame.
Your Thoughts
What are your thoughts on big egos in our industry? Have you noticed it as well?
image by andrewrennie
About the author
Amber Weinberg specializes in clean and semantic XHTML, CSS and WordPress development. She has over 10 years of coding experience and is pretty cool to work with. Amber is available for freelance work, so why not hire her for your next project?
Where you mention – “But strangely enough, I don’t offer this level of service to all of my clients, and I’m not sure why”, it’s definitely a two way deal. If your client is going to make the effort with you, then by all means make the effort with them and more, nine times out of ten they’ll come back for more because you’ve offered a brilliant service.
I’ve had clients who I’d done a lot for but they’ve not really appreciated it or perhaps didn’t really understand what I’d done for them.
They can come at you with a bit of an attitude, you still play nice and you still don’t get anything in return. You’ve got to be careful not to be pushed around too – I think this is slightly different though than having a big ego.
I’ve had the odd dig at clients, but only in a jokey way, nothing a long the lines of telling them to get on their bike. After all, without them, we’d wouldn’t have a job!
Nice post Amber!
I agree! It seems a lot of the blogs around here forget that too. Without clients, we wouldn’t be freelancers.
Too right! I think freelancers need to be able to bin clients and say no but its also supposed to be our job to make our clients life and business better, there’s a balance needed. We ourselves need to look after our business by not working with and running around for total nightmare clients, but unless you sometimes go out of your way for people, you will never get the awesome clients.
I agree with some of this, as web specialists we need to realise that some people just don’t understand the internet.
I have had plenty of clients come to me at a consultation after having bought a standard 5 page website. Straight off the bat they point out they want some flash work, then some javascript work, and then they start feeling like they have been misled on what they can get.
We need to educate our clients and in a constructive way illustrate all the difference in web sites and web design, no is no point in just getting stroppy and telling them to beat it, as most people work comes from referrals so your only hurting yourself.
Good post Amber.
You’re right to bring this up.
I often got frustrated by client’s slow understanding and I would get short and snappy with them. *Not* a good way to please clients.
My sister runs a marketing company (Enthuse Marketing) and she pointed out a simple truth to me – people have different personality types. This brought a lot of things in to perspective as I realised the people I would snap at just had different personalities to me.
Successful people can realise their own personality and work on it to be more friendly / assertive etc as required.
I obviously had to learn patience and become more explanatory – beginning with why I have to charge for (almost) everything. After that, clients are often glad to either learn more or leave you alone to work.
Once they know what to expect you can ice and cherry the cake for extra praise.
The ego is a menace. But that aside, I absolutely believe in gently controlling the client. In any field, whoever is providing the service should take the lead and set up proper expectations for each client.
If we, the service providers don’t take control the client will and chances are they know a lot less about the service we offer. It can get ugly real fast for everyone involved.
I don’t think it takes ego to take control and try to create a situation that benefits all parties. I think it’s essential.
~Mike
I think the ego forms from too much confidence and also if you become “famous”.
Many articles I have read encourage to be confident in your work and not afraid to say. I think that is good because you need to have a positive attitude or your clients will be turned off from your service. However, forming an ego is very bad. An ego is terrible not only for the community, but for yourself.
I agree. Confidence and ego are two different things