Comments on: When You Need Your Website “Yesterday”, Don’t Call Me

By: SEO Canada

SEO Canada — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 05:55:42 +0000

I totally know the feeling. I always push a 60 day time line for non dynamic projects, and 90 days for custom dynamic (and right now I’m flat out rejecting over one over my work load). Anything sooner than that would be rushed and of much lower quality, and naturally you have to have the old if the client isn’t happy with the design clause this will cause the contract to be extended.

Working as a professional SEO I’ve seen this sort of scenario as well and nearly 90% of the time these companies miss their timelines, end up over charging, end up disappearing, and in one case told the client he could no longer warranty / support their website! As with everything else in life you pay for what you get.

By: Feydakin

Feydakin — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 14:05:16 +0000

I wish that web design was the only place we saw this.. So many people simply can’t grasp the concept of things taking time any more.. I see it almost daily in our jewelry business with people wanting hand made jewelry in a week.. Yeah, right.. We thank them for thinking of us and let them know that our schedule and craftsmen simply can not produce quality work in such a short amount of time..

The trick is to continue to emphasize quality over speed and ask the customer if they want the best or the fastest..

By: Scott Clark

Scott Clark — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 13:15:11 +0000

Oh thank you. I get this so often and it’s nice to know I’m not alone.

Another scenario I see are the “on the rebound” clients who just broke up with their web designer and need someone to save them right away because something is broken. It’s a no-win scenario for true professionals who realize that good relationships are nurtured over the long run.

Sphunn!

By: Doug B.

Doug B. — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 02:52:16 +0000

Will,

I feel your pain. Worse yet I feel the pain of the person /company that doesn’t end up with what they are ultimately striving to achieve by means of their website. Imagine the frustration when the web site does not accomplish or even come close too what was proposed and promised to them.

It is inevitable they will spend a lot of money and turn around and claim that SEO is a bunch of magic potion or beans. My guess depending on how serious they are about bringing quality traffic to their website she/they may never get it, or understand it. It is a likely scenario they will be dissatisfied with your industry as a whole, unfortunately lumping you and your competition as one in the same.

I do not recall talking with you about this unless it slipped my mind. I ultimately would like to take such mistakes by customers and post them on my blog as educational matters. One you have posted the other is coming soon.
Maybe titling them in a category named:

Learn from them or don’t?
What did they do wrong?
What could I have done differently?

You get my point I’m sure, the idea is to get people to think harder b4 making the same dumb mistakes.

PS Welcome to the real world “RETAIL END” of SEO.

Ironically I believe one of the things in your class you mentioned is that SEO doesn’t happen overnight.