Getting inside the mind of your client helps reduce frustration (and surprises) on both sides, reduce “contract creep” and project or budget overruns, and allows you to coach the client about what they really need. By learning to get inside the mind of your client you help them make better decisions and have more clarity early on.

It’s a common comment among web designers that clients often don’t really know what they want or need. That’s because it is the process of designing – seeing the changes along the way – that helps the client become clear. You can shortcut this process by remembering to ask some key questions that help the client get clear and give you more insight as to how their minds work.

1. What do you want your website to accomplish?
Sounds basic, yes? But it is often left off the “design” questionnaire. If a client doesn’t know what they want their website to accomplish, they will be changing their minds frequently throughout the design project – which can become pretty frustrating for the designer, especially if there is a set fee.

2. What is the first thing you want people to do when they come to your site?
Often clients are so focused on how they want the site to look, that they forget that the purpose of the site it to get the client to do something – sign up, make a purchase, leave a comment, etc. If you help them think through this answer, it will help you know what to place where on the site in order to create the greatest likelihood that people will take that specific action first.

3. What is the second thing you want people to do when they come to your site?
If you help your client think beyond just the initial process, you’ll be helping them make sure their website and their business and financial models are in alignment. That means less going back and making changes later, and less frustration and annoyance all around.

4. Who is your target market?
OK, so this is question is probably not missed as often as the others. But what do you really mean when you ask this question? Does the client understand? Have they defined it enough to help you create your design? (And by the way, if you’re a web designer, are you clear on who YOUR target market is?)

5. Give me a list of websites you like and identify, specifically, what you like about them.
6. Give me a list of website you don’t like and identify, specifically, what you don’t like about them.
Again…these two questions may be ones you ask, but you will probably need to coach your client on how to provide you specific feedback so that it will make sense to you and help you get inside their head, thus allowing you to create a more on-target design the first time.

Don’t let the client just say “I like the menu on this site.”

What, specifically, do they like about the menu? The font? The color? The hover effects? The size of the menu in relation to the header?
It could be any, or all, of those things. But if you don’t ask, you’ll just be making an assumption, which is never the best way to meet a client’s expectations.

7. How will you know when you are satisfied with your site?
This is, by far, the most commonly missed question. It is essential to get the client thinking in these terms before the project even starts. Both you and the client need to be clear on what the measures of “satisfaction” are. You may “finish” a site and fulfill the design contract, but if the client isn’t truly satisfied, how does that help you long term?

Your goal is to design great websites that help your clients do what they want, but part of your goal is also to have delighted clients who send more work your way. Asking this question upfront, even if the answer is a little fuzzy at first, is one way of ensuring great word of mouth advertising and ongoing client relationships.

Consider incorporating these questions into your intake form, discovery questionnaire, or whatever process you use when beginning a new web design project.

What other questions do you ask that help you get inside the minds of your clients? Please share them in the comments below.

This will give you a primer for making your own website the center of your marketing, but can also serve as talking points to share with your clients.

Topics Cory covers are:

• 4 reasons to make your website the marketing hub of your business.
• 5 things to look for in a web designer.
• How to get people to your website.
• How to educate and market through your website.
• How to take it to the next level.
• How to make the pitch and close the sale.

Here is a quick snippet of the video introduction by Cory Miller.

The entire series is available as part of the WebDesign.com premium membership. Join to today to access a growing library of other valuable web training resources.

Today’s Internet has become a social environment. Like it or not, that’s just a fact. As a designer you should be aware of the various social spaces that are available to you and your clients and try to learn as much as you can about them. You need to be able to integrate their various customization schemes into your (or your client’s) brand strategy.

The first thing you’ll need to do is create a plan of attack. By this I mean that you need to research and find the correct networks for you or your clients. Finding the right audience is half the battle when it comes to social media. Don’t waste your time on networks that don’t have relevance for you or your client.

In other words… If you’re a dog… don’t try to be a kangaroo!

Once you’ve determined which networks are right for you, you should study those networks and learn the ins-and-outs of their platform. You’ll need to know the limitations such as screen sizes, customizable area size, level of interactivity, and a host of others. The more you know about your chosen platforms, the better off you will be.

The next phase is creating what we call a “Unified Message” through design. By this I mean that you want to develop your designs (logos, colors, slogans, etc.) and build a core set of graphics that will work across multiple social spaces.

Consistency is key when it comes to the web because consistency creates awareness.

Once you’ve developed your core set of graphics and/or branding materials it’s time to put your plan into action. Go to your chosen networks and use your knowledge of their platform to design some memorable landing pages/profiles.

The final phase focuses on the importance of “social cross pollination.”

The premise of this theory is that by referencing your various social profiles on ALL of your sites, marketing materials, and (seemingly) benign places like email signatures or business cards, you will be able to capture a new segment of users or simply expose your existing user base to a different side of you. By doing this you will constantly give people new ways of interacting with you and keep them “on the hook” by giving them fresh ways to get interesting content from you no matter where they may be on the web.

As you can see, I’m very passionate about this subject and fully believe that the internet is headed down a road that will only become more social. Now is the time to act on this and get up-to-speed with these technologies. If you don’t you run the risk of being left behind, and as we all know… If  you’re not at the party, you can’t dance with the pretty girl!

Below are the slides for the “Designing for the Social Web” presentation:

We’re offering a free webinar on Google Analytics on Wednesday, Oct. 13 from 11 a.m.-Noon (Central Time).

This webinar will get you started on understand how to use analytics to better understand your site visitors.

Reserve your webinar spot today here

Today on the WebDesign.com live show, Cory and James talked about conversation, content and community. They also recommended a lot of books that have really helped us build a community around our products and services. Here is the list of books and their Amazon links.

The Whuffie Factor: Using the Power of Social Networks to Build Your Business

Trust Agents: Using the Web to Build Influence, Improve Reputation and Earn Trust

The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference

Six Pixels of Separation: Everyone Is Connected. Connect Your Business to Everyone

Raving Fans: Satisfied Customers Just Aren’t Good Enough

The New Community Rules: Marketing On the Social Web

Launching a website is a lot of work. So be sure to have fun.

The Internet is a place for serious business, but it’s also full of distractions both hilarious and informative. While you can find anything on the Internet, there is a casual atmosphere that pervades. Don’t take yourself too seriously. Loosen your tie a bit and be prepared to laugh.

While your business is undoubtedly serious and very important, it’s OK to crack a joke now and then. It’s OK to link to a funny video or write in a style that’s a little more casual. You don’t need to be a complete jokester, but you should be human.

Have some fun. The more fun you have with your site, the more people will notice. Launching a site is a lot of work, but it shouldn’t be a chore. Make it fun by having fun. You’ll enjoy and your readers will, too.

Once you’re up and running with a website it’s important to pay attention. If you’re going to reach your goals and objectives you need to be watching for the appropriate indicators that measure success. These may be your site’s traffic or response from the site or customers or whatever it is you’re tracking.

Just be sure you’re tracking them. Use a stats system like Google Analytics to track some of the big numbers. If you’re tracking things that aren’t automatically trackable like number of customers or responses you could just set up a simple Excel file (or a free Google Doc, to continue the economical streak). Maybe you’re tracking multiple numbers, like customers, sales, web site visitors, RSS subscribers, Twitter subscribers, etc., and an Excel file is an ideal way to bring them all together. The point is to pay attention to the important numbers and see how your strategies and tactics are working.

Especially as you’re getting started it will be slow going, so don’t get discouraged. Your website will need time to become established and you’ll need to spread the word. Your customers won’t realize you have a website until you tell them. As word begins to spread and your plans fall into place you should see your metrics begin to rise.

After a little time you should be able to notice if your efforts are paying off. This is especially important because you don’t want to waste time on something that isn’t working. If you’re posting blog entry after blog entry and your site’s traffic is still flat, you might need to try something else. But if you notice a little rise each time you post a blog entry that might be an indicator that you’re doing something right.

Keep in mind that you can’t put complete trust in the numbers. There are always other indicators that might trump the numbers (for example it might not directly bring in customers to blog, but blogging might give your brand an unquantifiable shot of respectability). And it’s also easy to become obsessed with the numbers. Especially when you can look at snazzy graphs you might be tempted to check your stats every day. Resist the temptation. While you do need to pay attention to what’s working, you can’t obsess. Instead obsess with getting your content right. Figure out how to track your stats and then do it infrequently enough so it’s not a distraction, but often enough that you can spot patterns and react accordingly.

Above all, be patient. You can build a website in a day, but you can’t build a great website in a day.

There’s a recession going on. We’re a long way away from the dot com boom. It’s OK to be cheap with your website.

I’m not suggesting cutting corners and getting sub-par design or tech help. Those things cost money and you’ll need to invest in them. I am suggesting being as cheap as you can. Be economical.

It’s easy to dump a lot of money into a site. And don’t forget the time investment. You might not be paying yourself like you would a contractor to write for your blog, but your time is still valuable. It’s easy to dump a lot of resources into a site before you know it’s worth your investment.

One of the great things about the web is that there are a lot of extremely cheap or even free services out there, and some of those do exactly what you need. Try a free service before committing to hefty monthly fees. You might discover the monthly fees are worth it. Or you might save yourself a pile of cash.

One of the best blog services and content management systems out there is WordPress. It’s free. But setting it up, customizing it and keeping it updated might be beyond your skill level, which is where a pay service might pay off (like ours).

While you’re saving money, don’t forget about making money. Spending a little on your site is worth it if it starts to bring in more money. Hopefully your site will quickly bring some health to your bottom line (that’s the point, right?).

But don’t forget that there are extra ways your site can bring in money. Especially if you’re running a blog it’s worth considering some of the extra revenue possibilities. There’s always advertising, which may or may not work for what you’re trying to accomplish, and there are also referral opportunities. Some of your business partners may offer a small kickback when you refer paying customers. Amazon runs a popular affiliate service that will pay you a small percentage when click-thrus turn into sales. It may not amount to much, but a few dollars from Amazon when you review books might help offset some of your costs.

As you’re trying to sort out the timing issues, what you really need is a plan. You need to think through what exactly you’re going to do with a website and how you’re going to do it.

• What do you hope to accomplish with your site?
• What’s the end goal?
• What’s it going to cost? And does the goal justify that cost?
• How’s it all going to work?

You’ve got to ask the big questions and you need to come up with serious answers. Just like your business, you’re going to get out of a website what you put into it. If you don’t put any thought into how it’s going to benefit you, you’re likely going to get haphazard results. But if you come up with a solid plan, you’re much more likely to succeed. You came up with a thorough and detailed business plan for your business (hopefully)—so likewise you need to come up with a detailed strategy for your website.

First come up with some goals. What do you want your site to accomplish? Your goals should be big picture:

• A restaurant might want more diners.
• A realtor might want to sell more houses.
• A nonprofit might want more donors.

Next figure out some strategies to accomplish those goals:

• A restaurant might offer coupons to lure in more customers.
• A realtor might use educational marketing to set themselves up as an expert and draw more customers.
• A nonprofit might use storytelling to get their message out there and engage more donors.

Now you’re getting somewhere. But how are you actually going to make these things happen? Come up with some specific tactics:

• A restaurant might use Twitter and Facebook to post coupons.
• A realtor might launch a blog and post three times a week to start educating potential customers.
• A nonprofit might create videos of the people they help.

Finally you need to come up with some objectives to measure everything by. How do you know if you’re succeeding if you don’t have some measure of success? This can be tough because you need to be realistic but fair. Results might be slow to come at first.

• A restaurant might want to see one new customer per week using the coupons.
• A realtor might want to see steady growth in traffic over the first month, hitting 500 unique visitors that first month.
• A nonprofit might want each video to be seen by 50 people.

And the questions and goals and objectives can keep building on each other. Blogging might be the tactic you take, but how are you going to get 500 people to visit the site? You need to keep refining and clarifying your plan with detail after detail. You’ll get those 500 people by posting three times a week, e-mailing all your friends to spread the word, asking a well-known real estate blogger to do a guest blog post, etc.

You can quickly see how much planning and thinking you have to do to pull this off. But that’s what you need to do if you want to succeed. The web isn’t the place for casual or sloppy marketing. If you’re going to get started with a website, you need to do it right. Be intentional. Think it through. If you manage to do that you’ll be doing more than getting started with a website—you’ll be on your way to succeeding.