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Zachary grace
6,682 PointsClient Interactions
So I've been designing a website for my boss, for her business and recently showed her the progress so far. I am very pleased with what I have produced for her at this point, but she has some rather problematic requests for me to add to her site. First she wants really bright colors. She wants horses in the background running on a lotus flower.. She wants a picture of a waterfall somewhere and all of this for her Massage Therapy business. I've explained to her that if she has too many bright colors it will distract viewers from reading the content of her site, and having too many picture that don't seem relevant to massage will most likely confuse the viewers. I also think that having really bright almost neon colors not only will be distracting, but will not look professional. SO do I make her the site she wants or do I say look this really might not look good and here are some other options. I don't want to create a website that look very unprofessional because it also makes me look bad to potential future clients. What are some other people's thoughts on all this?
1 Answer
David Thomas
Courses Plus Student 21,263 PointsExcellent it looks like you've educated the client.
Personally I wouldn't show them how it would look if we went with their bad suggestions because then its up to the client to say you where right it looks ugly. However giving them alternatives lowers this risk but still try not to create work your not proud of.
The Unrelated Pictures Content Strategy - This is all about the content (Text,Images, Videos e.t.c) instead of the design. Design would then be worked around the content. There are some badges on Content Strategy here on treehouse.
The Colour Situation - I'd work closely together to make a colour scheme (I use Adobe Kuler) Get the client to agree on this colour scheme making sure that the colours are limited to a certain amount and aren't too crazy, I usually use 4 or 5 as a Maximum with 2 of those Neutral Colours. There is a treehouse badge on colour theory.
Once you've decided on the colours and got the content sorted the next step really is to get the design back on track, get the client to show examples of websites they like and have a bit of a consultation or exploration session. Find out why they want to use these seemingly unrelated pictures, perhaps knowing why they want to use them could help you find a way to incorporate them into the design.
At the end of the day you don't have to put your name on the website but its certainly beneficial, A website i built for someone last year wanted some crazy ugly look but we agreed after some discussion in the end that the suggestions wouldn't be professional looking so we ended up making 1 crazy page just for them (blocked from google) - it was our little secret of crazy design to keep them happy and I had fun making it too - This page had designed by and the clients logo on it instead of my logo.
Zachary grace
6,682 PointsZachary grace
6,682 PointsHey David, thanks for your response. You provided me with some very useful suggestions. My client is from China, so there is symbology important to her in the seemingly unrelated pictures. Horse brings good luck and good fortune. Waterfall symbolizes money flowing toward her, Lotus flower for purity. My concern is that viewers aren't going to understand the symbology of these and might wonder why she has these images for her massage therapy website, but I also think that if it's important to her it should be included in some way. Maybe I can use your suggestion about doing one page especially for her. Thanks again for your feedback!