Welcome to another episode of Websites Made Simple, the podcast designed for website designers and developers who want to build thriving businesses without losing their sanity.

I’m Holly Christie, website designer, mentor, and straight-talking website design advocate, and today we’re tackling one of the most common challenges in the web design world: how to attract more clients... especially those perfect-fit, dream clients who really get your vibe.

In this episode, I’ll guide you through practical, actionable strategies for filling your client list with people who love what you do.

Whether you’re just starting out or looking to uplevel your web design business, this episode is packed with advice to help you stand out, stay true to yourself, and attract a steady stream of clients who value your unique skills.

Timestamped summary

00:00 Authentic Branding Through Personal Design

06:08 Website Messaging for Sales Success

07:12 Social Media Messaging Consistency Guide

11:22 "Building Trust Through Expertise"

14:50 Display Prices on Your Website

18:13 "Focus and Clarify Your Offers"

20:37 Collaborate to Avoid Scope Creep

Mentioned in this episode:

Remember to sign up for our blogging masterclass!

Go to https://websitesmadesimple.co.uk/masterclass

Blogging masterclass

Getting clients for your website design business is one of the

things that website designers struggle with the most.

And that is generally because Scope creep red

flag clients. A steady stream of really

perfect fit ideal clients clients, clients, clients.

Hi, I'm Holly. I'm from Websites Made simple, the podcast for

website designers and developers to have an absolutely

stunning, stellar career without pulling your hair out for it.

In today's episode, I am going to walk you through how to get

more clients for your website design business. Because trust

me, building websites and attracting clients to those websites

are two different things. As a website designer's

mentor, this comes up over and over again. In fact, I

actually call it one of my big three. The three things that people

consistently come to me with. How to get clients for their website business.

How to deal with scope creep in their business. How to

recognize and deal with red flag clients in their business.

Now, I have actually already done episodes on Scope Creep

and Red flag clients, and I am sure there will be some more coming out

as well. But today, this episode is for you. If you

are struggling to get not only a steady stream of

clients, but a steady, steady stream of really

perfect fit ideal clients, I promise you they

are out there and this is how we're going to get them

kicking off. I want you to sit back, close your

eyes and think. How do you feel when

you are absolutely intrinsically you.

What does that look like? Does it look like

a very professional veneer, which some people are, you know, some people

are just very kind of professional and yeah, that's great. Do you

have that witchy, gothy Persona that I know a lot of web

designers have and you go on their websites and they're really good fun

as well. Are you creative? Are you playful?

Let's just take one word that really encapsulates not only

who you really truly feel you are, but how you would

like to be known for. What would that word be? And

let's start there. Because something that I often notice

is that website designers try to present

themselves as the person they think the client wants them to be.

And this isn't always in line with the

person that they actually are. And when we create a website

for ourselves, and we try and create it

with us being someone who we feel like we've playing up

to the camera with, it means that the website doesn't have that

cohesion that we're actually looking for, that's going to earn

the trust of the people that we're trying to get there as well. And you're

much better to just throw that idea out

and design for something that is completely you. It's like people

say to me, why have you got so much pink on your website, Holly? And

I'm like, that's me back when I got married. Years and years ago, I wore

a pink wedding dress. I'm recording this from my pink living room.

I live and breathe that. And while I'm not the girliest girl, the pink

has become synonymous with my brand. People have said, oh, but don't

you want to work with men as well? I do work with men as well,

but they see past the pink and they just see what I want them to

see of the brand, that really kind of professional, cohesive one.

But I've been working today on a website with a website

designer who is putting her new website out there.

And she's got this really cool, witchy, gothy kind of

vibe going on. And I can see the type of people who are going to

want to work with her as well, because people buy

from people as we know. They want to

see the bits of their personality that they really

like kind of reflected on the website page that's there in front of

them as well. I have had so many people come to

me wanting again, those witchy, gothy kind of websites

and I was lucky for a long time. I had someone on my team, Amy,

who really kind of met that profile and she created a lot of the websites

while we worked together. And I can design those, of course I

can. As web developers, we can just design anything, really. But I'd much

rather pass that on to someone who just absolutely had that

vibe. So the lesson here is, if you

feel that you are not putting

the whole proper you out there,

then really stop and consider how many

people out there would really love to work with someone like you

and are just not finding that kind of personality

match, that mirror being held back to them. So please don't

hold back.

Our second thing is work out your messaging before you build

or rebuild your website. Otherwise you're just going to feel like

that puzzle piece that just doesn't quite fit. You know, the one where you wish

you could take that hacksaw too and just hack the end off just so you

can squish it in there. But you don't need to do that because one of

the great things about web design is this business is yours and

you get to build and shape your little corner of the Internet however

you want to do it. So don't hold back. Don't think,

oh, I think my client will want to hear this. Just put it

out there as it is. But make sure your messaging

is something that you're really aligned with because you're going to be

using this a lot. And as you get more experience, that

messaging will start to naturally update. I mean, my messaging

used to always be when I started out is homemade websites don't

make sales. That's great. But I don't work with anyone now who

has even tried or wanted to do a homemade website.

And so my messaging has evolved in that space. And a lot of my

messaging is your website should be bringing in leads and making sales

even while you sleep. And trust me, as web designers, you know

that this is possible. But trust me, I often wake up to

notifications saying that people have bought my courses, that they bought my

web designer's contract pack, that other sales have gone on. It has

all happened while I've been asleep. It also happens for my clients as well.

So really work out what your messaging is because

this is really going to be the mountain that you die on. Get

really clear about it, get a journal, jot it down, kind of throw out

some phrases, think, what do I really believe about

the websites I build? What do I really believe about the process

of working with me? What do my reviews from my past clients tell

me? Look at all of this and start to really dig

into that detail there about that messaging because this is going to become really

important. And if you are struggling to

work out this messaging, I do have a course on the Websites Made

simple website which is how to get clients for your web design business.

And it's got a workbook that goes alongside it and it's got loads of prompts

on how to work out this messaging for you as well. So when you do

have your messaging and this could just be a straight strong as

a message with a tagline there, you're going to

need to really rework this messaging into your social channels.

You need real consistency. Consistency is what

gets clients. And I know every now and then we can be really tempted

to think I'm just going to throw out a post about this or I'm going

to throw out a post about that. And yeah, that's fine. Let people

have an insight into stuff you do outside of websites by all

means, but make sure the main focus of your

business are your social channels. If you're

struggling with how to get stuff across on your social channels,

then we can look at that. I offer some mentoring. I've also

got really exciting membership for website developers coming up in September. We

can work on that together. But right now, get your messaging sorted,

make sure it is absolutely intrinsically you,

and then you are going to build your website. As you

build or rebuild your website, I am going to just give you these

words, imposter syndrome be damned. Because

often this is the point where imposter syndrome will kick

in. You'll have it all worked out on paper, or digitally on paper, in

my case. You'll have it all there and you'll go to build and

then you'll probably head to the kitchen to make a cup of tea or you'll

put the TV on for this, or suddenly that pile of ironing looks really

tempting even though you haven't ironed since 2000.

Yeah, imposter syndrome shows up in loads of different ways. And

as a website designer, it can be really hard to

get past that and get through it because it's not only

you building your website, but it's your website should be

pretty much the best representation of your work. And you also know that

there's going to be other website designers out there who are going to be looking

at your website. They're going to be trying to find it lacking

in comparison to theirs. Your job is to push through

because as Dave Grohl was once quoted as saying,

no one is you and that is your power. Let's say

it again, no one is you and that is your power. So it doesn't matter

what other people's websites have on them. It doesn't matter what other features

or functions or how well designed they have or, you know,

whatever else. It just doesn't matter. What really matters is

that you build a website that you feel fully reflects you,

that you're really happy with, to put out there and which is going to

give you that platform to get clients over to

as well. So get going with your website. Get

going, get building, go forth and build. Hit, publish.

When you've done that, you need to keep your blog updated, and

you need to keep your blog updated with things that people actually

want to read about. So if you head over to my website

for clients, it's thisdemandinglife.com you will see

the blog has it's time for a new website. It will have why

we choose WordPress for our website. So it will have how to

choose a designer or developer for the website. It has a blog that

says why I have two different web design services and what the differences.

It has a blog about process. All of my clients who are

thinking about working with me, they don't need to know

how to do something on my website because they're not interested in doing it on

their website. They're interested what the process of working with me looks like

or when they're going to get a return on their investments, or lots of

little things about the process, which also helps them

to choose to work with me because I'm essentially giving them information that lots of

other websites designers aren't. I'm saying this is the timescale, this is the process,

this is the software. You know, there's a real transparency there.

But I can't tell you how, back in the day, how many blogs

I wrote of how to do this, how to add an image on your website,

how to use Lottie files on your website, how to do this, how to do

that. And they never really got anywhere or did anything. And then

I realized, with the help of my mentor at the time, that

people wanted me to do that on their website and they trusted that

I knew how to do it. They didn't need me to tell them how to

do it or to write down the step by step instructions. They needed me to

go and do it for them. And so my blog is essentially there

to persuade them, convince them, encourage them to recognize that

I'm the person with the skill set and experience for it as well.

Wherever you niche in your industry, it could be that

you, for example, build websites for photographers. And I

recognize, as I say this, that lots of photographers build their own website, but let's

say some of them don't. So it could be vlogs on how to

best showcase photography on a website, what's the

best size images to use on websites, how to do

this, how to do that, how to choose the right website designer

for your photography business, and the best tools

for photographers websites. So there's lots and lots of ways that

you can shape your blog to be

absolutely targeted to this ideal client

whilst being intrinsically you and getting your message out there as

well.

The next thing is very obvious, but sometimes we do miss this, and you could

miss this as well. If you're quite a new branding designer, make

sure your SEO is done. And if you're not sure

about SEO, I have a course, it's quite a short course

and it's called Unlocking Boost yout Website's Visibility.

And as I say, if you're not very sure about it, you can jump onto

the course. It's less than £50. It has tools, it has

workbooks, it has sheets with it, it has a webinar. It will teach you

everything that you need to know. Not only for your website but, but for all

your clients sites. And with my clients websites, when they go

live, I send them a screenshot as part of their website user

manual. I send them a screenshot of their

page speed scores on the time of

publishing and that goes in the website user manual and they can

see what their performance is, what their accessibility report is, what their

SEO score is as well. So the unlocking SEO

course will get you a score of between 92 and 100 for every website

you publish. And you can reuse all of those materials and

stuff for every website you publish as well. But make sure your SEO is done

because you're putting all this work into your messaging, into everything

else you want to make sure people can find you. And SEO is the way

to do that.

Next, have prices on your website. Gone

are the days of thinking, oh my goodness, my competition is going to go

in, look at my prices, they're going to undercut me or they're going to do

this, that and the other people don't make their decision based on price anymore.

Price is a factor. You know, if someone's looking to spend £500 and

your minimum website is £5,000, then yeah, they're not going to work with

you. But also you don't want to work with someone who's only got £500 to

spend on a website. They're going to be much better suited to maybe

self building a site and having some mentoring or something like that along the way.

And even if you're a brand new designer, please do not build a website for

500 pounds. It is not enough money in return for the professional

service. Regardless as to how much knowledge you do or don't have.

But do put your prices on your website, do make them accessible for

people as well. Hiding prices is not cool. And it

means as well that you'll often lose people along the

journey who can't find your prices because if they don't know

how much it's going to cost them to work with you, then

they're often not going to go to too much effort to find out. They will

just find someone who does have their pricing on their website. I've got a very

real example of this. I put a shout out on LinkedIn a couple of weeks

ago for branding designers because I had a client who's looking to

rebrand, had over 70 responses, thought how

are we going to filter through all of this? So I went on all of

their websites and immediately the ones who didn't put pricing on

their websites were the ones who we didn't take any further, they didn't get

shortlisted purely because we didn't have time to contact everybody.

Lots of people have a follow up sequence and stuff like that. It's

all time consuming and we need to know whether we want

to engage with someone straight away based on what expectation is.

And don't be afraid if your prices are on the higher side

as well. I've had people say to me, oh, the prices feel a bit

toppy. I'm like, that's absolutely fine if I'm not the right fit for you right

now, totally understand, lovely to meet you. And they often come back

and say, yeah, had a word with myself and I've decided this

is where I want the investment to be because I want the service and I

want the experience of working with you and I recognize that it's going to cost

a little bit more than someone who doesn't have that service laid out

in that way. So do put your prices on there. Don't be afraid to

do so. If you're only offering bespoke

custom built stuff, just have a starting price on there. I have a starting price

for my custom build website because it's impossible

to kind of price everything according to, to what people need. But

I can definitely say, yeah, this is the starting price of my

websites. So that's there.

Use testimonials. So many people get really good

testimonials and then completely forget about them and they build

their website and they think, where's my credibility? And your credibility

is there in the emails that satisfied customers send you. Hopefully

they're there in Google reviews. And if you haven't got your Google My business set

up, that's a reminder to go and set that up. Get those Google reviews.

Make sure every time you send a website live that you ask people, you

send them a link to leave you a Google review or a LinkedIn recommendation

and I use both. But I do prefer Google because it's more accessible for people

who might not be on LinkedIn. And then when they're there, add them on the

website, use them to break up the page as well so they're

reinforcing the messaging. You'll see on my own websites that I

use them on a pink banner throughout the site and then at the bottom

of the page I have the Google widget there and I have all the Google

reviews come up there as well. You can also set Google

widgets where you can only show four and

five star reviews onwards. So if you've got like a

pesky one star review from someone where it just didn't work

out. Hopefully you would have dealt with that well on Google.

But people can always go on your Google site and see all of your

reviews. You know, it's obviously we're only going to display the best on the

website there, but it's not hiding it if it's publicly and easily

available as well. So do you use testimonials on your website? Do

you use them to back up what you're saying with your messaging on your website?

Make sure your offers are really clear. And this is where

a lot of web designers fall down, is that they don't want to turn down

work and they want to end up being all things to all people.

And if you heard of the expression, you know, he was a jack of all

trades and master of none. Sometimes people can

feel that if someone's offering to do everything, you know, work on every

website, platform or offer every form of hosting, plan or offer this

or offer that, it just feels like there's not a

tightness there and that you're not going to be very good at the one thing

they do need you for, because they only need you for one thing, not

all of the things. If someone's got a WordPress site, they're not going to need

you to have skills in Wix or Squarespace or Shopify or

whatever else. They just need their WordPress website. Don't be afraid to

narrow down and really double down on what you're really good at.

It is okay to do it that way and to have really

clear offers when you have really clear offers. And you'll see

on mine, I have two different types of website builds. I have the

care plans. I've got one which is self hosted one and one which is where

we host yourself. And I have the website clinic and that's it.

I have people say, oh, I had a client who asked me could I do

this? And I don't usually. So I'm trying to get a price and you can

already see it unravel. They're losing confidence

in what they've been asked to do because it's not part of their offering.

And when we get someone who wants us to work outside of our scope

and it's different software or it's not what we offer. You don't need

the 50 quid a month or whatever it is that they're going to to be

offering that badly, that it's going to throw out your invoicing

system, that it's going to throw out your Regular work routine. What you need to

do is have a really clear offer so that when someone comes in to work

with you, you're bringing them into you. You're saying this is how it does it,

this is how we do the direct debits, this is how we do that. And

it all falls into place easily. You don't want to be creating systems for one

off jobs for people. And often people who ask you to to

do that sort of stuff end up not being very happy with what

the end result is because they don't feel that there's been a

level of expertise together. You know, essentially it feels from both of your

parts that it's a patch up job. When that's the case,

don't be afraid to recommend other people or to collaborate with other

people. I already spoke in my episode about Scope creep.

If you need to work on a bit of a website, you end up being

asked to choose something and it's outside of your remit. Get another

designer or developer on board involved. There's loads of people we can recommend

people you can go on LinkedIn, find people and you'll find people you really

enjoy collaborating with as well. So seriously, it's

a really good one, is passing on work to other

designers and developers and trust me, it comes back to you

over and over again. I often get recommended work from other developers and

designers. I often recommend others for work as well and it can

build some really good relationships as well.

So my very final point here is make it easy for people to reach

you. So often we focus on the website and we forget about the

contact page or you know, we don't make it very obvious how people get in

touch with us or like, oh, just come find me on Instagram. No, they are

on your website. They are here to reach you through the website. Make it easy

for them to do so. I have the contact

forms on my website. I like a contact form because I always

think it shows people that you want to hear from them and it gives them

a guide. What's your message, what service do you want to talk about? That sort

of thing. And it gives you a little bit of a heads up before they

get on the phone to you as well. If you're happy taking phone calls, have

your phone number on there. You can even have hours that you accept calls.

And I also have book a call link with Zoom Calls as well. So it

books straight into my calendar. So I also know when people click that

the first I know about it is that it will land in my inbox. With

the booking there, but I also know that they are booking for a date and

time. That works for me as well using a method that works for me. I

like using Zoom because it means I can screen share and I can show them

ideas as I'm kind of thinking them as well. You know some people just want

to hit email and just come straight to you as an email as well. So

do make it really, really clear. Make it really available from each page

through your calls to action through that sticky menu. Would be surprised how

many designers and developers forget to use sticky menus as well.

Have that sticky menu so that once someone's read enough of one page they can

easily navigate to the next one and they can navigate to contacting you.

So there we go. If you want to go through this in any more detail,

I do have the course how to Get Clients from for your website design

business. It is under £50. It will be

probably one of the best investments you make in your business and you can get

it from websitesmadesimple.co.uk. if

you've done the course and you would like to give a review of it,

drop me an email. I'd love to hear from you and if you have any

points you would like to add to this podcast, anything you've heard

today and you think, oh, I've got one, I've got one. I want to talk

to you about it. Come and find me at

[email protected] UK. Until

next time. See you soon and happy designing.