Client Dilema

hello,

I'm new at web development, and I have found some of the challenges working with clients as difficult as the most challenging coding issues. Right now I do some work for a non-profit, and I got asked to code a site built by people in different section of this orginazation.

On paper the design looked nice and clean. (It was already sold to the client). But, when I started asking questions about the navigation, and why stuff was there, and how it was actually going to work, the responded that the were all just made-up samples. It turned out the people designing the site had no experience with website development.

The site map they had was something they produced in dreamweaver and was a Gif that was very hard to read and scrolled down for about ten pages. The sitemap had virtually no organization and was basically, just a list of files.

So as it stands there is a design with virtually no navigational structure or planning. They don't even really know what they want to put on the site. They are asking me to just build something and let the client 'click around' so he can get a sense of what to put on it. They also said that for a while the site would probably just be a homepage that linked to their current pages. There current site is something hacked on Microsoft Word or something. I said that I thought that this was inefficient to start the building process without having the architecture thought out. This whole thing is sort of giving me the willies because I like to do good work.

So should I just build a what they want, or should I persist at trying to work with them to produce a higher quality end product? They don't seem to want to do this.

Honestly, I'm kind of confused because without a coherent site map how do build something? I could take a risk and try to organize it in a way that maks sense to me. There is also little navigational function physically in the design to work with.

Please Advise

Thank You

 

That's the joy of working with clients.. they never know what they want, but they wont let you have free reign.
Really if you want their business, you need to do what they ask. Get it all in writing, so when it turns out looking crap, they cant come running to you and blaming you - you simply say "I did what you wanted"
Then when they want to improve on it (which they will once they see how bad it is), you charge them for all the extra work of a redesign.

So really, you win as you'll probably make more money by firstly doing what they ask, then inevitably fixing/redesigning it once they realise their idea just doesn't work.

 

I suck at laying out websites, that is what my WEB DEVELOPERS job is.

 

Exactly - they know it when they see it and they want to pre-approve every 20 minutes that you will be billing them. Ah, such is the life of a freelancer!

 

It's quite simple, you explain beforehand that the price you quoted includes _____ hours of actual labor. If they harass you every 20 minutes you bill at ______ per hour over that paid in advance.

 

I am not sure I understand - I bill hourly - I don't quote prices.

 

If you bill hourly it should be no problem jumping through their hoops, you make more.

 

Well this is the part that's a litlle hard on working in web services you got clients that don't have a clue about what it is about