The above fat cat photo is not in any way related with the below entry :p
In my line of work, dealing with clients are part and parcel of the job. Of course there are nice clients while some have unrealistic expectations. You would be surprised that some of the fussiest clients I have are people who happens to know me. Yes they expect a certain kind of friendship deals too. I cave in most of the time as I don’t want to ruin a friendship over money matters
But to handle such unrealistic expectations, can be rather tricky. I always wonder why a client would ask for something unrealistic. First thought in my mind was to smack them silly. I restrained myself of course. Instead I try to understand behind their request
I believe such clients are looking for the best deal, so by attaching a low value to my work, the client put a pressure on me to discount heavily on my work product thus the client believe they would get the best deal out of this
Another school of thought is that the client are oxymoron of course. They believe that their expectations are reasonable even when it is not. They of course knows nothing about my line of work, the effort put it and would always do comparison price with lesser quality design
Of the two above, I would ascertain which of the above two does my client fall into. Then after I would either negotiate again if I find the client is using the unrealistic expectations as a negotiating strategy or the need to educate the client of my work instead; the extra values and differences. This is the part I hate the most lah. The need to sweet talk them
So my advise for all designers out there. Deal with the objection with a managed expectation
