Author: Hilary Baumann

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Why is it important that I leave you a voicemail?

  1. I typically don’t answer calls from numbers I’m not familiar with. The do not call registry has little to no affect on a business number even if it’s a cell phone and I get a lot of telemarketers who call me.New potential clients: If you didn’t leave a voicemail, I didn’t call you back because I don’t know who you are or why you’re calling. Imagine calling an office back and not knowing who to ask for, it’s awkward and typically doesn’t go anywhere.
  2. It saves time. People typically leave shorter more concise messages when leaving a message than when they talk to someone. It also lets me look anything up that is necessary before returning your call.

Other reasons I may not have answered:

  1. I was in a meeting – I generally don’t interrupt meetings to take calls.
  2. I was really engrossed in working on something – sometimes it’s hard to switch back and forth between coding and talking to people.
  3. I was driving – my car isn’t quiet and trying to talk over the noise and deal with traffic is usually fairly useless.
  4. I was asleep – occasionally I stay up late (like 4am late) working on a project and sleep in the next day if I have no meetings. Though I do try and keep normal working hours (8am-5pm EST) most of the time, this isn’t always effective for me.
  5. You called at a really odd time – as I just mentioned, I try and keep normal working hours 8am-5pm EST Monday – Friday most of the time. If you called me at 11pm on a Saturday I’m probably not going to answer unless we are working a rush project with rush fees.
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Do you do photography as well?

It is not what I would consider to be my area of expertise (even if you have seen the photographs I’ve taken on social media or my personal blog, I consider it a hobby and myself an amateur photographer.)

I can however contract a photographer for your particular project and include that in your project budget. Or give you a list of recommended photographers, especially if the photography needs to be of you or your staff where there may be more details needed to work out dates and times, makeup and wardrobe.

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Can I get a discount?

We have two main options here:

  1. We can adjust the scope of the project. Maybe for example take a couple of features on a website and plan to add them on later.
  2. In select cases we can arrange for payment plan to distribute the cost of the project.

Straight discounts have only created problems for us in the past so we do not offer discounts.

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Why don’t you have an office?

I’m a location independent professional; with the internet and technology, I’m able to work almost anywhere, anytime.

I also prefer not to have the overhead and expense of an office when it’s not a necessity. I have a home office and I like getting out and working at coffee shops.

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Will you donate your services to our non-profit or church?

We actively seek out pro-bono projects that fit well with our working style and prefer to offer our services to a worthy cause after carefully researching it. We’re sorry that we can’t work pro-bono for everyone who asks.

If you’re a 501c3 (and have the paperwork to prove it) we do work with hosting companies that offer free hosting. What’s available does depend a bit on the size and server needs of the site.

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I liked the design yesterday but after getting change suggestions from family and friends I think we should start over – why won’t you?

If you want to pay for the time, that’s fine, but it doesn’t resolve the underlying problem here.

Everyone is a critic. Your cousin Bob probably said he didn’t like the font, sister Sally didn’t like the color, and your best friend since high school Jeff said he really thinks circles are much more awesome than squares.

Does this have anything to do with what’s right for your business?

Sometimes there’s a gem of constructive criticism that’s useful and can be implemented but design by committee (even a committee of friends and family) usually results in something that isn’t impressive and doesn’t accomplish it’s job.

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Why do you only present one initial concept design or mockup?

It’s my job to guide you through the design process, not create an indecision based on choice.

Long ago I thought I had to create more than one mockup because that’s what a lot of designers do. But what I quickly found was that too many small business owners end up liking all of my designs and have a hard time choosing. 5 week delays don’t help any of us.

It also saves time and money if we present only one design mockup and work from that. Occasionally we’ll present one design with several smaller variances in the design but that’s fairly rare.

If you hate the first design we can drill down to what you don’t like and either alter the design or scrap it and start over.

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Why use open source like WordPress and Drupal?

Why reinvent the wheel? We can add complex features, allow you to edit certain aspects without knowing code and secure your site more easily.

Why open source vs buying a package? With open source there is a giant community of people constantly working and improving the base of your site at any given moment. This doesn’t mean there isn’t a time and a place to purchase software or add-ons. Both WordPress & Drupal, our most popular choices of opensource website content management systems, have robust and stable base teams with a paid branch of their business to ensure longevity.

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Cost & Payment Options?

Checks are the most common form of payment we receive from clients but we also accept payments via paypal. We can also use a small card reader called “square” for the iphone for in-person payments should you want to make your payment at the end of a meeting.

Cost will be clearly outlined on your project sheets. See “Process” in the site menu for more details.

Payment plans:

  • Print: Unless you are an established client with a history of prompt payment, we require a down-payment at the beginning of the project and remaining payment to be made prior to going to print or before releasing the files to you. We can discuss payment terms for subsequent projects or issues of publications once a payment history is established.
  • Websites: If you (the client) are handling your own hosting then the same terms are applied from print. If however your site is hosted on Fascination Design’s servers we can arrange for a payment plan on the first project. Usually this will be your estimate broken down into monthly payments for 6 months with a down-payment of one month.
  • Hosting: Is automatically invoiced yearly. If you need to pay monthly we can auto-charge your credit card. Hosting is pre-paid for the upcoming year.
  • Domain names: are automatically invoiced based on number of year purchased and can not be changed. Typically this is annually though if you have purchased 4 years upfront you will be billed every 4 years. Domain names are pre-paid for the upcoming year(s).
  • Consulting & Everything else: Consulting, SEO, SEM, etc are payments made in advance of time spent.