Comments on: When Saying No Politely Gets You In the Door

By: Matt Clarke

Matt Clarke — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 12:34:06 +0000

Hey, this happens to me a lot too. The whole free pitch system seems to be filtering all the way down to us freelancers. Have had to do pitch work to get a job for an agency so that they can charge four times what i can without the expenditure or risk. Am sure am going to be asked to do tea or coffee pitches as well soon. It’s all bonkers! Still keep smiling! Matt.

By: Jonathan

Jonathan — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 15:30:11 +0000

Thanks for sharing this.

I recently had an exchange with a potential client with whom I’d been corresponding with via email for over a year. I even had a face to face with him over a year ago and discussed his site for hours. We then proceeded to negotiate price and specifics and finally he passed because of funds or timing or something of that nature. He continued to send me emails here and there saying he was still interested in working with me. Last week we exchanged some more emails and he seemed ready to go ahead…I gave him a price, he asked me if I could do better….I gave him a reduced price….he said it sounded good and we negotiated the terms. Then I realized his email suggested that I was going to send him a design FIRST. When I politely explained that I only started working on a site after getting paid and how this was a major part of the whole process and how we’d really be working together through the design process he declined. He wanted me to show him a design before paying me. He was quite taken aback but I explained my stance and explained it was standard practice.

In this case the client backed off and I was quite upset by the exchange. After finding this site I almost sent him a link with some further explanation but decided against it. It is frustrating dealing with this. Don’t people understand that hiring people for free is not right? I never ask people to work for me for free and always pay them what they ask. What are people thinking?

It seems to me that people don’t seem to think of design as work. It’s just something designers pull out of a drawer or something….ugh!

By: The Freelance Rant

The Freelance Rant — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 16:50:07 +0000

Spec Work: Taking Advantage of Freelancers…

In a nutshell, spec work (also known as pro-bono work) requires that freelancers submit sample work, often a completed project, to a potential employer in order to compete with work submissions from other freelancers.
……

By: Mike

Mike — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 15:54:16 +0000

Of course, it might be even more professional if you learned how to spell “lose” properly.

By: Rex

Rex — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 01:38:31 +0000

Note that he said, “I hope this is not a deal breaker …”

What he really said was:
“Screw you. We are absolutely intransigent on our web design contest rules. We expect you to produce a design at your own expense the we ultimately may reject while retaining all rights to your work. So fsck you. Come on in, we’ll see if our VP can browbeat you into doing it anyway”.

By: Joff

Joff — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 11:28:38 +0000

Great result and should inspire other designers to politely decline spec work.

By: no-spec

no-spec — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 09:51:16 +0000

Yes, a professional approach has a better chance of succeeding over an in-their-face outraged attitude.

By: Eric

Eric — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 18:18:14 +0000

This also happened to me when I refused a spec-work related project. The manager hired me for a side project of his after I explained the harm that speculative work does for the end client.

Congrats on the new project(s).

By: Strategy Node

Strategy Node — Tue, 13 May 2008 00:17:06 +0000

I find that taking the Nordstrom approach of customer service opens a lot of doors.