Measure twice, cut once
We've been beefing up our scoping process at Headspace to make sure that when we provide a quote on a new project, it's as accurate as possible from the initial estimate. By spending more time and energy upfront, we're hoping to avoid the awkwardness of addendums and budget discussions midstream as we work through a site design or app build.
There is nothing - NOTHING - more uncomfortable to discuss than money, and even more so when you're in the depths of a project, or almost finished, and you have to go back to the client to let them know you'll need additional budget to finish the job.
So many factors can cause a project to go over budget - scope creep, additional feature or functionality requests, a full moon. Sometimes it's completely unavoidable. But it's still never a fun topic to bring up to any client.
Every agency has a different approach when it comes to billing. Some lowball their initial estimate to get clients in the door and then issue addendums aplenty during the process. Some mark up estimates like crazy, adding contingency buffers like they're going out of style, then looking like heroes when they magically end up coming in under budget. We strive to make our estimates as accurate as we can while accounting for a few bumps along the way.
We like surprises. Sometimes. Surprises are good when they come in little blue boxes. Surprises aren't good when your account person calls to let you know you're going to need to fork over $10,000 more to finish a job you thought was already bought and paid for.
How do we keep our surprises to a minimum?
Review the project over the phone.
Email is great for following up phone conversations for posterity but there are things that can easily get lost or misinterpreted through emails. During a phone conversation with a client, it's a lot easier to jump in when they allude to this form or that button and clarify how exactly they envision it working.
Involve the whole team.
On complex projects, it makes sense to get everyone together for 20 minutes and run through the functionality to confirm exactly how much time they'll need to spend. Even if you end up burning an hour or more of billable time upfront, it's way better than many wasted hours down the line.
Provide a functions spec document.
Clients can review this and see exactly how their site or app will work, so there's no, "Oh, I thought this was all going to be animated!" when you provide them with a static design. No surprises.
Add an hourly clause where appropriate.
Sometimes "little jobs" turn out to be the biggest jobs. Making upgrades on an existing website, for example, can end up taking more time than just creating a new design from scratch, with rounds of feedback and "actually, we liked it better the way it was before". So often, for these "little jobs" we'll provide a quote with the stipulation that we'll be billing to actual. Sometimes we end up spending less time than estimated, which is terrific. Sometimes it takes longer, which is less terrific for our clients, but at least they know what to expect. It helps to alert clients when your project is down to, say, 10-15% of the budgeted hours remaining, not when you're already over budget and the project is at a critical point.
Measure twice, cut once!
