Tips for Clear Communication With Clients

Over the past 20 years in market research, many project issues I've seen stem from mismanaging client expectations. Whether you work for a research firm, an agency, a consultancy, or any other business that involves regular client discussions, here are 4 pointers. 1️⃣ Communication—Regularly communicate, candidly ask the client how often they want updates, and never let a week go by without touching base, regardless of the project stage. Anticipate questions and answer them before they ask. A client sending an email asking, "What's the status of...?" is a failure on your end - within reason. Lack of responsiveness leads to mistrust, even more micromanagement, skepticism, and other issues that can be snuffed out by communicating openly. 2️⃣ Be Realistic—We all want to say "yes" to clients, but there are often ways to showcase your experience and expertise by being honest about what can be achieved with a given timeline and budget. The expectation could be a lack of understanding about the process or industry norms. Underpromise and overdeliver versus overpromise and underdeliver. Those honest conversations may appear inflexible, but they're often more about setting expectations and setting up both parties for long-term sustainable success. Saying "no" to this project could be a better long-term decision for the account than saying "yes" and failing with no second chance. 3️⃣ Understand Perspective—Take the time to actively listen to your client's needs, goals, and priorities. It goes beyond listening and includes asking smart (and sometimes bolder) questions to get a complete understanding. What drove the need for research? Why is receiving results within 2 weeks crucial? What happens if you don't receive results in 2 weeks? Understanding what's pushing the decisions behind the scenes can be a game changer. 4️⃣ Solutions Over Problems—Never present a problem or an issue to a client without a path forward. "This happened, but here are 3 things we can do to fix it." You need to be more than someone who relays information, you need to be a true consultant. Be able to justify each recommendation and explain the pros and cons of each path. -------------------------------------- Need MR advice? Message me. 📩 Visit @Drive Research 💻  1400+ articles to help you. ✏️ --------------------------------------

Process is a huge differentiator. And more importantly, it can make the difference between a stellar client relationship and one that barely makes "meh" waves. You may not know that I cut my teeth in the creative business world as a traffic manager-slash-account manager-slash-other duties as assigned. That meant understanding the intersection of process and client communications to set and manage expectations and create an exceptional customer experience. When you communicate what's already happened, what's happening now, and what's coming next, clients don't spend time guessing...and you're not chasing your tail to manage seemingly wayward questions or challenges. It's why I build process-driven communciations into sales, onboarding, and offboarding **as well as** actual delivery. Here are some musts for every client-focused business **before you ever begin work**: ✅ Define the steps of your process before sending a proposal or naming a fee ✅ Break phases into the simplest possible terms ✅ Save the minutia for onboarding, but make sure proposals outline major project phases ✅ During onboarding, set expectations for project flow, timeline, communications, and client responsibility ✅ Create a clear-cut path for client updates and make sure they understand how to use it ✅ Reiterate process, current stage, and next steps in every communication ✅ Complex project management systems aren't necessary: simple Gdocs or templated email checklists also work On the other hand, here are some words of caution: 🚫 Never assume clients remember your process or timeline. They have a lot going on, so by reiterating current and next steps, you make it easy for them. 🚫 Never assume clients know what you're thinking. Be clear and make sure they understand. Better to over-communicate than under. 🚫 Never "let" them go dark mid-project. Things come up and it may slip their mind. Follow up regularly (and in those follow-ups share with them when you'll follow up again). 🚫 Never guess at what they want or understand. Practice good communication skills even in writing "What I'm hearing you say is...XYZ -- is that right?" 🚫 Never assume they read or remember your last email. Make sure the information they need is easy to access. 🚫 Never let them go off into the sunset without a debrief or check in. I'm thinking of offering a workshop for creative pros and entrepreneurs on client management. If you're interested in that, drop me a DM, and I'll make sure you get it! ***** I'm Erin Pennings, owner of CopySnacks. As a brand messaging strategist and copywriter, I draw on 20 years of marketing experience to help startups and scale-ups turn their brands into customer magnets with a blend of strategic insights and tactical delivery. For more tips like this, go to erinpennings .com/newsletter (remove the space)

The biggest mistake I've made with clients is not establishing proper communication channels. → Lack of communication results in lack of clarity. → Lack of clarity results in lack of speed. It’s akin to driving a car in the fog vs driving in clear daylight. In the fog you drive slow due to decreased vision. You’re less confident moving forward. Once the fog clears you speed up as visibility increases and with it your confidence. Removing project blockers is like escaping the fog. Project fog happens because of a lack of communication. — The most successful designer/client projects I’ve done had the strongest communication. I performed the best when: ✅ I joined their team slack ✅ I joined their team project management tool ✅ I joined their weekly planning The projects where I struggled the most: ❌ All communication happened via email ❌ No shared project management view ❌ There was no schedule for planning next steps As I’ve started to own this role as a freelancer since my layoff, I’ve had to learn a few things. I’ve made some mistakes and disappointed a few people. I feel badly about that. It’s been a challenging career adjustment. But I also now feel more confident moving forward. I am better equipped to handle the adjustment with my elevated awareness of the pitfalls. I hope sharing these tips helps other designers exploring the world of client work.

Here’s the mistake that I made as a beginner that cost me more than $10,000 Getting clients, closing them, and getting them results. These are all essential pillars that freelancers & businesses know. But a key factor that is often missed: Communication. I lost a client worth $10k because of miscommunication. And here are 3 things, you should learn from it: 1- Connect your client at least 4 times a month Keeping that communication flow intact, helps you understand and relate to their pain points. 2- Reiterate your scope of work This is important because both of you need to be aligned on it. This sets the client’s expectations in a correct manner. 3- Communicate both your wins & mistakes to your client Wins are of course something that is shared, but your mistakes should also be discussed. So that you can show how you’re going to improve the next time. After we fixed these, we increased our retainership by 80%. Do you have similar learnings? Let’s talk👇🏻