JM Design Solutions

Q: What's your name and position in the company?
A: James Monk, Freelance Website Designer

Q: Describe your company in 5 words.
A: Creative, Reliable, Honest, Friendly & Professional

Q: What's your business philosophy?
A: To provide a reliable, relaxed, friendly and informal approach and experience for all my clients.

Q: Describe your office environment.
A: Incredibly tidy (I'm a neat freak)! Apart from my 2 colleagues Wilbur and Orville who tend to leave their hair everywhere..

Q: Describe how your team interact and work together.
A: I design the websites, Orville provides motivation and Wilbur tends to do very little!

Q: What makes you different from other web design companies?
A: I don't use "geek speak" or technical jargon, my clients are from all walks of life and I treat everyone the same no matter what their budget or technical expertise.

Q: How do you get the majority of your business?
A: Recommendations/word of mouth and Google searches.

Q: Describe how you manage projects from the initial client contact to completion and handover.
A: I manage projects by having a detailed work list/schedule which is updated throughout the day when projects are complete/started. I tend to communicate with clients using a variety of methods including online chat, skype, phone, email and meeting face to face.

Q: What do you think is the most crucial element of creating a good client relationship?
A: Trust and honesty. I'm always up-front with all clients and costs are always fixed unless the project brief changes mid-completion in which case the client is always notified in advance.

Q: How do you manage demanding clients?
A: Gently! I've found it's always a good idea to not reply straight away to heated emails/demaning requests. Write the reply and come back to it later on and then

Q: If a client was trying to decide between a shortlist of web design companies, how would you recommend they go about selecting the right one for them?
A: Do your research first! Look at reviews/testimonials, ask previous clients and get different quotes from a variety of comapanies to make sure you're getting the best value for money.

Q: Where do you see your company in 10 years time?
A: I'd like to still be providing my core services of Wordpress websites, Ecommerce websites and Web Hosting but also have a team of contractors covering more specialised areas which I currently also do but don't specialise in. Print design, social media interaction, search engine optimisation and software development.

Q: Where do you see the web design industry in the future?
A: Leaning more and more towards an "organic" growth, websites and the search engines relying less on strict rules and formalities.

Q: What computers do you have use in your offices, PCs or Macs?
A: PC

Q: How was your company name chosen?
A: It was chosen last-minutes whilst at university just to show-case some of my work and I've stuck with it ever since. Admittely it's quite long-winded but I'm quite fond of it!

Q: If you were to give your clients one tip on how to get the most from their website what would it be?
A: Plan, plan and plan! Don't rush into the project and think carefully about your time-scales.