New Client Meetings: 10 Ways to Make a Great Impression

So you’ve got a new client meeting to talk about a website project. Awesome. Way to land the meeting. Now you need to seal the deal. New client meetings are a chance to make a great first impression. This is your chance to stand out from the crowd of freelance developers. Here are 10 rules to remember for new client meetings:

Rule #1: Do Your Research Before You Meet

This should be obvious, but you’d be surprised at how many freelancers try to wing their new client meeting. That’s a good way to fail. Know what you’re getting into ahead of time. Do your research so you can ask intelligent questions.

• Be familiar with their current web presence. Not just their site, but also all their social media outlets.
• Don’t stop with their online properties. Check out reviews and what other people are saying. Check out Yelp, Google Maps and do a search for “Client Name Sucks”—you want to know it all.
• Know who their customers are.
• Find out who the important players are in the company—the owner, the president, the founder, etc. Remember to learn the names of the people who don’t have fancy titles as well—the person who answers the phone may be just as important to your success at landing the sale.
• Learn their product and understand their mission statement. A new client meeting is a great time to get clarification, but you should make an impression with what you already know.

Rule #2: Treat All People as Clients

You are your brand and people are watching you. Every tiny behavior is noticed. Losing your patience or just acting like a jerk with a random person in the lobby could lose you the job. You never know who is important and who is not. Don’t write someone off just because they’re a janitor, secretary or little old lady. Be respectful of everyone. So be a human: Hold doors open. Smile. Say hello.

Rule #3: Hold New Client Meetings in Person

There’s nothing better than sitting across the table from a client. You can look them in the eyes, gauge their reactions, respond on the fly. It shows you can interact. It shows you’re professional and you value their input. It shows humanity because you’re there. You’re real and tangible. That’s important because everything you deliver as a developer is an intangible, digital creation. If an in-person, new client meeting is impossible, at least do it in real time. Set up a video conference or even do the old school phone call. It’s not ideal, but at least it’s live and you can get immediate reactions. Doing new client meetings in person instead of just sending a proposal will pay big dividends.

Rule #4: Highlight Existing Positives and How You’ll Build On Them

You need to start the conversation with the positives. You want a new client to have a positive initial impression of you, so emphasize the positive. It doesn’t matter how bad their current website is—find something positive to say. Because you don’t know the history. The person you’re meeting with or the founder’s kid might have built their existing site, and by mocking it you’ve inadvertently offended your not-so-potential client. Maybe the site is a sore spot and they’re embarrassed. Don’t make them feel worse. So find a few things that are positive. Then talk about how you can build on that. At the very worst—they have a site. That’s something. They probably get the top search result for their company name and location—even a horrible site can manage that—so there’s an SEO foundation you can build on.

Rule #5: Use Resources and Examples

Knock their socks off with charts and graphs. These examples can communicate instantly and that’s huge. Create some simple charts to show a few basic things you can improve:

• Website Speed Test – Check out how fast their site is loading.
• Performance Report – Take a look at the site’s load time and overall performance.
• Validator – Does the site’s code even validate?
• Marketing Grader – Grab all kinds of details, including blogging, social media, SEO, mobile and more.
• Mobile Screenshots – The Chrome browser has an emulator that can show you how a site looks on different devices. Take some screenshots and show how the site looks and how you can make it better.

Rule #6: Define Metrics of Improvement

Show them where their site is now and how you can make it better. Emphasize things you can track and improve on, like search referrals, traffic, etc. You want to be able to show them success down the road. This is also a good place to talk about future improvement. The changes you’re pitching will help them today, but they’ll also help your new client down the road when the site is done and you’ve moved on to the next project. Don’t just talk about now—talk about the future. Your client wants to hear how this is an investment that will pay off today, tomorrow and into the future. Think bigger than new client meetings.

Rule #7: Talk to the Client Not About the Client

When you’re talking to a client about their company and what you can do for them, it can be easy to slip into an abstract way of speaking about the company. That’s a good way to depersonalize the conversation and disregard the person sitting across the table. Instead you should keep it personal. Talk directly to the client. Emphasize how this will impact them, how this will help them do their job. Avoid falling into the abstract and talking about the company. It’s about people, not corporations.

Rule #8: Help the Client Dream Outside the Box

A new client meeting is not the time to limit ideas. Help them think big. Don’t restrict what they can do during this meeting. Ask what they’d love to see on their site. Ask what they’ve seen on other sites that they really like. Ask where they want their site to be in two years, five years—even 10 years. Your goal is to make them think you can do anything. You’re an amazing web developer. Don’t worry if they bring up something you don’t know how to do—that’s what sub-contracting is for. So don’t limit this new client meeting to a website they need right now. They could become a long-term client. And you never know where that’s going to take you. Maybe today you’re building a blog, but who knows what you’ll be building tomorrow. Your client will recognize that this big picture thinking won’t happen overnight. It has to be a process. You can scale the dreams back when you’re drafting a contract. The dream is where you want to end up, but that means starting with something smaller today.

Rule #9: New Client Meetings Should End With an Action Plan for Both Sides

Before you walk away from the meeting you need to have an action plan in place. Not just for you, but for the client as well. You both need something to do. If you do not plan an action, no action will happen. If you don’t plan for something, you’ll get nothing. Make it a quick and easy so you can get things moving. Tell them you’ll send a summary of the meeting within 24 hours and ask them to respond immediately so you know they got it. Make it clear who is doing what by when.

Rule #10: Always Follow Up With the Client

This is not your action plan from rule #9. This is separate. Touch base after every new client meeting just to say thanks. Tell them you’re looking forward to working with them. That’s it. If a conversation develops, that’s great. If not, just say thanks and you look forward to talking later. And try picking up the phone. Too many people default to email. The whole point is to reinforce all the positive things from your new client meeting. You’re proving that you’re someone who follows through. You’re polite and great to work with. You’re also bringing the meeting back to the forefront—who knows what emergencies they’ve dealt with since your meeting, pushing the whole thing out of their mind. You’re showing the new client that they’re a priority to you. Sometimes a simple follow up can make all the difference.

Rock Your New Client Meeting

Every new client meeting is going to be different, but these general rules should help you make a good impression and land the sale.