The Importance of Sending Weekly Updates to Clients
Your clients are wondering what you’re doing and why they haven’t heard from you.
A lot of architectural design firms are not sending weekly updates when they’re working on a project. This is a big mistake! In this article, we will discuss the importance of sending weekly updates to clients and how communicating regularly can help you build trust and loyalty with your current clients.
Weekly updates are important for a number of reasons. If you’re not updating your clients regularly, they’ll think that the project is going nowhere and that their money invested into it was wasted. What have you been working on? Are they even doing anything with my project?
These are the questions that are going through your client’s mind. As designers, we know things take time and you want to work through all the various scenarios before showing your solutions to the client. We want to work out the rough spots, and really make sure the design addresses all the potential issues that could arise. During this phase, it can seem like the designer goes into radio silence.
How can you make sure you’re keeping them in the loop while needing to focus on designing the right solution?
Send a weekly update to your clients. This will show them that you’re working on their project and give them an idea of what tasks have been completed as well as which ones are still in progress. I suggest sending these updates consistently on a particular day each week. They will receive a regular update but not get overwhelmed with information. The key is being consistent about it!
This will also help build trust and loyalty with your clients because they’ll know that you’re actively working on their project. You can’t expect them to be happy if they don’t know what’s going on with it!
As designers, we want to take the time to get it right.
When you leave your client in the dark on what your working on and the timeframe or schedule ahead they will start to request that you catch them up to date. The issue with this is that it will inevitably happen at the most inopportune time in your design process. At a time when your current design has the most holes in it. You need time to button it up. Repair all the issues before you share them. If you don’t you know there will be more questions than answers.
You are the designer and you know what it takes to make a design perfect. When pressed to share incomplete work you will start to undermine your credibility. As we all know great designs evolve from very bad ones. We have to push through all those bad ideas to land on something good. It’s the design process. So when the process gets derailed you end up presenting bad ideas. Take the time and communicate along the way what your process is. This will give you the ample time you need to create an effective solution to your client’s problem.
Help your clients feel more confident in your work. Send them a weekly update!
What are the benefits of regular communication with clients?
- They’ll know you’re working on their project.
- You can build trust and loyalty with them by staying in touch.
- It will allow you to do what you need to without being micromanaged.
What are the common mistakes made when it comes to not sending weekly updates?
- Clients may think that the project is going nowhere if they have not heard from you for a while.
- When pressed to present incomplete work, designers might start undermining themselves which is never a good thing.
- Without the bigger picture of your process and timeline, clients will not feel confident in your work and your ability to stay on task.
The Importance of Sending Weekly Updates to Clients
How are clients supposed to be happy when there’s no sign that anything has been happening? It doesn’t matter whether we’re spending hours designing — every time you get an email from your client asking “What have you been up to or How is the design coming along?” That question feels awkward! Keep your clients informed of the process. Send weekly updates.
