Selling the work
Replies, objections, proposals, quotes and deposits: turning a reply into a paid project.
How to ask for a deposit when you have no case studies
Page 1 sizes the deposit by how little you know about the client. A local owner knows nothing about you, so build the deposit to survive their question: tied to the prototype they’ve seen, refundable until build day, and the words for the quote, the email and the call.
14 min read
Website redesign proposal for a local business: one page, answered by reply
After the pitch, the prototype and the call, the proposal is one page, not six: their words, the failure, the link, one price, the yearly running cost, what you need, a day count and “reply yes”. With a filled-in example.
12 min read
Web design questions to ask clients who replied to your cold pitch
Page 1’s discovery-call scripts are written for inbound clients with a brief. The owner who replied to your pitch gives you ten minutes between customers: six questions about how customers arrive, a script for someone who has never sold, and one sentence that ends the call.
10 min read
Website redesign quote: answering “how much?”
When an owner replies “how much?” to your pitch, the textbook sales advice is wrong — the prototype is discovery already done. How to quote in writing, in one number.
7 min read
Web design client objections, and what to write back
The eight objections owners actually reply to a redesign pitch, sorted by what each one protects, with a short written reply for each — including the switching facts page 1 never states.
8 min read
How to build a web design portfolio with no clients
Skip the fictional bakery. Build the concept for a real local business with a weak site, put it in your portfolio, and send it to the owner — one piece of work that is also the pitch.
7 min read
How to write a web design case study for concept work
A redesign nobody paid for can still carry numbers. Measure the old site and your prototype the same way, the same day, and separate what you measured from what you only expect.
8 min read
Free website in exchange for a testimonial: what to ask instead
A free site for a Google review is the one swap Google removes. What a first client can give you that helps the next pitch more than a star rating, and when free is worth doing at all.
9 min readJudge it on your own market.
Pick one of 10 business types and one of 10 cities, and up to 10 leads a day cost nothing, no card needed.