Uplift

Thanks, She has came back to me with some examples, I'll come up with something based on them, if she's not happy i'll be telling her to come back when she actually has an idea. I know what you mean about entrepreneurs... I have a few clients who like to think of themselves as entrepreneurs and are constantly coming up with crazy ideas that I don't believe in, yet they expect to be able to shoot over a half assed email and have a fully functional business website sent straight back to them. Thats not a bad approach to take, i may adopt that.. I definitely need to come up with some screening process because it happens all too often, I would normally be a little more resistant but with this one being a recommendation of an existing client I'll need to give her the benefit of the doubt. This is my biggest issue with web design.. finishing a website and then client complaining because they aren't #1 on Google and making millions in like a day, I have just finished a site for a client who is complaining about the exact same thing, after less than a month she didn't get any leads, her site had barely even been indexed by Google and she done no promotion what so ever but still expected the leads to role in.

Hey, I have a question regarding client relationships. I have recently taken on a job through a word of mouth recommendation. The lady who contacted me was a little broad in what we wanted (she was starting a business, needed a logo and website).. I asked a couple of questions about the project and didn't really get much back, however, not wanting to risk any other recommendations or destroying the relationship with my existing client I decided to take it. After answering a lot... A LOT of emails and phone calls (i'm talking hours of wasted time) I still don't know much about her business to really deliver what she wants. All i know is she likes two colours, and wants to start a business in a specific sector. Anyway, trying to move forward I knocked up some mockups of logos, nothing solid, I just wanted to try and get her juices flowing, I sent 5 logos which took me a few hours to make, she replied 'they're all basic and black, i don't like any of them' .. I stressed that they are just mockups and I am basically shooting in the dark since I don't have any indication of what direction her business is going in or what type of image she wants to portray. I asked for more information and she said she needs to see what she is working with before she can put stuff together... my argument is I need to see something before I can truly design what she wants. So now to my question: How much thinking do you do for your client? She clearly has no brief or plan and is expecting me to come up with everything for her, would YOU keep churning out work until YOU got it right? I've always worked under the notion that it's a designer/developer job to bring an IDEA to life, but not actually sit coming up with ideas for people who don't really know what they want? What do you think? Who is in the wrong? Is this project dead in the water?

I didn't register but i think it looks great and there is an incredible amount of information on there. I think the home page is the 'worst' part of the site, the whole thing is very much in my face. The images and text are just a tad too big in my opinion.. the hero text in particular is huge.

those with JS disabled would also see the blank case study page.. what other methods could i use?

I've run into a problem on my website. On my portfolio page i'm listing my work, when an item is clicked an iframe lightbox window appears with a case study for clicked item, which is actually another page. These pages are being picked up by search engines and can be accessed directly so all they are getting is the case study as the case study page is just a blank page with the information, no template is needed i dont need my whole website to load within the iframe. Is there anyway to over come this? eg.. force the page to reload back to portfolio view with lightbox appearing if it is accessed outside of the lightbox iframe? or if accessed directly it shows the default template, instead of just the case study (blank) template? obviously i could remove the lightbox and send the user to another page with full template but it seems overkill. Hope that make sense.

I'm wondering if there is a better way for doing this: http://jsfiddle.net/Km7Cj/ Basically a hyperlink with a background image, and then centered inside it's parent. I know an easier way would be to create a div with background image and then position hyperlink text inside it, however the div is unnecessary as i can apply background images to the hyperlink element... the behaviour with padding inline elements in browsers like internet explorer is different to other browsers. The above JSfiddle is a rough idea of what i'm looking for.

While i'm on SEO, i have another question so i'll just throw it in here Should i apply rel="nofollow" to a hyperlink that does nothing, does it make any difference? When clicked it shows content, however the content is already on the page but hidden with CSS, so according to a spider it's a link that goes no where.

I am redeveloping my website and have a page listing my services. Some of the services only have a couple of paragraphs so i can't justify giving them a page of their own, so i would like to list all of my services on 1 page. Naturally i would use something like /services/ /services/web-design /services/graphic-design .. or whatever for SEO purposes. Since they are all on 1 page the only link would be /services Would this hurt me SEO wise? Do anchors have an influence, for example creating an anchor for each section /services#web-design /services#graphic-design Does the above work in the same way?

I think i managed it Instead of using a div i applied all styling directly to the hyperlink, it looks like removing the block element places the 2 hyperlinks inline, so it's pretty exactly how i want it without any positioning. <div class="span8"> <a href="#" class="learn-more">Learn more</a> <a href="#" class="featured-link">Contact us today!</a> </div>

Is there a text book way to position smaller elements contained within the design? See screenshot of the learn more button and contact us button, usually to get those side by side i would put them both in their own div float left and then get them where i want with padding or margins, i understand this is a sloppy way to do it? (or is it?) Naturally the elements are positioned in rows. see my code <div class="span8"> <div class="learn-more"><p><a href="#">Learn more</a></p></div> <p class="featured-link"><a href="#">Contact us today!</a></p> </div> So i want the <p> element to be inline and perfectly centered vertically with learn more button. So is using floats messy? is there a 'correct' way to do it?

After looking for a new design forum i think i've found my new home I'm a 25 year old developer/designer from England. I'm currently re-designing my own site so i wont post it but looking forward to hanging around here.