The Web Design Business Kit, Brendon Sinclair

October 21, 2004

Title: The Web Design Business Kit
Authors: Brendon Sinclair
Date Published: July 2003, First Edition
ISBN: 0-9579218-3-7
Buy It Online: Sitepoint

Book description from Sitepoint.com: Brendon Sinclair runs an extremely successful Web Design Firm. The Web Design Business Kit is a compilation of everything Brendon has ever done and every document he has ever used to build and grow his business!

Shortly after the official launch of Creative Arc, Ryan sent me a link containing sample chapters of The Web Design Business Kit from Sitepoint. Intrigued, I read through the sample chapters and was immediately inspired by what I was reading.

Sounds intriguing, but is it worth $250?

Brendon Sinclair is the founder and executive director of Tailored Consulting in Australia. His book is a collection of strategies he's used to market and promote his Web Development business. Tailored Consulting "one of the most successful web design Firms in Australia" so I was curious to see what Brandon had to say.

When I purchased the kit, it was very early in the life of my business, so I was a little skeptical of what seemed to be a hefty price tag. In the end, I bit the bullet and ordered, mainly because the reviews were very favorable and I kept remembering that "you have to spend money to make money."

What does it include?

My version includes two binders: one with the 'book' part of the kit, the other containing forms and charts mentioned in the book, including a CD-ROM with Word documents of each example. This is not a skimpy volume; the first binder is over 400 pages, and the second weighs in at 221 pages.

The kit is organized into 5 sections:

First Steps In Freelancing
Establish Your Business
Run Your Business
Expand Your Business
Look To The Future

In my opinion this is a logical sequence, however I didn't read this book cover to cover. Instead, I focused on the sections which were relevant at the time. I felt the first few chapters cover areas that any prospective CEO has already considered, but that seems to be something covered every business development books. Sinclair's insights are very thoughtful from the get go, but I really started to pay attention starting with chapter 5.

Pitch, Quote, and Win Your First Client

Pricing for web development services was a struggle even before I went out on my own. While working for someone else, I never came up with an effective way to properly charge for the Web Sites we developed. Without fail, we'd end up undercharging and selling $10,000 sites for $2,000. Sinclair's book solved this problem for me. One quote, "Calculate your changes on the value you provide to the client" was worth the entire cost of this kit. This is the only pricing scheme that has ever made sense to me and we use it to this day. Sinclair continues with strategies for marketing your business, and he does an excellent job condensing a many textbook's worth of information into a few chapters.

I had no formal education in marketing, so I found the entire 2nd section, "Establishing Your Business" extremely worthwhile. The next section, "Run Your Business" delves into how you can manage your workflow after you have a steady stream of clients. Again, Sinclair packs a plethora of good information into a small space. Handling client complaints, managing web projects and making add-on sales should be mastered by any Web Development company. Also discussed is how to find, and more importantly win, the "big fish" we all strive for.

Section 4 is entitled"Expand Your Business," which deals with the growing pains emerging companies have to deal with. Sinclair has clearly learned from the school of hard knocks, and his advice to buy equipment off eBay and put off leasing an office as long as possible have been echoed by several of my mentors. Definitely good advice!

The volume closes with section 5, "Look the future." Chapter 16 is a collection of 100 "tips to live by," and it was interesting to see many of these I've heard from others. It never hurts to find a nice slogan that you can hang your hat on. Chapter 18 includes case studies of several businesses that dealt with issues relevant to any new business. Not as detailed as a Harvard Case Study, but useful nonetheless.

The second binder

Binder number 2 is jam packed with every conceivable document required to run a Web business. Some the templates for customer contact are particularly helpful, as you never know when you'll need a starting point when addressing different situations. Depending on your workflow, this binder could be extremely beneficial. I personally found it difficult to apply Sinclair's templates to my objectives, so I haven't really had a use for them. If anything, its worth perusing the different documents to get some ideas for how you can streamline your business.

Conclusion

As a whole, I highly recommend 'The Web Design Business Kit.' I know of no other single volume that covers so much pertinent information. The strategies Brendon describes are very effective and can apply to all areas of your business, and you can revisit the kit when your business grows. Of course, you have to have a certain personality to put these advice into action, but most aspiring CEOs don't have that problem. If I have one complaint, its the style in which Brendon's advice is written. Some of his examples and strategies seem way too cheesy, but again, he isn't going to build the business for you.

In particular, his example proposal is far too verbose for what I would be comfortable in submitting to a client. However, his proposal template was a wake up call for the breadth of data a client might be expecting. I personally took his advice at face value and modified them so they felt natural for me. Overall, I found this book extremely useful and considering it an essential part of a Web Developer's library.

Our Rating: 9/10

Minneapolis Web Design