Your easy, effortless Intro to Design Intensives
Considering design intensives? Here's a good look at what they are, how they differ from templates or fully custom designs, and which clients need them.
Your easy, effortless intro to design intensives
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Introduction
An intuitive glance of the web design industry might tell you that the most reliable way to set up your studio is to provide a fully custom, one-on-one design experience to high-ticket clients. This was how I got my own foot in the door—by looking for businesses in Southeast Asia who were willing to invest in expertise for their digital presence. However, not every prospect that comes knocking would be able to afford this level of support from you.
On the other hand, you could create and sell templates as I’ve done myself a few years down the line. But this passive income takes time before it can make a substantial contribution.
Thankfully, there now exists a third way for web designers, one that can integrate some form of customization from 1:1 services with the convenience of standardized templates. Design intensives are emerging as a new, flexible offer among studios—and for good reason.
What are design intensives?
You may know it by its other names: design days, day rates, day intensives—or alternatively, its weekly variants. Simply put, when I say design intensives, I’m talking about an offering that leverages on the select range of website customization a single day or week can allow.
Speed sets this offer apart from other options. Intensives are more time-efficient compared to fully custom design services, where strategy requires longer deliberation, and do-it-yourself solutions, where lack of experience might lead to more trial and error down the road. As such, the underlying system has to be streamlined and refined from an existing design workflow to make it possible in the first place.
Some people may balk at paying a thousand dollars or two for a day’s worth of design, but it can take years of skill and experience to pull off this caliber of efficiency. The premium pricing of design intensives is meant to reflect your expertise.
Clients best suited for design intensives
Not all entrepreneurs are seeking a highly personalized design experience, nor could they afford to invest a relatively huge amount into their website when they’re just starting out. In my experience, these are some tell-tale signs that potential clients may be a great fit for design intensives:
1. They’re looking for a simple website
For a number of small businesses, the functions and prerequisites they want to see on their website are straightforward—perhaps the homepage, about page, services page, blog collection, and contact form will do. Not a lot of bells and whistles, so clients don’t want to drag out the build process for too long.
If you already have an established process for such cases, especially in a niche you know like the back of your hand, then you might want to consider design intensives.
2. They need to launch their websites ASAP
Are you in talks with someone who seems to just want to get their website out of the way? They’d be happy with any minimum viable product you can come up with so they can launch in a few weeks’ time and take it from there.
They could look for a template, but they’re too pressed for time to set it up themselves. In fact, they might have even come across your template when they approached you to request a couple of small tweaks upon installation. This is where intensives could come in handy for template reskins.
3. They already know what they want
These types of clients have a singular goal and clear aesthetic in mind for their business. Their requests are website projects simply awaiting your creative execution.
Since time is of the essence, you cannot work on strategy and execution simultaneously; both you and the client would have to collaborate towards one of these two. Otherwise you might have to dedicate one design day for strategy then another round for the website build itself.
4. They can be quick on their feet
When you’re running a tight ship, there can be no space for excessive back and forth communication. You’d want to check if you’re working with a small team, preferably with one decision maker keeping in touch with you throughout the day. Observe closely if they have the ability to make snap decisions within your discovery call.
5. They have a list of random website tasks
Businesses could also have recurring website needs that may not be readily listed in your service packages. For instance, what if they need a designer to publish a couple of new product pages or blog posts on their behalf? If there’s a small glitch in one section you coded in—you just have to get into their backend to make a quick edit?
The day rate can provide a baseline for miscellaneous add-on or support services to new or returning clients. In this case, intensives may prove to be a better alternative if you find that hourly rates tend to be too constricting and monthly retainers too unpredictable.
Should you offer design intensives?
If you’ve been offering fully custom web design services for a while and you’re coming across quite a number of potential clients like these, it might be time for you to consider an offering that meets them where they are rather than turning them down entirely. There’s still an opportunity for you to work together there even when you have to reconsider the finer details of your collaboration.
I didn’t always offer this as a service outside of my custom-coded builds, until someone who expressed their love for my distinct style said, “I don’t need the full extent of the design experience you can offer. Admittedly, my business can’t afford that right now. But I would really appreciate a touch of your expertise for my website.”
To me, that put into words the value that design intensives could offer at the end of the day. If this is something you’d also like to provide for future clients, I have a workshop that can help you learn everything you need to know before getting started:
