How To Onboard A Webflow Client: 7 Step Process

You have spent hours watching webflow tutorials, learning how to do animations like Joseph Berry, watching Charli Marie TV do her portfolio redesign. Your portfolio bangs and now, you have a client interested in your services. But how do you even start the process of on-boarding them?

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In my experience, onboarding is a bit like onboarding people on to a ship. The ship is the project that is about to sail for hundreds of miles. You're the captain that needs to guide the ship safely to harbour - the destination your client wants you to guide them to. You need to collaborate closely in order for the ship to get to it's destination. With good planning and organisation, you will avoid rough weather and all help each other to ensure the ship reaches the harbour safely. Welcoming them on board and explaining what will happen over the course of the journey limits surprises and manages expectations.

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As a result, the onboarding process is a vital step in creating a good experience for your client. Having a clear process to follow will make your life easier as a webflower, and it will make your client feel like you are guiding them through the web design process.

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I’ve started this onboarding process from the first contact you receive from the potential client just because I firmly believe on boarding clients is made far easier if the client already trusts you which is determined before the client has agreed to work with you.

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The steps that we will cover are:

1. Get On A Call
2. Send A Proposal
3. Send A Contract
4. Receive Payment
5. Set Up A Slack Channel
6. Set Up Google Drive
7. Set Up A Kick Off Call

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1) Get On A Call

Often, clients will reach out via email or on social media. Since this is your first interaction with the client, it’s important to reply in a timely manner and show excitement to work with them.

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Sometimes, particularly on social messages, people will essentially just ask bluntly “how much?” and “how quick?”

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These type of clients are often just shopping around. If that’s the case, they aren’t looking to work with you because of your specific skills or process, but are basically just trying to look for the cheapest option. I recommend avoiding clients that are looking for the cheapest option available since I have found that they are often the most difficult clients to work with but up to you!  Learn more about this in my client red flags article

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Whoever reaches out though, reply courteously and promptly. I try and get clients on a call to understand more about their business, vision and why they do what they do.

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Why?

The big reason for me is about building trust. You want to help the client make the best decision for them.

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In the words of Chris Do, ‘People value a relationship they trust more than the price point.’

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If you are a good fit for the client and they seem keen to work together, I recommend talking about a price point on the call.

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I usually ask their budget first, and if they don’t reply with a number, I would say something like, ‘Typically, a project of this scope and time would be between 5 - 7.5K. If I sent over a proposal with that type of price range, does that work for you?”

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This way, you won’t put loads of effort in to making a proposal that is a complete waste of time, and you can openly talk about the budget. If it’s outside their budget, you can simply reduce the scope.

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Watch this video to learn more about client calls:

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2) Send a proposal

After I have had the initial client call, I send a proposal. In it, I include:

• Brief summary of initial call with project goals
• The Website process

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• Past work and testimonials

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• Webflow explainer

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• 3 different pricing options with different timelines

If I really want to get the client, I will record a video going through the proposal. This just helps the client get to know me better, I can explain things in depth beyond the information that is already there and it shows my willingness to go the extra for the client.

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3) Send contract

I use Hello Bonsai to send my contracts. What I love about Hello Bonsai is that it basically writes the contract for you and you just need to slot in the relevant information.

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I used to send clients a pdf but the experience is just not nearly as polished for the client. They need to reply via email with a signed document which often took ages for them to do. I also had a contract on pdf that might get lost in my emails whereas Hello Bonsai keeps the contract for both me and the client to easily check in one place.

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4) Receive payment

With Hello Bonsai, you can also take payments. It links to your stripe account so the money can be sent to you from anywhere in the world seamlessly.

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I recommend getting 25% up front, 25% after wireframes are done and then 50% at the end when the project is done. This means you have money coming in throughout the project. However, you can choose whatever pricing structure you like.

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Note: Do NOT start work before you have a deposit. Even if you are really keen, it’s important to set clear boundaries with the client that you don’t do work unless you get paid. No money, no work.

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5) Set Up Slack Channel/Join Their Channel

I recommend using something like slack to communicate with clients. The reason for this is that often, clients know how to use slack already (rather than discord or something else), and things won’t get lost in email threads.

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The other thing is that other team members can be added easily + it’s free.

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6) Set up a Google Drive

For any assets, I recommend using Google Drive or DropBox.

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Both are free and easy to use both for you and the client. What’s great about this is that you can add team members to add things if necessary and you can also put videos and images of large sizes in here easily.

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7) Set up Kick-Off Call

When all that is done, you are good to have you kick off call. In this call, I believe it’s useful to:

• Understand precisely what success looks like for your client from working together
• Understand who needs to be on calls throughout the web design process (marketing team, design team or anyone else)
• Look at calendar and book in calls in advance (this way, you can plan your life around the calls in the future and it gives your client incentive to get assets to you by certain times)
• Explain how you work and how you expect your client to work (Perhaps you want to say you don’t work on weekends so don’t expect a reply + You want client to give you feedback within 2 working days for project to stay on schedule)
• Explain that you only want to be contacted via slack just so that everyone you are working with can see it

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Then, you dive in to the web design process. That’s a whole other article though!

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Hope this helped and let me know if it did.