Zoom

[glorybound]

OMG! Is anyone else had enough of ZOOM? Every client, everyday, wants to make a ZOOM call. I know we are locked in and lonely, but enough! No, we don’t need a ZOOM call to go over if you want white walls or off white walls. Okay, I feel better now. I actually had a client who wanted to schedule a ZOOM call every morning to discuss his projects progress. No, you are not that important and neither is your project. I didn’t say that of course, but that’s what I thought.

[fixeighted]

LOL I feel you...though I am lucky and only have a couple of clients at the moment and only
recently have they tried to get me on Zoom calls, which I agreed to though I haven't got a mic, only a gaming headset with a mic that I can't get to work with Zoom.
I also don't have a webcam, so it probably makes me look entirely unprofessional, which is entirely their problem of course.
I've never liked this tech when it was all Skype. I either want to be face to face in reality, which I value immensely, or they can email me or phone. Not that hard

The one 'semi' Zoom call I had with them and their main client the other day had me unable to input anything of real value, as most of the probable 2 hours that I sat there, bored, was about an entirely different aspect of the project.
So yeah, enough of it! Or manage it rationally so they're not wasting my (and others') bloody time

Funny post that...thanks Bobby

[glorybound]

I have one client that wants to meet every time they make comments on an iteration. They schedule a ZOOM meeting each time with a dozen people and all they do is go over each comment. It really is an expensive waste of time. I have worked places that I spent more time in useless meetings than we worked. You know, we had meetings to talk about meetings. ZOOM meetings are getting just as bad. I do have a pretty sweet setup, streaming from my DSL with a pro microphone. From my MACBOOK Pro I stream using my iPhone 12 Pro, which looks just as good as my DSL. I guess I made it fun to get past the annoyance of having to do it.

As I write this I got an email from another client wanting a ZOOM meeting to go over her comments. I have done a dozen projects for her last year and this would be a first. I made a mistake of inviting her to a ZOOM meeting last week to share the screen on something she couldn’t understand otherwise.

[fixeighted]

Oops....Floodgates = open
Maybe you need to engineer a catastophic and unresolvable hardware failure

[glorybound]

Yeah, that only works so many times . I had two leads yesterday, both wanting to meet on ZOOM. I can't spend an hour on each lead unless it is a pretty important project that I would be dying to work on. If I would have allowed it, I would have been on ZOOM calls for 4+ hours yesterday. All were handled with short and quick email exchanges, which I can document.

[fixeighted]

I think it's fine to say that Zoom or similar is something that you don't offer as a communication tool, due to very
rational reasons. You don't really need to explain why you made this or that decision. Your rules
I don't think it'll lose you any business...you'll just upset them a bit and them make them cry cos they're lonely
and can't discuss shades of white

Anyway, your last point is absolutely correct and provides the perfect reasoning. I make an absolute point even during phone conversations that everything need to be
laid out in an email for reference and traceablility. People always forget what they say in a call, Zoom or otherwise, then magically remember you agreeing to do
something that there is no record of

[glorybound]

I avoid the phone too, for that very reason. A phone call means I am taking notes and transcribing everything into a log. I get the occasional client who wants to call me several times a day and recently I had to tell one to stop calling me. I told him that I am a web-based business and all correspondences should be through the review site, where everything is documented. This is the same client who called me on Christmas morning a few years back to discuss his project. He is the kind of client that sends something at midnight and wonders where the changes are by morning .

You mention my rules, but most think the game is played by their rules. I currently have one client who thinks that her images will be updated until she is happy. I locked her imaged down last night for comment, telling her that I went above and beyond her two revisions and anything else will be billed per hour. This morning I woke up to a PDF with 100+ comments and a note that she'll need her images updated by Friday morning. Nope, sorry. Your images are now a hostage. I disable downloads from my review site until the balance is paid in full. My rules!

[fixeighted]

Oh dear...some people know no boundaries. At least you let them know it's unacceptable.
Generally clients don't call me, luckily, as they don't have my number. One does and talks for hours and rambles - but then he is a very old friend and it's tough to
deny him
The other one at the moment falls into the ''most think the game is played by their rules'' category.....they do send a lot of work but are increasingly trying to dictate costs to me.
Literally every project is a 'what's the best price for this', like I'm selling vegetables on a corner stall. And lately; 'well the last project was this much, why is this one more?', when the projects/products are different. I despair.
They may have to disappear from my life if they continue

I do like a nice rant

[glorybound]

Yeah, this menu system some of these China outfits have is that cause. You know, $250 per view, regardless. I get emails all the time for my 'menu of prices' and I have a canned reply that says "I quote each project uniquely, because, well, your project is unique". Come on guys, how much is a car? What kind of question is that? Call a car dealer and asked them that question and see what they say. Call your realtor and ask them how much a house is?

[Neilg]

For what it's worth I prefer zoom meetings. used to go to a lot of in-person meetings which would take 30-40min to get to, once there someone was stuck in traffic so it would start half hour late, everyone would want to chat and hang around talking about vacations or other things.
Meetings with one particular client used to take 3-4 hours out of my day. Now with zoom calls, nobody is late or wants to do small talk so they're super quick and straight to the point.

I think one on one meetings are worse, but ones involving 5+ people are better.

[glorybound]

I can imagine ZOOM meetings can be more convenient in those situations. They just remind me of the corporate mindest where there is a meeting for everything. Meetings to discuss meetings! A meeting should be billed per hour, like a lawyer. I think people would double think about meetings if they knew it would cost them money; it costs me money.

[Pixelcon]

Maybe people are so demanding of you because you don't represent yourself as a real human. You're only web-based and only operated via a digital interpreter? No wonder they want changes done immediately or work done at rock-bottom prices. You're competing with these cheaper foreign companies by choice.

The phone is the most important tool I have. More important than software or hardware.

[fixeighted]

I would argue that the main point is that it's not necessarily the technology that is flawed, just people's ability to use it in a proper manner.
People will ramble and shift focus on any given project without necessarily considering the crux of the particular matter needing discussion.
Most points can be dealt with concisely and by email, or a very short personal call if absolutely necessary.
This all takes time and if it's not managed properly, then more time can be spent discussing frivolous tangential stuff than actually working on
completion or addressing pertinent amendments. And as has been said, many many things that happen during a call can be forgotten if not in a properly laid out brief/checksheet etc.
I already spend way too much time even emailing, simply because clients seemingly can't understand their part of the process

An example would be that I asked, with a provided image, for clarification on where a certain element needs to go.
The response was a wall of text including history of the product/parts and contradictory
image reference resulting in not actually answering my simple question and further confusing the situation.

*Sigh....

[fixeighted]

....and almost right on cue my client just asked me to attend a Zoom at 3pm....with 5 other people, to discuss what I asked them - about one small point.
I have jinxed myself

[andybot_cg]

Yep, just send me a damn email with the changes you want, I can read over that in a minute or two. It's like presenters who read every word of their power point slide. No, I don't want to Zoom call either.