Building one website for a friend is a favour. Building websites for paying clients, month after month, is a business. The difference isn't more skill. It's a few documents and habits you set up once and reuse for every client.
Most new web designers learn this the hard way. They quote a number on the spot, start without a deposit, agree to "small changes" that never end, and put the client's domain on their own card. None of that is about code. This guide walks through the system in the order a client meets it. It won't promise you an income: that depends on your city, your clients and how steadily you work.
01Step 1: Keep a lead tracker
Most new freelancers don't lose clients because their work is bad. They lose them because they forget. A lead tracker fixes that: one spreadsheet, such as a Google Sheet, with a row for every business you talk to, its stage, your last contact, your next action and the date for it.
- Stages: Found, Contacted, Replied, Demo shown, Proposal sent, Won, plus Not now and Lost.
- Channel: demo pitch, social media, referral or Google. After a month, you can see which one brings clients, not just chats.
- Only what you need: public contact details and notes on your conversations. No home addresses or ID numbers. If anyone asks you to stop, mark them "Do not contact" and delete their details.
Set weekly activity targets you control, like businesses found and messages sent. You can't control who says yes. Where those leads come from is covered in How to find your first web design client.
02Step 2: Turn your work into three packages
A package is a fixed set of work at a fixed price. The course uses three: Starter ("look professional online"), Business ("take orders or bookings online") and Premium ("the full system, looked after").
Each package spells out the pages, features, rounds of changes (usually two), the timeline, and a fix period after launch, such as 30 days. It also says what the client provides (logo, photos, prices, text) and what they pay for directly, like their own domain. Extras become add-ons with their own price.
Only list what you've built and tested. Keep the sheet to one page, as a PDF on your phone. For the numbers, read What to charge for your first website and try our website price calculator.
03Step 3: Send a proposal, not a price on WhatsApp
When an owner says "send me something", don't send a number and start building. Send a proposal: what you'll build, when, and for how much.
A good proposal talks about their business, in their own words. It shows the three packages, says what the smallest one doesn't include, and marks one Recommended, with honest reasons. It has a payment table and says how long the offer stands (for example, 14 days). For a small job, like adding a booking form, one page is enough. Never promise sales or Google rankings.
04Step 4: Take a deposit and agree in writing
The course uses a simple order: the client chooses a package, you both accept a short agreement, you send a deposit invoice for 60%, and you send a receipt when it arrives. Then you send a website information form, and the build starts when the deposit and the content are in. The other 40% is due when the client approves the finished site, before it goes live on their domain.
No deposit, no start. A client who won't pay a fair deposit is telling you something before it costs you anything.
The agreement is two pages of plain language: the work, the timeline (which moves if content arrives late), payments, rounds of changes, who owns what, the fix period, their customers' data, ending early, and no guarantee of sales. If a client won't sign, a written "I agree" by WhatsApp or email is much better than nothing. The course template is a starting point, not legal advice: for larger projects, have a qualified lawyer review it once.
For payment in Ghana, the course suggests mobile money to a number registered in your name, or bank transfer. A provider's payment link works for cards once your business account is set up. Send a numbered invoice before each payment and a receipt after, and record both. Never share your PIN, and never ask for a client's.
05Step 5: Put every account in the client's name
If you register a client's domain on your own account and later fall out, or stop answering, the client can't renew their own web address. Do the opposite from your first client. The domain, DNS, database, email sending and Google accounts are opened with the client's business Gmail, on their card where there's a cost. You're invited as a member with your own login. The client types their own passwords; you never keep them. In the course setup, code and hosting stay in your accounts while you maintain the site, and your agreement promises to transfer them if the client leaves.
Keep an accounts register for each client: every account, its owner and who has access, with no passwords. It's also a selling point: "You'll own everything. I'll never hold your website hostage."
06Step 6: Hand over properly
The last steps run in order: written approval, balance paid, launch, handover meeting. At the meeting the owner sets their own dashboard password with "Forgot password?" on their phone, and you hand over a short owner's guide, a 5 to 10 minute video walkthrough recorded with test data only, the accounts register, your completed checklists and the final receipt.
Then ask for a testimonial with three questions: what was the problem before, what's different now, and what would they tell another business owner? Get written permission before you use it, and never change what they said. How to show your work without a portfolio explains how to turn it into proof.
07Step 7: Offer a monthly care plan
A one-off project pays you once. A care plan pays every month, and it's what the site needs anyway: security updates, a monthly backup, a health check, small changes up to a set limit, and a short monthly report.
The course offers three plans, Care, Care+ and Growth, with example prices of GHS 200 to 400, GHS 500 to 900 and GHS 1,000 to 2,000 a month. They're examples, not market research: work out yours from your hours and rate. Define a "small change" (prices, hours, photos) and what isn't one (new pages, new features). Unused time doesn't roll over, plans are paid monthly in advance, and either side can stop with notice, such as 30 days. Offer the plan in the proposal, at handover and when the fix period ends.
08Step 8: Make referrals part of the routine
Ask for a referral when the client is happiest: launch day, their first real online order, or a 30-day check-in. Never before they've seen the result. Ask a specific question, and give them a short message they can forward.
A simple reward helps, paid only after the referred client's deposit clears: for example, a free month of care for an existing client. Build two-way links with printers, photographers, graphic designers and accountants. And ask every new enquiry "How did you find me?", then write it in your tracker. The system feeds itself.
09Learn the whole system
Module 13, The 4-Channel Client System, sets up the tracker, scripts and weekly rhythm. Module 14, Price, Close & Deliver, gives you the package sheet, proposal, agreement, invoice, care plan and handover templates, ready to adapt. Nothing in the course promises clients or income. Module 0 is free, so you can see how the course teaches first.
This guide comes from Module 13 of the course. The full course is GHS 399 ($40), paid once and yours to keep. Module 0 is free.