This past week I went to a client’s house and fixed his internet. He thought it was an email problem, and it turned out to not be such a big deal, but he’s not very techy and he’d had the problem for a while, so finally I just went over there and called tech support for him, and we got it fixed. It hasn’t even broken again since.

Yes, I’m a designer. No, I don’t offer tech support as one of my package options, or even talk about it much on my site at all. But I’ve learned that a small business owner doesn’t just get overwhelmed by business card vendors and web hosts — and since I’m small, I can afford to use all my skills for my clients’ benefits, and not just the ones that fit under my job title.

I only have a few regular clients, and while I would like to have more, it’s never been my ambition to have a lot more. I’d rather go deep than wide — I think I can be more help to a small number of clients over a long time, than I could be to dozens or hundreds as one-shots. I don’t want to just be a designer, I want to be their designer, the person they feel like they can call whenever they have a problem.

I’ve realized that for a client relationship to work for me, it has to work both ways — I have to be committed to their success as a business, not just because it means more work for me. I work hardest for my clients when I believe in them, and because of that, I want to help them do what they do, within my abilities.

It’s helped clarify my marketing a lot — I’m looking for small businesses that do something nifty. I’m looking for people who need my help, and with whom I can work to build their business into what they dream that it will be.

And I’m happy to help them with their email problems, as long as they’re on a Mac.