When clients come to your shop, you have a great opportunity to send a powerful message about your competence and capability. For David Showalter [www.daviddesign.biz], it starts outside, with an attractive exterior and primary signage. Customers then come in to a comfortable display area where they can discuss their project.

Most clients look first at the cost of a sign, the amount they have to pay the day the sign is completed . Larry Elliott finds that showing that cost over the life of the sign really puts it in perspective.

One of the great things about aluminum composite is that it's easy to fabricate into cabinets and boxes--making signs and mountings that are exceptionally stable and durable. John Dutton, Quality Signs, Jasper, Alabama, used this approach on this project.

Ray and Rose Grossi of Midwest Signworks in Morris, IL, have felt the squeeze of the economic downturn just like the rest of us. See the strategy that is seeing them through it.

The simple yard sign is one of the best ways for a service business to get their phone ringing. Yard signs catch the eye and tell a quick story of "who's doing what" on this site.

Rocco Gaskins shares how easy it is to overlook installation costs, and says many shops lose money as a result.

Have you ever done a great design on someone's sign or truck, only to have them call later to say, "Can you e-mail me the file of the design you did on my truck?" If you have, you know how hard it is to get paid for the design at that point.

The fastest way to educate a client about letter legibility at typical reading distance is to show them how it works. Larry Williams, Gulf Breeze, FL, created a simple chart that he output at actual size—about 4 ft. tall overall.

Art Schilling [East Coast Artie's, Surfside Beach, SC] has spent a lifetime making and selling signs. Just the other day he was telling me about a prospect who stopped by the shop to ask how much it would cost to get his new van lettered. It was a conversation he's had a million times.

 A few weeks ago, when we featured John Shoffner's tip on how easy and profitable it is to offer t-shirts to your sign customers, I asked if any readers had success offering promotional items, like imprinted pens, letter openers, calendars. I received several great responses.