Background:

A friend of mine designs patios, orangeries etc. on commission for a large manufacturer. He gets paid a fixed amount based on the signature value of the contract but is expected to maintain the relationship with the client through any changes and the install - all without any further compensation.

He's not getting rich from this but accepts that client hand-holding is best done by him as he has built the relationship. Unfortunately his manufacturer client won't consider any fe variances so he can only look to his costs, hence this post.

He costs in two visits pre-contract; one for the initial enquiry and one for the presentation & signoff. This is fine as long as there aren't loads of "couldn't you just" and "I don't like the colour" which may call for a redesign longer than can be achieved "on-site"; result being another site visit and associated travel & time costs.

Final gotcha to be considered is that his intellectual property (his design) is highly portable (aka robbable) so he cannot afford to release designs until the contract is signed.

Problem:

How to share ongoing designs with a client without

a) having to visit the site.

having to release copies in either hard or soft forms

c) (desirable) to be able to interactively update the design whilst the client is on the phone.

My Thoughts:

I know very little about SketchUp but I thing that running it over a virtual desktop app on the client's PC would work. It won't stop a "print screen" grabbing copies but it should discourage most.

Any ideas, suggestions etc. please?

Regards, Mike

Use webex or similar online meeting tool

Edited 15 April, 201313 yr by BertB

Teamviewer.com can be used to share your desktop with a potential customer. Should do what you need

Remote desktop throws wobblies with some software (including sketchup if hardware OpenGL is enabled).

Teamviewer, Skype (apparently supports it to a basic extent), VNC, and if the client doesn't wish to install additional software you could use twitch.tv (website for live streaming footage) but this wouldn't be as private although I think you can use a password to protect a twitch feed, not sure.

He could use join.me to share his screen with his customer for free.

https://join.me/

Download the file, generate a code, tell the customer to go to that site and put the code in.