I am sharing this because I witness people like Yvette Murrell of YvetteMurrell.com get away with not paying creatives all the time and many of us don't speak up about it but that needs to change. I am not sharing this out of malice as I don't believe Yvette is necessarily a bad person. She is just doing what many people often do to creatives because they believe they can get away with it.
Over a year ago, Yvette and I agreed to exchange services, she never held up her end of the agreement.
Yvette reached out to me asking me to on 12/28/17 asking to if I would be willing to create a memorial website for her deceased husband.
After a couple of messages back and forth, I agreed to design a website for her husband in exchange for coaching services from her. This quickly shifted into me creating a website for her YvetteMurrell.com brand. I created a beautiful, high-quality website along with a promotional commercial video for her to promote her brand with the understanding that she would be offering me coaching services.
I provided Yvette with 3 months of design and consulting services, countless text messages back and forth, phone and email conversations.
Yvette only provided me with one reading that she calls a "Divine Guidance" reading which was about an hour-long which is not at all what we agreed on.
I knew this wasn't an even exchange and Yvette was extremely difficult to work with; always making excuses as to why she couldn't get content to me and saying that she needed to meditate on every single decision. After 3 months of designing this website, Yvette informed me on the day her website was scheduled to launch that "her spirit told her to wait."
Throughout my time working with her, I was extremely patient, met every single deadline, even though this was a bartered service and went above and beyond to make sure she has a website that showcased her brand in a beautiful way.
My website packages start at $3500, the branded commercial that was created for her would normally cost her $1900
Ultimately, the site that I created for Yvette never launched. In January of 2019, Yvette called me informing me that she has a project she was working on and wanted to talk to me about it. Against my better judgment, I returned her call and she stated that she'd like to work with me again. I informed her what my process would look like, we went over pricing and I sent her over a proposal/agreement. Yvette stated that the numbers and contract looked good but that she wanted to be able to update her website within a few months as "her spirit" is constantly evolving. Here we go again.
When I ended that phone call with her, I felt extreme anxiety and began regretting that I'd even returned her call.
After a few phone conversations and emails Yvette decided that in her "reflection and meditation, she decided she needs much more spaciousness and choice"
This kind of spiritual bypassing in business keeps people like Yvette from showing up as professionals and honoring the processes, time and energy of creatives who take their business seriously.
So not only did Yvette never make due on our initial agreed-upon exchange, but she also did not honor any of the time, energy, creativity, and patience it took to produce work for her. And to add insult to injury, she took the branded commercial video that I created, that she did not pay for or even from a moral standpoint have the right to use to put on her current website to promote her services to her audience.
When I contacted Yvette about this, she told me to send over an invoice. When I sent over the invoice she responded, once again in typical Yvette fashion that "After deep meditation, she's decided to remove the video" and ultimately that she would not be paying me.
At this time, my video that I created was on her website for much longer than a month. And after she refused to pay for my services she still did not immediately remove my video so I had to send a cease and desist and demand payment letter.
My packages for video editing are $1900, Yvette received an invoice from me for $375 which she refused to pay. So even then, I granted her grace and she still refused to honor that.
I don't think many people understand how this works but anytime a creative creates any piece of work for your brand, that work can be used to alter the perception of your brand and help you increase your sales, bring in new revenue or generate opportunities.
Yvette, once again refusing to pay for my services, goes to show that she along with many others like her really don't understand or value the work of creatives.
People like Yvette assume that they can use our work without paying, infringe upon our work and because we're entrepreneurs, they assume they can get away with it. They blow it off as if it's not a big deal.
If I would've never contacted Yvette regarding her using my work without my permission and demanding payment, my work would still be on her website, she would've never asked for my permission to use it and she would still be using it to promote her it.
This kind of behavior clearly shows that Yvette lacks integrity and professionalism when it comes to doing business with creatives and she, along with people like her, need to be held accountable.
Yvette Murrell Reviews
I am sharing this because I witness people like Yvette Murrell of YvetteMurrell.com get away with not paying creatives all the time and many of us don't speak up about it but that needs to change. I am not sharing this out of malice as I don't believe Yvette is necessarily a bad person. She is just doing what many people often do to creatives because they believe they can get away with it.
Over a year ago, Yvette and I agreed to exchange services, she never held up her end of the agreement.
Yvette reached out to me asking me to on 12/28/17 asking to if I would be willing to create a memorial website for her deceased husband.
After a couple of messages back and forth, I agreed to design a website for her husband in exchange for coaching services from her. This quickly shifted into me creating a website for her YvetteMurrell.com brand. I created a beautiful, high-quality website along with a promotional commercial video for her to promote her brand with the understanding that she would be offering me coaching services.
I provided Yvette with 3 months of design and consulting services, countless text messages back and forth, phone and email conversations.
Yvette only provided me with one reading that she calls a "Divine Guidance" reading which was about an hour-long which is not at all what we agreed on.
I knew this wasn't an even exchange and Yvette was extremely difficult to work with; always making excuses as to why she couldn't get content to me and saying that she needed to meditate on every single decision. After 3 months of designing this website, Yvette informed me on the day her website was scheduled to launch that "her spirit told her to wait."
Throughout my time working with her, I was extremely patient, met every single deadline, even though this was a bartered service and went above and beyond to make sure she has a website that showcased her brand in a beautiful way.
My website packages start at $3500, the branded commercial that was created for her would normally cost her $1900
Ultimately, the site that I created for Yvette never launched. In January of 2019, Yvette called me informing me that she has a project she was working on and wanted to talk to me about it. Against my better judgment, I returned her call and she stated that she'd like to work with me again. I informed her what my process would look like, we went over pricing and I sent her over a proposal/agreement. Yvette stated that the numbers and contract looked good but that she wanted to be able to update her website within a few months as "her spirit" is constantly evolving. Here we go again.
When I ended that phone call with her, I felt extreme anxiety and began regretting that I'd even returned her call.
After a few phone conversations and emails Yvette decided that in her "reflection and meditation, she decided she needs much more spaciousness and choice"
This kind of spiritual bypassing in business keeps people like Yvette from showing up as professionals and honoring the processes, time and energy of creatives who take their business seriously.
So not only did Yvette never make due on our initial agreed-upon exchange, but she also did not honor any of the time, energy, creativity, and patience it took to produce work for her. And to add insult to injury, she took the branded commercial video that I created, that she did not pay for or even from a moral standpoint have the right to use to put on her current website to promote her services to her audience.
When I contacted Yvette about this, she told me to send over an invoice. When I sent over the invoice she responded, once again in typical Yvette fashion that "After deep meditation, she's decided to remove the video" and ultimately that she would not be paying me.
At this time, my video that I created was on her website for much longer than a month. And after she refused to pay for my services she still did not immediately remove my video so I had to send a cease and desist and demand payment letter.
My packages for video editing are $1900, Yvette received an invoice from me for $375 which she refused to pay. So even then, I granted her grace and she still refused to honor that.
I don't think many people understand how this works but anytime a creative creates any piece of work for your brand, that work can be used to alter the perception of your brand and help you increase your sales, bring in new revenue or generate opportunities.
Yvette, once again refusing to pay for my services, goes to show that she along with many others like her really don't understand or value the work of creatives.
People like Yvette assume that they can use our work without paying, infringe upon our work and because we're entrepreneurs, they assume they can get away with it. They blow it off as if it's not a big deal.
If I would've never contacted Yvette regarding her using my work without my permission and demanding payment, my work would still be on her website, she would've never asked for my permission to use it and she would still be using it to promote her it.
This kind of behavior clearly shows that Yvette lacks integrity and professionalism when it comes to doing business with creatives and she, along with people like her, need to be held accountable.