First I want to say your signature is quite funny. I haven't noticed it in your previous posts. As for the client management issue... There is some decent software out there but if you have the patience for it then a notebook is a great way to keep everything. Personally I don't have the patience for this and I tend to make a "resources" folder for each project (I use Aptana as my editor and have a project for each client). Anyways in the resources folder I have questions and answers that I deem important, login information for anything I may need to log in to, contact information, and a copy of the contract. I find that separating the resources for each client this way lets me keep up with the clients that don't like to email back... so after waiting for a month to hear from them I can go back and look at what I have forgotten in the long silence.
As for questions to ask them... I always make sure I know what kind of business the site is for so I can look at other websites in the same line. I get them to look at competitor sites to find likes and dislikes. If I don't get enough information from that I'll go to template monster or something similar and find a few designs and get likes and dislikes from the client. Ask what kind of cross browser compatibility they are looking for (basically do they expect a lot of traffic from old versions of IE). If they don't know the answer to that question (invariably they won't) then I typically just offer support to IE8 and up and put an upgrade warning on all versions of IE less than 9. Finally I try to get them to pick some colors they like and get some basic content from them like a mission statement or about the company information. Just so the final product isn't all lipsum...
Okay so I rambled a bit there.... been awake too long and finally about to sleep. Hopefully that was decent information
good luck to you.
