Commissioning Design…what

you?TERRIFIES

money-munching

monsters1

(You’re terrified of costs that go ‘bump’ and expand in the night)

Possibly the worst way to commission a designer isto give them free reign to charge by the hour for ‘as long as it takes’ until the job is finished. Going down this route, you’ll never know what you’ll be payingfor the finished job, until the invoice lands on your desk with a terrifying ‘THUD’.

Any professional designer will take the horror outof this situation, by providing a quote for the job prior to being commissioned. Once this quote is signed o�, by you the client, both parties know exactly what’s expected in cost terms. Similarly, costs for printand/or web build should be on the quote at thisstage where relevant.

TRICKTREAT?

OR2

(You’re afraid of whether you’ll like what you get back)

This is indeed a ‘tricky’ one, because, if you’re using a designer for the first time, there’s no way of knowing what they’ll come back with. Marketers that have used a designer for a number of projects will have got to know, and trust, a designers work and built up a professional relationship with them.

When commissioning a new designer, all you can do is look at examples of their previous work – ask them to send you some portfolio examples if there’s none on their website (but be afraid if there’s no work examples on their website!)

Unless you’re commissioning an illustrator for a certain ‘style’, be wary of designers who seem to only have one style of work. Also key is to provide a decent design brief so the designer knows exactly what you want. Ideally meet face-to-face. This is an ideal situation you both to ask questions, agree a route forwards and start building that important client/designer relationship.

3 TIME-PROMISINGINVISIBLE GHOSTS

(You’re scared about the designer not delivering when they promise)

Always try to give designers a deadline, even if you haven’t really got one yourself. In my experience,I work much better if I know a client needs it for a certain time or date. Clients that say, “Get it back to me whenever you can”, often get their work pushedto the back of the queue, behind the clients thathave given a stricter deadline.

While it may not always be practical, on longer projects, regular catch-up meetings help to makesure the job stays on track, both in terms of timing and creativity.

These can also be done by phone, or simple emails from the designer explaining what stage they’re at. Also, don’t be afraid of chasing up the designer if you’ve not heard from them in a while.

4 HIDDEN SURPRISESUNDER THE BED

(You’re terrified of hidden extras that might appear on the final invoice)

This goes back to the quote mentioned in slide one. Designers may need to charge for extras such as photography, stock images, or specific font purchases.

At the quote stage, a designer probably won’t knowif they’ll need some of these or not (until they’re part-way through the job).

However, the possibilities of these extras should be stated on the quote and the costs for these should be run by you for sign-o� BEFORE purchasing, so there shouldn’t be nasty surprises at the end.

5 KNOW-IT-ALLwizards(You worry whether someone who says they can ‘do it all’ really can)

Other designers may disagree with me on this one, but I would be slightly wary of those clever wizards that say they can do everything. Whilst it’s good to have a suite of connected services, good peopletend to specialise in things they’re good at.

Many ‘one-person-band’ graphic designers nowadays say they can design, build websites, copy-write, sort brand strategy, help with your marketing plan etc etc. They may be able to do all this, but will any one part of it be particularly good? A larger design agency probably can, as they’ll have di�erent people, with di�erent skill-sets, that they can call on and supply to you.

I’ll do the things I’m good at, such as graphic design and branding and if any of my clients require other services – web-build, copy-writing or 3D modelling, I’ll call upon the services of people that I know are skilled at these things to deliver a the best possible job.

Now you can sleep soundly in your beds, knowing that there’snothing underneath them. Next time you need to commission

design for the marketing of your business, you needn’t be afraidof the horrors you thought might be lying in wait.

And… if you need to commission design that won’tgive you nightmares, you know where we are.

www.creative-cadence.co.uk