What do clients, potential clients and connections worry most about when commissioning graphic design for their marketing materials or businesses? In this presentation, I hope to demystify some of the more terrifying concerns people have.

1. Commissioning Design…
what
you?
TERRIFIES

2. money-munching
monsters 1
(You’re terrified of costs that go ‘bump’ and expand in the night)
Possibly the worst way to commission a designer is
to 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 paying
for the finished job, until the invoice lands on your
desk with a terrifying ‘THUD’.

3. Any professional designer will take the horror out
of 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 print
and/or web build should be on the quote at this
stage where relevant.

4. TRICK
TREAT?
2 OR
(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.

5. 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.

6. 3 TIME-PROMISING
INVISIBLE 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 pushed
to the back of the queue, behind the clients that
have given a stricter deadline.

7. While it may not always be practical, on longer
projects, regular catch-up meetings help to make
sure 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.

8. 4 HIDDEN SURPRISES
UNDER 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 know
if they’ll need some of these or not (until they’re
part-way through the job).

9. 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.

10. 5 KNOW-IT-ALL wizards
(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 people
tend to specialise in things they’re good at.

11. 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 dierent people, with dierent
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.

12. Now you can sleep soundly in your beds, knowing that there’s
nothing underneath them. Next time you need to commission
design for the marketing of your business, you needn’t be afraid
of the horrors you thought might be lying in wait.
And… if you need to commission design that won’t
give you nightmares, you know where we are.
www.creative-cadence.co.uk