The Designers Working With series is about getting real people to share opinions on how they work in, or with, the design industry. For the opinions, I went to designers from all walks of life, as well as the professionals who work with designers. For the guts of the series I requested tips and advice, known issues, anything to reflect how both sides work. Exactly what I asked for, in this series you’ll find professionals telling of their experiences with designers, designers with clients. Each will then go further with descriptions of how their profession works best.

A litany you’ll read on BoDo often is “Learning how to run a design company isn’t just about design, or even the clients we design for”. That’s right. It’s about the whole - organizing, bookkeeping, personality, dependability, marketing, management skills and more. They all come into play when running a successful business.

Visiting author Josh Jeffryes (Cube 2.0) joins the conversation with:

First off, your design talent doesn’t really matter. Sure, it matters as far as whether you’ll do good work, but it’s almost entirely meaningless when it comes to business success. There are plenty of terrible designers out there with clients lined up outside the door. The reality is that most of our clients don’t know anything about design, and wouldn’t know the difference between a genius and a talentless hack if they came pre-labeled and color-coded. Being talented might get you better clients, but it won’t make you a success, and lacking talent won’t hold you back.

You’ll be able to read Josh’s views in full in the next post, What does it take to run your own design business?

Apt to this series, in my first Podcast Humpday I quoted James Archer from Forty Media:

The creative side and working with clients are just a portion of your business … there is a lot of stuff you don’t want to learn, but you’ve just gotta learn … you have to do it because it’s what keeps your business operational.

A part of that “lot of stuff” (depending on your flavour), is learning how to work with the professions responsible (in various degrees) for getting a polished product to your clients - the professions working with and in the industry.

I asked 7 short questions of writers, photographers, illustrators, marketeers, programmers, printers and pre press specialists:

1. What are the main points that you’d expect / want designers to know before contacting you about a project?
2. When working with designers, what do you see as the top problem areas?
3. How do you work?
4. How should a company or individual in your profession be chosen?
5. At what point should your profession be brought into a project?
6. How do you charge?
7. How can a designer improve their skills in your industry?

I asked the same questions of designers, but with changes to question 1 and 2 (and a minor change to question 7):

1. As a professional designer, what are the main points you want clients (potential and present) to know before contacting you about a project?
2. When working with clients, what do you see as the top problem areas?

Months into research I came across the ‘Designers Survival Manual’ by Poppy Evans. The timing was perfect. I already had the series structure, so there wasn’t a blending of layout (although I will quote / plug Poppy as often as possible).

Starting with designers, followed by writers, I’ll work through the industries on my list. On Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, for three weeks each, we’ll get personal insight into how writers, photographers, illustrators, marketeers, programmers, printers and pre press specialists work. Also scheduled for the series are account planners, design agents and bookkeepers.

Note: In keeping with the rest of BoDo, those interviewed will be in alphabetical order, by first name. Quirky? I imagine so. It comes from going through grade school as a ‘W’.

If you would like to be included in the series, contact me as I’d love to hear from you.

until the next
Designers WW,
cat

In the previous post, Clients, Oh My! we talked about how many clients are needed before starting a business without undue pressure. Need a quick rundown on the post?

Some have made it with none, some with one. But if you want to hedge your bets, try and aim for the 50 / 50 guidelines.

Below we have Leslie, Stefan, Neil and Cat explaining how, as new start-ups, their client bases were structured.

Leslie’s covered

I had originally thought that I would open a “creative business helper” kind of business, as I had seen so many individual creatives struggle with the business part of their business. However, I was recruited by a friend at an agency and, because they were so interested in me and my skill set and it was a safer thing to do, I went to work for them instead. I did a great job, but didn’t enjoy it at all. I had the “calling” to go on my own. I had photographers nagging me to rep so, as I didn’t know of any “creative business helper” kinds of businesses but I did know rep firms and how they worked, I launched my business as a rep. At the same time, I was already active on photographers’ forums and in creative pro groups, so I had all these contacts and information in that arena. People were constantly asking for my advice, which was helping them achieve their creative business goals. I was, essentially, making my money repping but doing what I wanted and loved on the side. One day I woke up and told myself that it was silly to do what others thought I should do (rep) when what I loved doing was helping lots of different creatives be successful. I made the switch.

Being active in all those forums and groups made getting clients relatively easy. I had already built a strong reputation and I didn’t stop participating just because I wanted to make money advising creatives. There is a difference in what I do on the forums and in my writing (general advice) and the consulting for an individual business (specific advice). I continue marketing to reach new potential clients, however, as all businesses should.

Leslie Burns-Dell’Acqua | Creative/Marketing Consultant & Coach
Burns Auto Parts–Consultants | Burns Auto Parts blog | Podcast | Book

Neil’s covered too

While I was working for others, I always had some freelance clients. Most came by way of friends and family, others came by referral from my freelance clients. Yet others came by way of business clubs I belonged to.

While I was setting up my business, over the course of about a year or so, I worked a day job, meeting with clients during my lunch hour or before or after business hours. I did the work in the evenings and on the weekends. Fortunately, my employer didn’t have a problem with my freelancing and allowed me to make calls to clients, printers, etc. during business hours. I also used my employer for some printing jobs, so it worked for everyone involved.

Neil (nt) Tortorella | Marketing Manager
Tortorella Design | The Marketing Mind | Creative Latitude | BoDo Team | Marketing Minute

Stefan had it made

Well, I came right out of school and began working at my father’s design firm (the business I now own) and I certainly had a lot of things to learn about dealing with clients. First of all, I had to get past my ego and begin to really listen and understand what a client wanted. But I also had to learn when it was a good time to push a client out of their comfort zone a little. I think there will always be something new we glean from working with each client.

Stefan Bean | President/Creative Director
Pulse Creative Partners, Inc. | BoDo Author | Bean’s Biz

Jay’s been lucky

I’ve been lucky, as I have never wanted for clients, as new ones have always appeared as the work tapered off.

What I do find frustrating is having an intermediary between me and the client! Like ‘Chinese Whispers’, messages can be misinterpreted and just plan wrong! Dealing directly with the client is the only sensible way to go – you can react immediately to queries or concerns at all stages of the process.

However, you have to learn the process carefully dealing with clients and learning where and when to incorporate their ideas and suggestions without compromising your own good design ideals.

Jeanette (jay) Wickham | Systems Manager
FastCoconut.com | NO!SPEC | BoDo Team | Ask jay

Cat’s roaming about

I was lucky in that the client came looking for me. I went from being unemployed, to being over-employed. My first client brought in other clients. Word got out, bringing in more. But as I move quite often, I’ve had the pleasure (not) of working hard to gain clients in each new country.

It was only when I relocated to Scotland that I took business classes. Classes that should have been taken beforehand – small business bookkeeping, networking, public speaking and marketing. Luckily, the Business Gateway had a brilliant program going for new start-ups, free of charge for the first year.

Relocating forced me to take time out for business training (which included how to find new clients), but it really should have been in place from the start. Before the client juggling came to be.

I’m sure you already know what advice I’m going to give - “do what I say do, don’t do what I did.”

Catherine (cat) Morley | Project Manager
Creative Latitude | NO!SPEC | Katz-i | FastCoconut.com | BoDo team

Next will be our very first Ask jay. Then we’re going to take a couple days break from the BoDo Niblets series, but we’ll be back on Monday with Where’s the Money, Honey? It’s where we get into the realities of how much is enough.

Tomorrow will see the first Resourceful Friday, followed by the Weekly Recap on Saturday, then the Sunday Stressbusters, on, you guessed it, Sunday.

See you there,
The BoDo Team
cat - nt - jay