Things to Consider When You Hire a Graphic Designer

1. Who is your target audience?
This will have a great impact on the style, content and message of your project. Some variables that can have impact on a design include the age range of your client base, their gender, their geographic location, and additional factors such as economic status and religion may also come into play.

2. What is your message?
Make sure that you can tell a designer exactly what message you are trying to convey to your client audience. The overall message can be something as simple as thanking customers or announcing a new product. Once that is established, go beyond it to decide on the “mood” of your product or service message. Is it excitement? Sadness? Compassion? Gather some keywords that will help with the overall style of your design.

3. What are the specs of your project?
Decide ahead of time on the size of your project. For example, a 12-page brochure will take much longer than a 4-page foldout. The amount of content can help to determine the dimensions and number of pages. Also decide if you need black and white or 2-color vs. 4-color printing as this will affect your final price, as will factors like paper stock and the size the number of pieces that you need to print.

4. What is your budget?
In many cases, you may not know your actual budget for a project. Regardless, it is usually a good idea to at least have a range in mind. The designer may be able to alter some parameters (such as timeframe or the amount of design revisions to be provided) to fit within your overall budget.

5. Is there a specific deadline?
Make sure to tell the graphic designer if the project needs to be done by a specific date. The job may coincide with your product launch, or another important milestone. If there is not a deadline, you will want to create a timeframe for completing the project and present it to the designer..

6. Should you provide a creative direction?
Whenever possible, it is helpful to at least provide a little creative direction from your own imagination. Of course, the designer will be creating something new and unique, but some ideas rom you will help them get on the right track to your vision. Provide design elements that you already have in mind such as colors, fonts, or other previous designs or websites. It is also important to point out if there is an existing brand that you need to match that may already have a color scheme, font, logo or other element that needs to be incorporated into your new design.

7. Should you request your own copyright?
Unless otherwise specified in a contract, the graphic designer retains the right to his or her creations, and will most often attempt to do so. When hiring a designer, you would need to specify if you plan to request the specific rights to own the newly designed logo. Copyright laws protect against additional use other than for the original business or product that the logo was designed for without proper compensation or agreement.

About The Author-- Sheryl A. Skutelsky is owner of SAS Graphic Design, specializing in small business branding on Long Island and in the New York area. For more information please visit: www.sasgraphicdesign.com.

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