Why is working with a graphic designer so much like the fiery pits of hell?
You know what would suck?
Buying a new car, driving it around for a year, then taking it in for service to find out the company no longer existed. Then, to take it to a different repair shop and have the mechanic tell you that you need a part replaced which is only made by the original manufacturer. So he’ll make you a new part that will work fine, but now it’s going to cost four times what it would have if the original manufacturer was still in business.
You might shake your fist at the entire auto industry. You might push your car off of a cliff and buy a bicycle. I wouldn’t judge you for that (unless I was in the car, of course).
This is exactly the kind of hell it can be for a small business owner when they have graphics created.
Let’s say Liz, the owner of a hair salon, starts up her biz and goes looking to get a logo and some business cards made. She’s not rolling in cash (yet), so naturally she tries to find the cheapest designer possible. She’s also busy as hell trying to get permits for a build-out, obtain city licenses, file with the IRS, and network like mad to make sure there’s some hair coming in the doors when they finally open up.
So when Liz finds some dude online who has a halfway decent web site, an e-mail address, and will do it for cheap to “build his portfolio” she sets him to work on her designs. He’ll even upload the logo to VistaPrint so she can get 500 business cards for almost nothing. Groovy. Back to supervising the salon build-out.
When her business cards arrive, they look pretty good. Whew. One less thing to handle, except… her landlord asks her about the sign above her shop. He suggests a sign company that did the other tenants’ signs. Oops, Liz completely forgot about her sign. Thank you, Mr. Landlord.
She goes to the sign shop and they ask if she has a logo. Liz whips out one of her fresh biz cards. The sign dude asks the $10,000,00 question:
“Do you have the original file or camera-ready art for this?”
“Huh?”
The sign dude explains that he can’t blow up a scan of the business card because it will be pixelated (a technical term meaning “all crappy”).
Right here is where I could launch into an explanation of raster files, pixelation, dots per inch, vector graphics, blah, blah blah. I’m not going to do that. Read on and find out why.
So Liz tries to contact the designer to get his files. It takes a week because he had to take a full time job and couldn’t answer his e-mail at work. Then he couldn’t find her files because he loaned his computer to his sister and her baby spilled juice on the keyboard just before an elephant feel through the ceiling, crushing the hard drive which was on fire at the time because his brother-in-law was grilling inside their apartment because they can’t do it on the balcony anymore on account of the treadmill and the boxes from when they moved after the bankruptcy. Wait, what did you want again? Who is this?
So Liz has no files.
Thankfully, the sign dude can recreate her logo. Yay!
Unfortunately, that will take 3 hours and cost Liz more than the original logo design and cards put together. Damn.
In the end, Liz gets an awesome sign for her shop and the sign dude even gave her a CD with her recreated logo files on it. Yay, and lesson learned the hard way.
Why I’m not going to explain pixelation
There’s a lorry load of information on the internet and in bookstores about the particulars of raster graphics, resolution, vector files, etc. You could spend hours learning the ins and outs of creating the appropriate file types for various graphic applications and production methods to make sure your graphics are done correctly.
You. don’t. need. it.
What you do need is to know how to hire someone who stores that handy information in their own noggin instead of yours. You should be thinking about how to bring in customers, not how to design a logo.
You need to know how to hire a graphics person who can run with your concept and deliver a holistic solution particular to you and your business. Graphics are easy to come by – just look at istockphoto.com and you’ll see what I mean. If you don’t need something custom, that’s your best option right there.
Sure, okay. So how do I know who I’m supposed to hire? You mean, you, right?
I’m the first person to tell you that we may not be the right fit for each other. Maybe we are and that would be awesome, but I refer business elsewhere when I find I’m not the best person for the job. For example, I don’t do this. I like it, but it ain’t my thing to create. I know somebody who does and I’ll get you two together.
However, no matter what style you think you want, there are some guidelines that will help you find the right person. It takes a little longer than a quick post on elance.com, but the results will be much better. You’re investing in your business or your Very Important Project. This might take more than five minutes, okay?
Here are some questions to ask yourself when you’re ready to hire a designer, graphic artist, or illustrator for your thing:
When I look at their portfolio, do I already see stuff I like?
This one is easy. If you look at someone’s graphics and you think to yourself, “Hmm, maybe they’ll do mine better,” you’re already in trouble. Move along, nothing to see here. You don’t have to know about color theory, proper balance, blah blah blah. Do you like it? Really, really like it? Do you still like it even if some hot shot I-know-everything-about-everything-because-I-read-a-color-theory-book-I-found-on-the-toilet-once says, “They don’t use the correct formula of warm tones to cold tones…” Easy question: do you like it? Even better: do you love it? Is it cool? Is it awesome?
If not, move on. Don’t kid yourself.
Does this person ask me questions until my ears bleed?
When you tell an artist about your project, you should get annoyed (but in a good way). You should feel some pressure to answer a bazillion questions about what you’re doing. The person that’s asking those questions isn’t asking because they’re stupid, they’re asking because they’re smart. Smart designers ask questions about stuff like your branding, output, future use of the work, color of your web site background, and even seemingly odd questions like the one I recently asked a client: “Should your… image be a Green Day guitar thrasher or a Thievery Corporation instrumental?”
When the graphics person is asking questions, it means they’re preparing to give you a lot of value for your money.
Do I feel like I can’t afford this person?
I mean before you even get a bid. After looking at the work and talking with the artist, do you feel like this might be expensive? Good!
Maybe it won’t be, but how do you feel when you’re thinking well at least it’s gonna be cheap? I’m not going to lay some trip on you about how quality craftsmanship is an investment in your business, blah blah. It totally is, but I’m not going to guilt you into believing that line just ’cause I wrote it. You get what you pay for, simple as that.
Is this person here to stay?
How do you tell? Well, you can ask. If you ask an artist stuff like how long they’ve been in business and how long they plan to be in business and they get all snarky, grumbly and defensive at you, move on. Assuming you asked in a polite, respectful way, that is. You get back what you give, of course.
Professionals who are happy to tell you about their business are going to be around for a while. Bet on it. And even if the unthinkable happens and they have to close up shop for a while, they’ll likely have your files backed up somewhere in case you call one day and need to get them. They’ll probably even remember who you are.
Is this person an expert?
This one is hard to tell, because people can fake knowledge to a certain degree. So even if you don’t know the first thing about whether your graphic should be created in RGB or CMYK, you can still tell the difference between designers.
Again, an expert is going to ask you lots of questions. A non-expert will avoid asking questions because they don’t know what to do with your answers anyway. Likely, they don’t care what happens once they cash your check.
An expert says stuff like, “So you need a graphic for your water bottles? Okay, what method will the manufacturer use to print the bottles? And can I get a sample of the bottle or talk to your manufacturer to make sure everything lines up right?”
A non-expert says stuff like, “Oh, it doesn’t matter. I’ll just give you a file and they can figure it out.”
An expert wants to save you money in the long term, even after she’s done with her end of things. It’s about those annoying question thingies again.
The Most Important Thing
Work with someone you like. If you don’t like someone on a personal level, it will be really hard to care if they’re an expert or make awesome graphics. The experience will suck and you’ll look at that otherwise beautiful graphic forever and think, “What a —-.”
You don’t have to share a toothbrush with your designer, but at least have a comfortable business relationship. If you feel like you’re being pushed around because you don’t know a raster from a vector, go somewhere else. A good designer will help you make informed decisions and not judge you for lacking a doctorate in color theory.
So return that Graphics for Dummies book to the library. You don’t need it. Spend time on your business, not agonizing over dots per inch and symmetry. Just hire the right designer and go back to what you do best.* That’s why you got into business, right?
Sparky Feedpants
