Learn how to run your design business, work with clients, manage expectations, and handle your finances.
As a designer, you’ve probably used stock art quite a few times and can therefore attest to its usefulness. But have you ever considered jumping from the consumer side to the supplier side?
Today we’ll briefly go over everything you need to know to start making real money as a stock provider.
I’m sure the title of this article made more than a few readers scoff at the legitimacy of exploring such a topic, but the reality is being confined to a desk all day can take a serious toll on your health. When being a dedicated designer begins to directly affect your likely lifespan, it’s time to pay attention and make some changes.
This article will explore a few steps you can take to becoming healthier despite sitting on your can all day.
Today we’ll take a brief but personal look at over 20 designers and freelancers that have made an impact in the online design community through books, blogs, tweets and various other means. Some are huge names, ubiquitous in the design community, while others are just getting their start.
Most of the profiles below feature a quick bio and some links to find out more about the designer. I’ve also included a few expanded profiles for some of the better known individuals.
One of the amazing things about being a freelance designer is the freedom to choose who you are willing to work with. Unlike the nine to five crowd, we freelancers don’t always have bosses or coworkers that we are simply stuck with. If we don’t like working with someone, we fire them and move on.
Though this process sounds dandy in theory, the reality is much more complicated. Like anyone else, we have mortgages, utility bills and an annoyingly expensive need to eat just about every day. If you’ve got a client you can’t stand, run through the questions below to you help decide whether or not you can ditch them successfully (and whether you should).
If you’ve never been to a big design conference, you’re missing out. Aside from being a blast, they’re a great way to boost you out of professional stagnation or a design rut. Below we’ll take a look at seven reasons you should attend the occasional design conference. Along the way I’ll post a few images and links for upcoming conferences that you might find interesting.
As a freelancer, your role can often be that of a customer service professional as much as a designer. If you want to keep clients coming back for more, you must create a competitive advantage for yourself through building strong client relationships.
Below you’ll find ten ways to help you make your clients think of you as their absolute best option for design work.
Protecting your intellectual property has always been a difficult task and the Internet has only served to complicate matters. The web has become an unoriginal designer’s one stop shop for endless material to shamelessly ripoff. Today we’ll take a look into some of the reasons design theft is so rampant online and explore some answers to the essential question of what to do if someone steals your design. A big thanks to Von Glitschka for providing much of the content and advice seen below!
Due to the success stories of mega blogs like Smashing Magazine, the professional blogging world has really exploded in recent years. There is a thriving network of free content online spanning nearly every hobby or profession you can imagine. Driving virtually all of these sites (or at least those focused on profitability) is one thing: ad revenue. Consistent and rewarding ad revenue is the holy grail among the blogging world.
Knowing when and how to integrate ads into your site can be quite difficult. Today we’ll look at some tips to help you know if the time is right for you to jump into the world of advertising and what your options are for doing so.
Brainstorming can either be a creative gold mine or a time wasting disaster.
Brainstorming is often discussed in relation to a business environment. In college, nearly every one of my business school textbooks had an entire chapter dedicated to the concept. Though creative brainstorming is in many ways a different beast due to its visual nature, many of the same concepts apply.
Today we’ll take a look at ten tips to consider before you pull your creative team into a brainstorming session. When applied properly, they can drastically increase productivity and quality of results.
Recently we discussed how to find work as a designer, today we’re going to discuss what to do if that search is a little too successful.
Boring paperwork is one of the necessary evils of being a freelance designer.
There’s simply no way around it, if you want to track and manage payments from clients, you’re going to have to setup an invoicing system. It’s not all bad news though; the fun part is that you actually get to design a custom invoice.
Today we’ll walk through designing an invoice from scratch. I’ll be as in-depth as possible and include everything you need to know from the absolute basics to advanced features and even a little design theory.
So you want to be a freelancer, now what?
Despite the glamorous reputation, freelance design is no walk in the park. It takes an incredible work ethic, significant entrepreneurial prowess, and a little bit of insanity to pull it off effectively. This article will discuss how to effectively make a living as a freelancer (designer or otherwise). Since we are in fact a design blog, I’ll scatter in some well-designed freelancer sites along the way for inspiration.