Learn how to run your design business, work with clients, manage expectations, and handle your finances.
Running a website is can be a seemingly pointless and unfulfilling venture if you don’t take the proper steps to ensure advancement.
Today we’ll take a brutally honest look at how you should measure success and develop goals that actually lead to productivity.
You may have notice that this week’s theme at Design Shack has been talents to add to your skill set as a designer. First we looked at copywriting, then marketing, and today we’ll examine blog writing.
Blogging has come a long way in recent years. The practice has transformed from a questionably productive hobby into a popular and lucrative profession. The design blog industry is one of the fastest growing niches in the blogging world and here we bring you five convincing reasons to join the fun and begin writing your own design-related articles and tutorials.
In our last article, we looked at why designers can’t ignore copywriting, today we examine why marketing is the same way.
We’ll discuss why you should continue to better yourself by increasing your talents and how you as a designer should respond to the increasing need of online marketing for small business owners.
Designers often neglect to focus on both well-written copy and structuring a design so that it highlights the copy on the page. Today we’ll discuss why copywriting is so important, who needs to learn it, and how to create content-centric designs.
Working for other people can be a horrible way to spend your life.
Even if you’re doing something that you love, doing it 40+ hours per week for other people has a tendency to ruin the appeal.
One way to ease this problem is to create and maintain personal side projects. Below we’ll discuss why this proves true.
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!