Ten tips are provided for effectively managing creative services. The tips include securing logo files in all required formats, hiring an in-house designer with both creative and organizational skills, choosing a design solution appropriately sized for your business, invoicing third party costs directly, establishing a system to store and back up brand assets, requiring working files from freelancers, leveraging Microsoft Office for updates, providing clear briefs, engaging global design solutions, and establishing and periodically updating brand guidelines.

1. TEN TIPS
CREATIVE SERVICES
FUNCTION
m a r k e t e x p e r t i s e . c o m . a u
f o r a n e f f e c t i v e

2. #1 LOGOS
Secure your logo in all required formats - colour
and mono; on a choice of backgrounds (black,
white, transparent); in file formats that are
suitable for print (pdf, eps, tiff) and digital (png,
jpeg); and in executions which are appropriate
for landscape and portrait-shaped spaces of
varying sizes.

3. WHEREAS ONCE IT WAS TABOO TO
DECONSTRUCT A LOGO, NOW
IT'S COMMON FOR BRANDS TO LET
THEIR BADGE OR MARQUE STAND-
ALONE - ESPECIALLY IF SPACE IS
LIMITED.

4. #2 DESIGN & MANAGE
If you can justify employing an in-house
designer, and that person will be the only
designer on staff, recruit someone who has the
necessary organisational skills, not just the
creative nous. Your designer needs to be able to
take briefs directly, juggle competing projects
and priorities, and manage the production
process (quality control).

5. MANY DESIGNERS FAIL AT THE NON-
DESIGN ASPECTS OF THE ROLE.

6. #3 SIZE MATTERS
If you’re outsourcing your design work, be
careful to choose a solution that’s a good fit for
your business. Working with a design agency is
two or even three times the cost of engaging a
freelancer. While for some businesses, it will be
worth paying for those added layers of
management and supervision; for many, it’s
unjustifiable.

7. #4 THIRD PARTY COSTS
We believe third party costs should be invoiced
directly and passed on at cost. If your agency
adds a commission to third party costs, ensure
it's transparent. Require third party invoices to
be attached to the agency invoice and request
multiple quotes for big ticket items.

8. #5 LOCATION,
LOCATION, LOCATION!
Put a system in place so your brand assets are
identifiable, accessible and backed up. It’s a fact
of life that people move on. You don’t want your
business being disrupted every time they do.

9. #6 WORKING FILES
If you use a pool of freelance designers, have a
file sharing system in place, and be rigorous
about receiving the working files at the
completion of every project. Otherwise, you’ll
lose track of where things are, or be
inconvenienced when one of your 'pool' is absent
or unavailable. Of course, this assumes you’ve
also addressed the issues of copyright and
intellectual property ownership in your
contracts.

10. #7 WORD, PERFECT
We have the utmost respect for design and
designers but we’ve also come to appreciate how
much can be achieved using Microsoft Office.
The real value of working in those products is
you don’t need to engage a designer whenever
you need to update the piece. Unfortunately,
graphic designers tend not to be trained in
Microsoft products, or they’re purists who
simply refuse to work with them.

11. ONE OF THE BEST RECRUITS WE EVER MADE
WAS A WOMAN WHO THOUGHT OF HERSELF
AS A 'WORD PROCESSING OPERATOR'. SHE
COULD TAKE VIRTUALLY ANY INDESIGN
LAYOUT AND RECREATE IT IN WORD.

12. #8 CLEAR DIRECTION
To extract the best creative from your design
agency or freelancer, provide high quality briefs.
Briefs which are ambiguous, contradictory,
poorly structured and incomplete will create
animosity and result in inferior outcomes. Put a
brief protocol in place – one that’s been
developed jointly – and then mandate its use.

13. We do commerce in a world largely without
borders and that means you can procure from
anywhere on the planet. Engage the best design
solution for your situation, be it a
geographically-proximate solution or a virtual
one. Sites like 99designs, Freelancer and Canva
have change the way we access design and
designers.
#9 GLOBAL MARKETPLACE

14. Finally, if you are to invest in one thing this
year, let it be your brand guidelines. These
guidelines are the single source of truth which
your internal staff and external providers will
defer to and rely on to ensure the consistency of
your brand in years to come.
#10 WALK THE GUIDE LINE

15. REMEMBER, BRAND GUIDELINES SHOULD BE
PERIODICALLY REVIEWED AND UPDATED IN
RESPONSE TO NEW MEDIA, NEW
TECHNOLOGY, AND THE EVOLUTION
OF YOUR BRAND.

16. Jacqueline Burns
Managing Director
Market Expertise
info@marketexpertise.com.au
+61 414 287 206
MarketExpertise
Market-Expertise