Whilst going through my RSS reader, I came across this amazing achievement of tech and photography via Photography Blog. An amazing 70 Gigapixel 360° panoramic photograph of Budapest.

The photograph was taken from a 100-year-old observation tower built on the highest point of Budapest, the stitched panorama is over 590,000 pixels wide by nearly 121,000 pixels tall. The young Hungarian photographers used two Sony A900 bodies – each outfitted with a Minolta AF 400mm f/4.5 APO G lens and 1.4x teleconverter – on a sturdy tripod complete with a custom-designed robotic head. The image capturing stage of the project took over three hours to finish. The source images were then stitched with Autopano Giga software  and this process took two full days and resulted in a 200GB file!!

Click the image below to see the panorama on their website ( you will need microsoft Silverlight installed)

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• November 8, 2009 -- 20 Wonderful Photos of London Attractions (11)
• November 3, 2009 -- Amazing Panorama’s – Will Pearson (0)
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Hi all, I thought I would post up 14 blogs that have sat in my subscribe list on Google reader since the dawn of the time. Why do i think these blogs are so special? They actually provoke thought.

I am not a huge fan of sites that post lists / ‘best ofs’ 4 times a week, not a negative nor a criticism, its just not what I want waiting for me in my rss reader. The following blogs for the most part consistently strive to post articles that encourage: community, thought, continuing development, resources, laughter and advice. You might wait 4 days – 10 between posts but when they come – its worth-it.

In no particular order.

Aisle One

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AisleOne is an inspirational resource focused on graphic design, typography, grid systems, minimalism and modernism.

Boag World

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Boagworld is the blog of web strategist Paul Boag who lives in the heart of rural Dorset (hence the cows). He produces a weekly podcast with UX consultant Marcus Lillington on building and running websites.

Design Informer

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Design Informer is a web design and graphic design blog. We feature freelance articles, tutorials, freebies, resources, and inspiration posts.

Freelance Switch

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Our blog covers a vast array of topics about life as a freelancer, from Tax Tips for Freelancers to Determining Your Hourly Rate, Transitioning from Fulltime work to Freelancing to Where to Find Freelance Work and much more. If you’re new to the blog, a great place to begin is our Explore FreelanceSwitch page which has lots of jump points to get you into the material.

The Design Cubicle

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I’m Brian Hoff, a graphic designer from the always-sunny Philadelphia. I collaborate mostly on web design and brand identity, but I’m experienced in building all kinds of quality, strategic design, both on the web and in print.

The Future Buzz

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The Future Buzz is a blog about web marketing/PR strategies, spreading buzz in the blogosphere and building long-term visibility for your brand, business, and art on the web. Bloggers, marketers, freelance writers, entrepreneurs, artists, small business owners and public relations professionals will all benefit from the content here.

The Die Line

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The Dieline is dedicated to the progress of the package design industry and its practitioners, students and enthusiasts. Its purpose is to define and promote the world’s best packaging design, and provide a place where the package design community can review, critique and stay informed of the latest industry trends and design projects being created in the field.

Six Revisions

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Six Revisions is a website that publishes practical and useful articles for designers and web developers. We seek to present exceptional, noteworthy tips, tutorials, and resources that the modern web professional will appreciate.

FormFiftyFive

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Founded in 2005 by an ever growing group of young designers and vagabonds eager to collect and share the best design work they came across, FormFiftyFive soon became an international showcase of creative work.

Pro Blogger

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I started it in September 2004 mainly because I wanted to keep a record of what I was learning about blogging for money. Since then I’ve added well over 3500 articles, tips, tutorials and case studies to my archives here.

Seth Godin

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Seth Godin has written twelve books that have been translated into more than thirty languages. Every one has been a bestseller. He writes about the post-industrial revolution, the way ideas spread, marketing, quitting, leadership and most of all, changing everything.

Noisy Decent Graphics

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First and foremost it’s a blog about graphic design and the life of a graphic designer. Sometimes the blog creeps into design in general and then some related stuff about communication, ideas and inevitably brands.

Freelance Folder

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FreelanceFolder is a community for freelancers, entrepreneurs, work-at-home business owners, and web-workers. We strive to bring you the articles, information, and community you need to succeed.

Related Posts:

• July 27, 2010 -- 70 GigaPixel Photo of Budapest (0)
• July 25, 2010 -- Maintaining Business Standards As A Freelancer (0)
• June 14, 2010 -- 25 Amazing Photos of World Skylines (2)
• May 11, 2010 -- How to Avoid Over Working Yourself As A Freelancer (4)
• January 6, 2010 -- A Monitor for Every Budget – What Monitor for Photography and Design? (5)
• January 4, 2010 -- Referrals – Freelancing Dreams (3)

Freelancing is very different to the majority of other businesses due to its innately personal involvement and attachment to every aspect of the business. Maintaining objectivity and a decisive decision process can be hard as your personal feelings begin to creep into the equation.

As freelancer’s its hard to remain objective. How do you maintain business standards?

Being a freelancer, you have to work hard at not letting your personal feelings and preferences cloud your judgement.  Even the worst type of client can be right, well.. they ARE right if you want to keep them as a client in the long-term. As a freelancer, you have to learn, when the time is right, to put feelings aside and just do what a client wants and what your business needs. Furthermore, this applies to not doing work that does not pay the fee it right deserves, no matter how much you want to be a nice person or help out a friend for free.

As a freelancer, you also cannot forget about the administrative aspects of your business. It can be somewhat difficult to move away in the same day from your preferred creative persona to the clerk and accountant. However, putting off doing your book keeping, your marketing and not accurately tracking your prospects and projects can lead to a whole host of problems such as running out of work! ; forgetting to bill; under billing; late tax returns etc etc

Finally, remember to never take any client for granted, as soon as you do, the relationship you have created begins to erode and all the wonderful little things like repeat business and referrals are lost.Everybody wants to be appreciated and feel like they are top priority. Thus, always return emails and calls as promptly as possible.

The longer we freelance, the easier it is to fall into potentially destructive personal habits! Why get dressed in the morning? Why go after new clients when you are so busy? Why be polite and not dismissive to cheap clients?  The longer we go the more vigilant we need to be to maintain our vigor, professionalism and personal customer service that is a huge part of any freelancer’s success!

Related Posts:

• November 19, 2009 -- Should You Find a Niche To Stand Out From The Pack? (3)
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• December 1, 2009 -- General Rules For Doing Free Freelance Work (5)
• November 28, 2009 -- Interview With Will Kay of OddKingdom – Becoming Your Brand (5)
• November 25, 2009 -- Factors To Consider When Pricing For A Project (6)
• November 18, 2009 -- Long Term Freelancing Success – Part 1 – Dedication (8)

Quote Robot is an app that I came across recently that seemingly streamlined the tedious task of writing proposals for lots of freelance designer’s out there. Intrigued, I signed up and have been giving the free trial a run for its uhh… money.

Essentially Quote Robot exists to:

Well, we’ve always found writing proposals to be a chore.  I (Shawn) spent a lot of time creating a good proposal template in Illustrator, and it really worked, so I gave it away on my blog. I had no idea it would become the most popular article on my blog. I talked to Jon about writing an app to create the proposals, using my template, and we both thought it would help us out, so we did it. The longest part of quoting for me were always, a) coming up with the numbers (what to charge), and b) building the proposal in Illustrator. We decided to focus on trimming the time to accomplish those things. !

I have decided to split this into four sections: Interface, Making A Proposal, Output and Pricing

The interface
Quote Robot is a very cool, slick web application and it follows all the design trends one would expect from a web 2.0 application. More than just superficially looking the part, things are easy to find and the usability of the site as a whole is intuitive and for the most part simple stupid. These are good things, considering the application’s entire purpose is to streamline and decrease the time writing proposal’s takes. The application guides you through making the proposal fairly quickly and efficiently. There are a few superfluous drag and drop features which don’t seem to really make anything faster, but hey they look nice right.

Making A Proposal
The options it presents are the core of any proposal: client / company information, the scope, budgeting and timescale and quote summary. Each field gets to the core of the information that needs to be handed to a client. Their claim of it being a quick and easy process is definitely true, minimising clicking into new text boxes, formatting titles and all the tiny little tasks that eat up time in InDesign / Illustrator are done away with. I was done filling out the various bits of information for the proposal in less than 10mins.

Output
The template generated is a neat and tidy PDF that looks clean and modern. You can upload your own logo, so it is completely white labelled and looks like a PDF you have made the long and hard way in another desktop program. You can download the PDF so that you can attach it to an email or alternatively send it straight away to the client from the application itself.

Pricing
The easiest way to review the pricing is $24 a month and this gets you ‘unlimited’ everything that Quote Robot offers. Simply analysed, the SMALLEST job of lets say one billable hour – is more than the $24 charge. If you use the application to send one proposal a month, your fee is covered and the time you save can be used to do other projects or just sit back and have a coffee.

At Acuity, it’s something we will definitely be making use of!

Related Posts:

• July 25, 2010 -- Maintaining Business Standards As A Freelancer (0)
• February 21, 2010 -- Don’t be another washed up freelancer – The Freelance Lifecycle (1)
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• December 7, 2009 -- What Should You Include In A Design Project Proposal? (5)
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A great gem for you today; we managed to catch up with Jamie Billingham, a 14 year old young and aspiring Web Designer. We managed to catch up with him and ask him about his interests, challenges and opinions about Web Design!

Hi Jamie thanks for taking the time to talk to us. For those who have not come across you before, can you tell us a little about yourself, what it is you do and your work?

I’m a dude in year ten at a high school in Warrington (UK). I like computers, socialising and music (I’m a bit of a Clubland fan). I’ve been doing programming and website design for around seven years. I can now code adeptly in over thirty different languages and frameworks which I have been collating for a while now.

I currently do quite a bit of freelance website design, as well as a few games and other projects which I develop. At the moment, I’m working on a corporate identity and website for a cosmetics company (which is how I ended up writing this, after saying thanks for you freelance contracts); I’ve got a small game in development and will soon start planning a massively multiplayer online game with my budding team of graphic designers, 3D modellers and story developers.

Just last month, I did my work experience, as did everyone in my year. I was given the opportunity of working at Code Computerlove in Manchester and I have to say that it was absolutely incredible, just such an amazing atmosphere to work in.

“I am sure Moonpig.com nicked my idea!! ”

What made you decide on / become interested in Web Design?

From a very early age, I was fascinated with making computers do stuff. One of my very first projects was a very simple program to monitor time spent on the computer in order to allow parents to limit their child’s computer usage.

I soon found myself drifting into web design (because I could show off to everyone else). This took the form of my first website, J-Cards, a service that would let you choose a design, write a message, etc… and then have it printed. It was strangely similar to the services offered by websites such as MoonPig.com, I’m sure they nicked my idea.

Where would you say your inspiration comes from?

My Dad. He was a developer at a few companies before he started doing project management, so he knew all the ins and outs of how to do it all. Throughout my childhood, my Dad has tirelessly explained code to me, over and over again; for instance, I continually questioned why I can’t just click the dropdown and change a “<P>” to an “<A>”. But, finally, it seems to have stuck!

As is the case with a lot of geeks that grew up with Windows, I originally aspired to become Bill Gates. However, more recently, my opinion of Microsoft and the like has degraded quite a bit; I have started to become a Mac fanboy; and *shock horror* now code in PHP. I am now far more into the “open” sort of stuff, such as Linux, Apache, Java, etc… whereas before I was 100% Windows, IIS, ASP.Net, etc…

Are you self-taught? Do you plan on doing any courses in Web Design and Development?

To begin with, my Dad was the driving force for the development of my skills with website design, programming, etc… More recently however, I have found myself seemingly absorbing many frameworks and languages (currently, my favourite is jQuery!) and instead of receiving help from my Dad, I now find that I am helping him and introducing him to new stuff; I still haven’t managed to get him onto C# though!

My current plan is to do computing and graphic design at college, hopefully work at Code for a year, and then perhaps do a degree. I’m not quite sure at the moment, so I’d welcome any advice/tips!

With the many different styles of website a designer can create, what type of websites impress you and do you have a personal preference on design style?

Personally, I love designs that are clean, simple and minimalistic; however, I am also a big fan of abstract patterns and colours, as well as a bit of grunge where appropriate. For my own websites, I like to keep things very simple and clear, whilst still being colourful, with some grungy textures.

Some of my favourite website designs:-

As a 14 year old, you must face many challenges trying to run a business and get clients, what are they and how are you going about dealing with them?

That is definitely the case. Many people that have expressed an interest in my services have been quite wary due to my age. I find that the best way to combat those issues is to try to be confident and as professional as possible, whilst still being yourself. Also, saying web stuff like “exposure”, “web 2.0” and “social media” seems to earn lots of brownie points!

With my latest client, I had a few tips and some help with how to communicate with her from some Steve and Ian at Code, which I have summarized here, plus a few top tips of my own. I’d recommend to any person around my age that they consider these:-

Be yourself, at all times. There is nothing worse than feeling uncomfortable when doing a sales pitch.

Absolutely, do not under-price yourself. £100 for a day of your work isn’t actually that much to a company.

Don’t be afraid to speak your mind and offer your opinions. If your client doesn’t like it, then you’re only going to have issues with making them understand how websites work and they’re probably not the person for you.

Once again, thank you very much for the interview. Where can those interested in you and your work find you online?

My portfolio can be found at www.jamiebillingham.co.uk. I’m thinking about starting a blog to go with it, so perhaps you’ll see that on there sometime soon.

If I may, I have a few shoutouts along with their web addresses for people that have helped me achieve all this stuff:-
My Dad, Nigel Billingham
Jono Brain
Code Computerlove

Related Posts:

• March 16, 2010 -- Interview with Glennray Tutor – PhotoRealism Painter (5)
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The shapes of the buildings that cut into the sky define a large part of a city’s character and culture. Some cities compete for bigger and taller towers to represent their financial and political power; others strive to preserve elegant and historic skylines against over-development. This post collects 25 examples of beautiful cityscape photography from around the world, visual records of human endeavour and urban achievement.

1. Hong Kong, China

Image: Trodel

This dramatic panorama captures Hong Kong as seen from Victoria Peak, which rises dramatically above the city and its harbour. The photographer achieves an astonishing level of clarity, offering a sense of the millions of lights that illuminate the bustling centre of commerce.

2. Frankfurt, Germany

Image: Mispahn

This image shows the gleaming glass and steel of Frankfurt’s modern city centre, the largest financial centre in continental Europe. The city sits on a bend of the River Main, in southwestern Germany.

3. Chicago, USA

Image: a4gpa

The lights of the ‘Windy City’ glow above the shore of Lake Michigan. Chicago is recognised as another of the World’s great financial centres, and is the United State’s third most populous city.

4. Paris, France

Image: Trodel

This gorgeous evening shot takes in Paris at dusk, as seen from the heights of the Maine-Montparnasse Tower. The majestic Eiffel Tower stands above the Champs de Mars and Ecole Militaire; to the right is the dome of Les Invalides, above which the golden shape of the Arc de Triomphe can be seen in the distance.

5. Shanghai, China

Image: Emile Bremmer

Early morning in the Chinese city of Shanghai, with the sun coming up behind the skyline of the ultra-modern Pudong district. The area sits on the edge of the Huangpu River, with landmark buildings including the 468-metre Oriental Pearl Tower, seen on the left of the picture.

6. Tokyo, Japan

Image: Ratamahatta

A nighttime view of Tokyo’s west end, with the Japanese capital’s colourful lights illuminating the overcast clouds; on a clear day the mighty Mount Fuji rises above the cityscape.

7. Lima, Peru

Image: David Baggins

The Miraflores District of Peru’s capital, Lima, has high-rise buildings dramatically perched on the rocky cliffs above the beaches and year-round surf of the Costa Verde.

8. Florence, Italy

Image:

This photo shows a snowy winter morning in the Tuscan city of Florence. A centre of Renaissance culture, the city’s skyline features several important and iconic pieces of architecture. From let to right we see the Ponte Vecchio crossing the River Arno; the tower of the Palazzo Vecchio, Florence’s town hall; the red brick dome of Florence Cathedral; and finally to the right is the façade of the Basilica of the Holy Cross.

9. New York, USA

Image: Hyunlab

This atmospherically misty shot of New York’s skyline captures the elegant Art Deco silhouette of the Empire State Building.

10. Taipei City, Taiwan

Image: Orange Tuesday

Elephant Mountain is a forested hill that affords breathtaking views over Taipei City in Taiwan. Here we see the city illuminated at night, with the enormous Taipei 101 landmark skyscraper towering over the financial district. The 509-metre tall tower has advanced protection against typhoons and earthquakes, and a postmodern design incorporating traditional pagoda stylings.

11. Seattle, USA

Image: Bala

This image shows Seattle’s skyline by night, with the iconic Space Needle in the foreground. The tower was completed for the 1962 World’s Fair, and was originally designed around an outlandish flying saucer concept.

12. Moscow, Russia

Image: AlphaTangoBravo Adam

Moscow’s skyline reflects the Russian capital’s varied history, with the contrasting architecture of churches and monasteries from the times of the Tsars, grey Soviet-era edifices and tower blocks, and modern skyscrapers reflecting the new capitalist ambitions in the financial areas.

13. London, UK

Image: Harshil Shah

This picture shows London in bathed in evening sunlight, taken from Tower 42 in the City, looking east beyond the landmark Gherkin, downriver towards the Isle of Dogs and Canary Wharf.

14. Toronto, Canada

Image: Choudhry Saab

This is a view of Toronto’s skyline along the edge of the city’s natural harbour, as seen from Wards Island. High above the other buildings is the CN Tower, which at 553 metres is the tallest structure in the Western Hemisphere, a symbol of both Toronto and of Canada.

15. São Paulo, Brazil

Image:

This beautiful shot has a tranquil atmosphere with soft light, but that impression is at odds with the reality of São Paulo, a massive bustling metropolis, the largest city in Latin America on Brazil’s southern coast.

16. Sydney, Australia

Image: Dillif

This photo shows Sydney Harbour and skyline at dusk, with lights picking out the distinctive shape of the Opera House to the left.

17. Istanbul, Turkey

Image: Erin Can Spell

This view takes in Istanbul’s confusion of red rooftops, mosques and minarets, looking across the Bosphorus Strait, which both divides the city in two and forms part of the boundary between Europe and Asia.

18. Singapore, Republic of Singapore

Image: Yeowatzup

Singapore skyline’s futuristic skyscrapers tower above the Boat Quay district in the city’s Old Port.

19. Prague, Czech Republic

Image: Jlantzy

This vista, photographed from the Charles Bridge on the Vltava River, takes in Prague Castle at night. The castle building was started in the 9th Century, and has undergone so many additions, renovations and restorations that it now represents almost every European architectural style of the last 1000 years.

20. Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Image: Garry Loke

The lights of Kuala Lumpur’s staggering skyscrapers blaze above the Malaysian capital, with the massive Petronas Twin Towers to the right and the pinnacle of the KL Tower to the left.

21. Melbourne, Australia

Image: Wikipedia

This spectacular panorama captures Melbourne’s Central Business District, with an impressive collection of skyscrapers sitting along the banks of the Yarra River. The picture was taken from the observation deck of the Rialto Towers.

22. Thane, Mumbai, India

Image: Premshree Pillai

This nighttime skyline is in Thane, a district of Mumbai at the head of the Thane Creek. Here we see a collection of high-rise apartment blocks with stylised architecture, examples of Mumbai’s remarkable urban growth in recent years.

23. Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Image: Lima Andruska

Rio de Janeiro’s skyline is defined as much by the surrounding mountains as the city’s buildings, as we see in this view of Botafogo and Flamengo beaches. High above the waterfront, the statue of Christ the Redeemer stands illuminated at the peak of Corcovado Mountain.

24. Dubai, UAE

Image: Attawayjl

Dubai has become synonymous with innovative and unusual building projects such as manmade islands and vast hotel and sports complexes. This shot shows the city’s science-fiction-style skyline; the photographer likened the image to a scene from Battlestar Galactica.

25. Seoul, South Korea

Image: Sakoku

South Korea’s capital city Seoul is a huge conurbation, home to 10 million people. The city sits huddled between eight mountains on the bank of the Han River and the river’s wider plains. This photograph shows the Gangnam-gu District, an area with offices, shopping complexes and the six buildings of the World Trade Center Seoul.

Tom is a freelance writer and designer working for Cartridge Save, an online supplier of ink cartridges based in Manchester.

Related Posts:

• July 27, 2010 -- 70 GigaPixel Photo of Budapest (0)
• November 8, 2009 -- 20 Wonderful Photos of London Attractions (11)
• November 3, 2009 -- Amazing Panorama’s – Will Pearson (0)
• July 26, 2010 -- 14 Great Design, Marketing and Freelancing Blogs (2)
• January 6, 2010 -- A Monitor for Every Budget – What Monitor for Photography and Design? (5)
• November 30, 2009 -- Turn A Boring Photo Into An Emotive Portrait – Photoshop Tutorial – with video (10)

Hi all, thought I would share a list of resources which help me along my way. From business to the theory of branding, there is a lot contained within these great resources by their respective authors. Take the time to have a good read through them and if you find the list useful make sure to share it on.

Related Posts:

• December 7, 2009 -- What Should You Include In A Design Project Proposal? (5)
• November 22, 2009 -- 5 Essential Books For Running A Successful Freelance Design Business (23)
• November 13, 2009 -- QuickGamma – Calibrate Your Monitor Free (0)
• November 11, 2009 -- 10 Ways To Score and Evaluate A Client (6)
• November 9, 2009 -- How To Deal with Non-Paying Clients (29)
• November 8, 2009 -- 20 Wonderful Photos of London Attractions (11)

The other day we blogged about the amazing things we liked about Adobe Photoshop CS5. Today it’s Illustrator CS5′s turn. As keen illustrator users ourselves, any new features is a party in our minds!

The Perspective tool is genius! Getting angles of perspective right has always been a somewhat tedious task with endless reference drawings needed etc. Now Illlustrator pulls up a great interactive grid for use. Go Adobe!

The Bristle Brush is a great addition and another step towards removing illustrator and photoshop from intermediary steps in work flows. No more switching the file into photoshop and spending hours creating a huge painted version of a file to import into illustrator as you can now get similar effects in vector format from within Illustrator itself. Great stuff.

Enjoy the video! (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XFXJY0a8NiU)

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• May 25, 2009 -- Bus retrospective Illustration Animation (0)
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When running your own business it is very easy to run yourself into the ground as it feels like there is always something that needs to be done…

How do you know how to control it and yourself?

I think it’s essential (For our sanity) that weall learn how to draw the imaginary line for ourselves because business has  a sneaky way of taking over every aspect of your life if you are not careful! Discipline…

Working in a dedicated area

Freelancing from home and staying productive is an artform in itself but learning  how to give yourself dedicated time and area to work in will help leaps and bounds. Find somewhere where you can clearly mark your need for privacy while you work and don’t come out until your done!

Show clients where the boundaries are

Make it clear from the outset with your clients how your working relationship will be structured. Calls after 5pm will not be answered! Emails will not be responded to on weekends and bank holidays! You must train your clients to work in the way you do, and not the other way round.

Learn to say no

As freelancers we tend to leap t any work with open arms just because it is paying and will inject nicely into our cash flow. Also, some of us are people pleasers and simply do not like letting people down. However, is this a profitable business strategy?

Taking on jobs which will eat into your resources (time) for the sake of it, might not allow you to complete other jobs to their highest standard so you may lose referrals (those beauties) . Look at saying no / look at outsourcing? / look at passing on jobs to other freelancers for commission?

Organise and track your time

One of your most valuable resources is your time. Thus, it makes sense to organise and optimise its usage to avoid its waste. Find a system to prioritise each day / week /month the tasks that you need to complete. There will inevitably be things that pop up and eat into your time but at least you have a point of reference to go back to once you have dealt with such an eventuality.

Related Posts:

• July 26, 2010 -- 14 Great Design, Marketing and Freelancing Blogs (2)
• July 25, 2010 -- Maintaining Business Standards As A Freelancer (0)
• May 9, 2010 -- Designers – Maximising The Value Of Your Work (4)
• January 6, 2010 -- A Monitor for Every Budget – What Monitor for Photography and Design? (5)
• January 4, 2010 -- Referrals – Freelancing Dreams (3)
• December 31, 2009 -- Factors To Consider When Pricing A Project – Part 2 (4)

We here have been looking at developing a CRM system here, and as such we got talking about customer service and its relation to our business. Importantly, our pricing.

The more we talked, the more we realised there is no principal value to our work. To explain, the value we place on our work is based on perception. What we consider the value of our work is defined primarily by our positioning our services in a certain way in marketing and sales.

Part of your charging process should be evaluating what your clients will find the most value in. They may care most about how well a project is executed; they mare care most that you meet stringent deadlines or they mare care most that you get the job done with out them guiding your hand the whole way.

Value = service

Value instrinsicly comes from service, not from design.. Design has long become a commidity, in that your clients can get it anywhere. They can even claim to do it themselves. Your competitors are at varying positions within what it is these days a vast pricing spectrum. there will always be somebody who charges lower than you and can design to the same level of quality as you – you need to evaluate what value you add and use that to position your services.

Customer service, as well as being ‘young and fresh’ are what at this point in time we believe stand us apart from our competitors.

What stands you apart?

You can add value by anticipating your clients needs, by under-promising and over-delivering. Find ways to add value!

Related Posts:

• May 11, 2010 -- How to Avoid Over Working Yourself As A Freelancer (4)
• December 29, 2009 -- Freelancing From Home and Staying Productive (14)
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• April 29, 2009 -- 7 Things To Consider When Starting As A Freelance Designer (4)
• October 6, 2008 -- How Do You Organise Yourself As A Freelance Designer? (9)
• August 31, 2008 -- A Good Work Environment (1)