Mozy

I personally cannot recommend this online back-up service to more people. Mozy is an easy to install program that syncs your computer or multiple computers to a remote server. With unlimited data transfer for $4.95/mo. and the unlimited peace of mind that comes with knowing all your artwork is safe from disaster is a deal you can’t refuse. And if you do refuse this deal, they have a FREE 2GB storage account as well. How can you refuse free?

Dropbox and Dropio

Both Dropbox and Dropio offer you the ability to share files with other people and users. Dropbox gives you the ability to sync files between multiple computers. I use the free 2GB account on a regular basis as I’m typically working between various work stations around the office. Both are easy to use and offer a great way to get your print ready files to the printer.

Firefox/ColorZilla/Measureit

I’m almost positive that you’ve heard of these extensions for Firefox. Measureit gives you the ability to size up any on-screen object that needs to outfitted with a specific graphic element. Just drag the ruler and take your dimensions to Photoshop. Colorzilla is another useful tool that picks a color off a website for you. Great for matching specific shades.

OpenX

Similar to Google Ad Planner, OpenX is built by a well supported community of open source developers who have created an awesome ad sever for the web environment. Host affiliate ads or paid ads on your site with full control over how often an advertisement displays and to whom it displays. OpenX has been configured to serve ads for our advertising purposes and it comes highly recommended.

Woopra and Click Density

In addition to the mainstay of Analytic world, that being Google Analytics, there are a variety of up and comers that offer stats and behavioral tracking for your websites. Woopra is a free option which offers Wordpress implementation through a plug-in. Click Density is another that shows heat map overlays for your sites in an effort to help you discover what content you have is hot and which is not.

Hootsuite

If keeping in touch with tweeps is a priority, check out HootSuite. It’s a Twitter management application that gives you the flexibility to tweet to multiple accounts at once or at a time. You can also track the actions of your followers and create nice looking charts and graphs to put up on your filing cabinet.

TinyChat

Have you been looking for an easy way to video conference or chat with colleagues and clients in a private online environment? Well you’re reading the right post. TinyChat supplies the world with free, disposable online chatrooms. When used carefully, this can be a great tool for video conferencing with a number of people at once. Be forewarned however, that the public chat rooms are unsupervised and can contain some strange and perhaps disturbing behavior.

ProofHQ

Go green, save paper and impress your clients with this online proofing platform. ProofHQ can provide the tools you need to collaborate, revise and approve print proofs or online mock-ups. It’s full of a wide array of functionality that will make you wonder why you didn’t use this service sooner.

What the Font/Font Burner

Met your match with a font that will not be identified? Try uploading it to What the Font. It will detect its distinct characteristics and render a verdict. If this does not provide the desired result you can also post your mystery font to the forum where a number of font enthusiasts will solve the case before you can say “Arial Rounded MT Bold.” Another useful font site is FontBurner which is a service that embeds non web-friendly fonts for easy inclusion on your website.

Icon Finder

If you are on the hunt for an icon, start your search at IconFinder.com. Recently outfitted with a shiny new robot mascot, this site will locate the icon of your dreams in seconds.

Please feel free to make additions to this list in the comments!

Logitech Keyboard and Mouse

The Logitech diNovo Edge and the MX1000 Laser Cordless Mouse are both great peripherals that combine the convenience of wireless connectivity and a smooth user experience. The diNovo keyboard in addition to being sleek and modern in it’s design complete with touch sensitive navigation, is also equipped with bluetooth wireless technology and is fully rechargeable. The MX1000 is dependable, accurate and has a long battery life. I have two!

Another Logitech product that you might find helpful is the Logitech NuLOOQ Navigator which is not a mouse or a keyboard but simply a an ambidextrously alternative to the traditional navigation peripheral. It uses a navring that you push or pull in different directions and four customizable buttons for programmable functionality. It’s a non-dominant hand option for multitaskers.

Samsung SyncMaster Monitor

The Samsung Syncmaster 943SWX is a 18.5 inch monitor that provides the on screen space needed to run multiple windows and look good doing it. The screen’s matte finish is easy on the eyes and so is the glossy finish that surrounds it. It’s great for any design application and the price is attractive as well.

M-Audio Speakers

If you’re not rockin’ K-OS in itunes, you might not be taking full advantage of your music collection for the benefit of your portfolio. M-Audio Studiophile AV 30 is a set of highly rated compact powered speakers from a company that designed with the same critically acclaimed technology that has made M-Audio monitors popular in recording studios. These speakers are loud and clear when they need to be and small enough to stay out of the way in your office.

Wacom Bamboo

The Wacom Bamboo tablet turns your monitor into a notepad. Useful for designers and photographers alike, it’s a customizable and convenient way of touching up photos, bringing illustrations to life, and navigating between tools. It takes some time to get the hang of but those that acquire the required skills swear by it’s functionality.

Sony Cyber-shot DSC-H20

The Sony Cyber-shot DSC-H20 is an 10MB camera with a price tag that will make you smile. Combining Sony’s practical rechargeable battery and a 720p HD-quality movie capture with a 10x zoom lens, this camera is full of practical features and it’s easy to use.

Drobo Storage Robot

Data back-up is everything. Data Robotics Drobo makes redundancy new and exciting. We don’t have one but we want one. This storage robot is a fully automated, hot-swappable, RAID back-up system that can be modified for Network Attached Storage (NAS). It runs quietly and offers an informative dashboard and simple light notification system to provide data security.

Synology DS209

Comparable to the Drobo is the Synology DS209 Network Attached Storage. If the Drobo is a one trick pony, the DS209 is a thousand trick pony or a herd of a thousand ponies each with a unique trick. This unit does everything! Offering file sharing, scheduled back-up, a mail server, built-in PHP+MySQL, hosting with FTP access, itunes server, and even remote camera management, what’s not to love?

Western Digital External Hard drive

The Western Digital My Passport External Hard Drive is a great external drive for portability. It uses one foot-long USB connector that phantom powers the drive. The Passport comes in sizes up to 500GB and is competitively priced. From our perspective, it has no drawbacks.

D-Link DIR-655 Xtreme N Gigabit Router

Don’t forget the internet! The D-Link DIR-655 Xtreme N Gigabit Router is a super fast router that is easy to set-up, Gigabit LAN ports and the latest in wireless security. Dlink’s router interface is simple and straight-forward which makes it easy to get back to what you do best.

What do you use on a daily basis that you can’t imagine living without?

Recruiters
Graphic Designers don’t fit the mold, they tend to run solo or congregate in like-minded groups. With this being the case, recruiters don’t typically deal with designers on a regular basis and as a result, don’t understand how to find work for them. Unless you are lucky enough to have a good connection with a recruiter who knows you personally and feels confident placing you, don’t bother going this route.

Job boards
Your first stop when visiting online job boards should be The Society of Graphic Designers of Canada. Jobs from across Canada are available from a variety of industries. You will also be assured that the design of this website is pleasing to the eye which I’m sure is something you’ll appreciate. Continuing on the tour of job boards, be sure to drop by Freelanceswitch.com and Krop. Both of these sites list design opportunities, however they may or not have local relevance for you.

The Classifieds
It’s important to scour the classifieds, as archaic as that practice may sound, some of your best leads could come from kijiji.ca or craigslist.org. On Kijiji, you will discover the best results by searching your city for graphic design positions. On Craigslist, the well organized categories will allow you to visit art/media/design or web/info design for jobs that may be up your alley.

Career Finders
Perhaps the most traditional of online sources for jobs of any sort are websites like monster.ca, workopolis.com, and regionalhelpwanted.com. Monster.ca is seemingly the most useful of these as it provides you with the ability to save searches and receive frequent email updates that match your specifications.

Outsourcing Sites
The ubiquity of world wide internet accessibility has given rise to the concept of easy online outsourcing. Finding work, or finding talent is as easy as visiting sites like getafreelancer.com, elance.com, and odesk.com or even crowdspring.com (which is more a contest website than a job website). You will find a lot of work on these websites but you will also find a tremendous amount of competition as you are bidding against like minded professionals from many different economic situations . If you are planning on finding work via any of these sites, be prepared to work for a lot less than you may be accustomed to.

Aggregation Sites
Without a doubt, your most useful tool in fighting unemployment is the rise of aggregators in popularity and functionality. These are websites that do the searching for you, visiting all the websites you’d want to check and assembling the results for your review. There are three websites that do this job quite nicely. SimplyHired.ca, Indeed.ca, and Eluta.ca are great places to continue your search without expending the effort of clicking from site to site.

Good luck! Your dream job is out there somewhere, you just have to find it.

Shopping for a good WordPress theme for your blog can be a huge challenge. How do you find one that has all of the elements you need, but still feels original? It seems like anything on the main WordPress Theme Viewer is either forgettable or inadequate, and many of us lack the technical skills to develop a fully-customized theme. Here are six quick tips to help you conquer the boring blog blues, and come out with something that original and dynamic.

Start with the WordPress Themes Directory. As you begin to identity things that work and things that don’t, you can borrow some of the searching tips below and migrate over to Google for some queries YOU think of that span the wider web.

1. Search by most recent: sometimes the newest WordPress themes are the most advanced and original, so limit your searching by including the current year, or just the past 3 months, etc.
2. Find one theme you ALMOST like, and visit the homepage of the designer of THAT theme. It’s likely that he/she has created other themes that will be up your alley. Some of my favourite WP theme designers include Allan Cole and Darren Hoyt
3. Look for themes that are compatible with the latest version of WP (at the time of writing, the current version 2.7, with 2.8 is currently in beta). Again, like tip 1, it ensures your theme will be new and pretty original — for the time being.
4. Check out people’s personal stashes of WordPress-related bookmarks on del.icio.us. (Here’s mine.)
5. Find out what specific style of WordPress theme you want, and narrow your search down to those types. For design professionals and illustrators, I’d recommend using queries like “portfolio style wordpress theme” or “photo blog.” Other possibilities might be things like “magazine style” or “2-column.”
6. Use search.twitter.com to look for themes that are making people talk. On Twitter, following entities I Heart WordPress will give you some pretty good re-tweeted tips.

Of course, any theme you choose will depend on you to take it to the next level with your customizations: modify it enough to make it truly your own.

History has rewarded the graphic designer for being aloof, elusive, and eccentric. Unpredictability in both pricing and productivity, slavery to sudden fits of mis-communcation, and being too creative to play well with others are all reasons why we don’t fit well into today’s corporate reality.

If success and freedom as a freelancer is your goal, it may be time to make yourself aware of the common stereotypes associated with the Graphic Design industry.

Creativity is Not King

It’s certainly not something you hear very often and as a graphic designer it’s probably a statement that makes you cringe. More importantly than the level of creativity and innovation you bring to the table, your biggest asset is your ability to meet and exceed the expectations of your client. Although a wise client with submit to your professional direction, it’s important that you are willing to swallow your pride and sacrifice creative elements if it makes your client happy with the work you produce on their behalf. As a designer, despite your desire to excel creativity, when it comes to providing great customer service, your client is king.

Pick up your Phone

It’s tempting to get in a groove and isolate yourself until you are happy with a final result. Resist this temptation. Be aware that the level of service you offer is influenced by the accessibility you provide for your clients to ask questions and receive status updates. Return e-mails and voice mail within 1 business day and establish a reputation of being reachable the majority of the time. Be proactive in your efforts to be a good communicator and call a client before they call you, in doing so you will ensure your client feels respected and in control of their marketing efforts.

Make Sure the Price is Right

In addition to the uncertainty faced by business people to easily access creative professionals in a timely manner, the worrisome subject of cost is also a difficult issue often encountered. Before you present pricing, ensure you have your information organized and accurate. On larger projects where subcontractors or outside suppliers are involved, be sure you outline the scope of the project clearly to your client and the establish the responsibilities of each supplier you choose to work with. Receive written quotes for printing, development or writing and issue your proposal in writing as well. Do not make vague estimates a part of your quotation process. Take billing seriously, even as seriously as eating the extra cost of a project if you go over budget. By absorbing a small amount of money here and there, issuing an invoice that matches a proposal is far better than losing the trust of a client. I think you would expect the same in any other purchasing situation and by adopting this perspective, it will encourage you to be more careful with your numbers.

Nice to Meet You

Virtual tools make working together easy. If you work with clients that are not local, take advantage of technology to communicate well. If you find yourself working with a client who does work close by, make time, when it’s appropriate to meet over coffee, get proof sign-off in person, or even deliver a final printed product once in a while. By making yourself a part of your clients’ reality, you are making a case for a continuing business relationship. As technology makes working with anyone, anywhere a viable option, your local presence may be the reason a client is comfortable working with you.

Spell Check

Good grammar and spelling are often overlooked in favour of correcting pre-flighting issues or troubleshooting interactive elements. Especially in print design, one word spelled correctly can be the difference between success and epic failure. By using spell check often and paying attention to the little things, your client will never know just how close they were to being unsatisfied.

Every graphic designer is creative. Being creative and knowing what your clients expect in terms of customers service will give you the edge you need to compete and succeed as a Graphic Designer.

Tips for putting the finishing touches on a business proposal. Advice for dealing with a perilous relationship. Walkthroughs on how to build a fence on your particularly sloped backyard. Questions like this can sometimes be solved with a quick Google, by asking your friends, or by taking an old-fashioned trip to the library. Sometimes, though, your question is a little too precise, a little too obscure, or a little too convoluted for those sources to solve.

Thanks to the web, there are now countless services that let you put willing experts and helpful strangers to work answering your unsolved riddles. Below is a brief tour of some of 2009’s best sources for crowdsourced answers.

For non-profits: try Urbantastic

Founded by Vancouverites Heath Johns and Ben Johnson, Urbantastic is breaking new ground for micro-volunteering. If you want to help your city become “a more friendly, more lively, more benevolent place,” you can volunteer from home by completing tasks posted by local charities. As of mid-April 2009, there is now an “Ask a Question” feature, where you can help non-profits find answers to questions ranging from marketing advice to event planning.

Sample question: Where should we get our 2009 t-shirts printed?

On the go, from your phone: try Cha Cha

ChaCha describes itself as “mobile answers.” Call 1-800-2ChaCha from your mobile phone, tweet to @chacha, or text your question to 242242, and “you’ll receive the answer as a text message in a few minutes.” It’s not as new or crazy as you think: just last week, ChaCha officially answered their 100,000,000th question (that’s one hundred million). Questions submitted by you are routed to a subject-matter-expert (a “guide”), and within minutes, you’ll have your answer.

Sample question: Who is responsible for preparation of the president’s budget?

For a business angle: try LinkedIn Answers

Since LinkedIn is the go-to social networking site for business professionals, it means you’ve got thousands of pros gathered in one place eager to establish reputations for themselves. It also means you’ve got a ripe crop of potential question-answerers ready to help you out. LinkedIn’s Answers section lets you tap into the crowd to ask any question you like, receiving multiple answers from multiple perspectives.

Sample question: Which personal finance / budgeting / money tracking / money management software do you prefer and why?

For everything from relationship advice to technology tips: try AskMetafilter

AskMetafilter is one of the web’s mainstays for crowdsourced queries. Since 2003, AskMetafilter has been providing the “hive mind” perspective on countless issues, from personal dilemmas to business propositions. You can post anonymously or with your own username, and the result is a selection of opinions, ideas and opinions that will help you make a well-informed decision. Or, just find some really, really obscure info.

Sample question: I need advice or a good book to read on how to (i)not let my career and continuing education take over my life and (ii) keep myself from being negatively transformed through stressful experiences.

For live help from a real person: try Skype Prime

Receiving advice from somebody on the phone can be a much more reassuring experience than just blasting a question out into cyberspace and twiddling your thumbs while you wait. Skype Prime connects you in real-time to somebody whose background relates to the help you need, and lets you talk via Skype to walk through your issue. It is a paid service, though, which might be a deal-breaker for people looking for easy online answers.

Sample question: Can somebody show me how to use the clone stamp tool in Photoshop?

For in-depth research and oddball inquiries: try Wikipedia’s Reference Desk

If you can’t make it to your local library, the next best option is Wikipedia’s Reference Desk. Think of it as your opportunity to ask a helpful, diligent expert the weirdest questions you can think of. Although Wikipedia often gets a bad rap in academic circles for being a little too lax on its fact-checking, the fact is that anybody who is dedicated enough to pour hours of effort into editing a public encyclopedia is likely a smart, diligent person.

Sample question: What’s a word meaning misplaced nationalism?

For well-researched answers you have to pay for: try Uclue

Uclue calls itself “a professional, fast, and inexpensive research service.” Name your price (how much you’re willing to pay for an answer), and you’ll have yourself a crew of researchers out looking to earn that bounty. Staffed by former Google Answers Researchers, Uclue specializes in digging up the details on any topic imaginable.

Sample question: How to change your identity (UK)?

The new brand is cursive wordmark that aspires to embody a concept described by the tagline, “freedom to create, spirit to achieve.” According to the brand’s official website, AlbertaBrand.com, the identity development process was a 5 month long procedure with a budget of $4 million dollars. This budget was allocated towards the establishment of an advisory panel and focus groups consisting of normal citizens like you and me, oh and graphic design was in there somewhere too.

Let’s take a quick tour of the options that became runner’s up:

The Albertan may have proved unpopular due to it’s mixed messages. It’s certainly not clear what it’s trying to say. It’s very formal and corporate in it’s approach as well.

This version of the logo is very current in the way it uses gradients, just add a little shine and it would pass as a fancy new web 2.0 start-up.

The lowercase square treatment could make this version of the logo the corporate image of any North American technology company. The use of the period in the “t” is such an uninspiring concept and copied from an abundance of non inspirational sources. This could possibly be the weakest of choice in the set.

Meet the rainbow option. Symbolic of Alberta’s Leprechaun pioneers. That may or may not be true, but it would be very difficult to stand by a decision to appoint this logo for the cost of printing alone. It’s difficult to know what the designers were getting at here.

The Conclusion

Overall, the new brand for Alberta seems adequate. It doesn’t amaze and it certainly does not show off in any way. It’s disappointing that more inspiration wasn’t not shown in very many of the choices, there is no attempt at double meaning or any specific geographic mirroring. Ironically, the creation process of this identity, judging from the results, seemed linear and static, with very little motivation to come up with something new. Even orange was recycled and repackaged from the license plates. Perhaps at best, we’ve put a new suit on our old logo, which had much of the same reserved and bland personality the new one has. The lack of inspiration seems ironic considering we are looking to represent “freedom to create, spirit to achieve” to the world.

The Justification?

Sometimes, being a graphic designer and a normal citizen, I can’t help wondering what an invoice for this project would look like and how it would be itemized. If one graphic designer was hired for this project, the government would be paying him or her $50,000 per hour based on a 40 hour work week. If a team of 10 people worked on this project, for forty hours per week, for 5 months straight, tax-payers would be looking at an hourly rate of $5,000 per hour.

If you ask me, this final product does not deserve that kind of financing. The value of graphic design is not based on who the customer is, or what the final outcome is being used for. It’s based primarily on the time it takes to produce a result and the demand for this service. The concept of getting what you pay for in the design industry has very low ceiling and yet the cost of branding and identity development seems to be driven by the insecurity of clients to feel as though their logo must be very expensive to be good. Fueled by the greed of marketing professionals who are happy to propagate these sentiments through excessive fees, makes affording a graphic designer very difficult and trusting one even less plausible.

Do you have any thoughts on the industry or the logo? We’d like to hear them.

Millions of Screenshots

The first stop on our tour is at 456 Berea Street. This is the home of Roger Johansson, a Swedish web specialist and accessibility expert. His blog is always well stocked with cross browser compliance tips and CSS techniques. I found this topic on styling form controls particularly amazing and quite helpful. In this post, he’s coded and taken screen shots of over 200 different form elements in different browsers! Unbelievable!!

Digital Inspiration

If you are in the mood to be blown away, make sure you drop by Think Four’s blog. This post is is loaded with mouth-watering, juicy photo manipulation design, created by experts. Inspiration is just a click away.

Read Once, Print Twice

Next stop is Fuel Your Creativity, a source for ideas, inspiration, and helpful tips from your good friends and mine at Fuel Brand Group. This post, called 3 deadly sins of print design, although a bit more on the elementary side, is a great post for beginners in the print medium, or web developers who may be looking for some helpful advice.

Before you leave, make sure you check out this interesting post from Fuel on dual element logos. One of the most interesting and challenging aspects of identity design is the layers of meaning embedded into the design elements. When more than one idea plays across the logo, you know you’ve succeeded.

Be Good To Your Clients

The good folks at Vandelay Design seem to know what they are talking about when it comes to getting along with clients. In addressing the common problem designers seem to have with communicating well, this post outlines the right way to go about customer service. The emphasis on learning to respect your clients ideas and working collaboratively is a lesson many Graphic Designers could use to learn.

Be Good To Your Ideas

Eric Karjaluoto has difficult last name to pronounce. Don’t let that deter you from visiting this post at ideas on ideas. This is another post about being a better designer, but it’s more from a creative perspective. This is a great read on challenging yourself to take your work to the next level.

What to Read Before You Die

The Die Line claims to be the world’s #1 packaging design website and who’s going to argue with that? My favourite part of the site to visit is the redesign category of their blog for fresh new takes on product packaging.

Enforce Your Design Rights

In closing, here are some helpful templates from the Design Police you can use to vandalize critique other people’s work when you just can’t stand bad design.

Thanks for reading. If you’ve got any other sweet links you’d like to share, please leave a comment!

Being self-employed in a city like Vancouver makes you fortunate: with good transit, good people and good cafes, the only real challenge in this city is actually doing a good job. But since we know you’ve already got that covered…what you really need is a place to have client meetings.

1. Try the library

With 22 branches strategically placed in the most convenient locations all across Vancouver, the library is the most obvious (and yet the most surprising) choice for a business meeting. Vancouver has committed to providing free wireless internet in every location, and if you don’t mind embracing the “community” feel, nothing beats a library as a quiet space for smart people.

2. Do coffee

Your favourite local coffee shop is moonlighting as a prime location for your next meeting. Here in Vancouver, it’s almost harder to find a coffee shop that doesn’t have wireless: every Waves location will hook you up for free, and most Blenz, Wired Monk and Bread Garden Urban Cafe locations will, too. Even at Starbucks, all it takes for free wi-fi is a registered Starbucks card – I carry an empty one around in my wallet for just that purpose.

3. Join the club

Your meeting could be happening in a Gastown loft with view of the Burrard Inlet and the North Shore mountains, in a comfortable-yet-stylish space with exposed brick, floor-to-ceiling windows and ready access to the city’s best coffee. Yeah, it’ll set you back a monthly membership fee, but you’ll also be part of Workspace, one of North America’s pioneers in shared spaces. The meetings might just be worth it. (You can also try The Network Hub on Richards Street, available at $20/hour for our kind of meetings)

4. Chow down

The breakfast meeting is a classic, and if you’ve got a client you’re comfortable enough with to eat pancakes and talk business at the same time, then Vancouver has a couple options. Every De Dutch location has free wireless. All Cactus Club shops (for a lunch or dinner option) can feed you broadband and beefsteak, and The End Café on Commercial can give you coffee, food and internet (and big tables).

5. Centre yourself

In January of 2009 Vancouver City Council passed a motion to start rolling out wireless for all Community Centres in Vancouver. It’s not ready yet, but most of the Centres have a good amount of tables and chairs ready to be inhabited by entrepreneurs like you.

Tools & Resources

• Find a wifi-enabled coffee shop in your neighbourhood
• Read some tips on coffee shop working from Vancouver’s most notable mobile meeter

From a professional perspective, there are several factors that should influence your decision making process and help you, as a creative, to valuate your services.

Rate Formulation Equation

Your first step to take in establishing an hourly rate is to calculate your overhead costs by creating a budget. If the idea of budgeting bothers you, this is an unfortunate problem to have. Many designers experience these same sentiments which is one of the main contributing factors in unreasonable and wildly fluctuating pricing models. If you can’t create a budget or do not want to create one, you run the risk of running an unsuccessful venture.

If you have been doing business for a few years, and have managed to keep these records, look back on your invoices and receipts, itemize both into several streams of revenue on the income side, and categorize your expenses in the same manner. If you are starting from scratch, there are several types of expenses that you can typically account for on a month to month basis. Here is a sample of what this may look like:

- Utilities: $300
- Rent: $1,500
- Phone/Internet: $75
- Recordable Media: $25
- Travel expenses: $150
- Online subscriptions: $100
- Payroll (your salary): $3,000
- Tax Remittance: $250

Total Monthly Expenses: $5,400
Total Yearly Expenses: $64,800

Once you have an idea of your annual expenses, it’s time to turn your attention to your income. Keep in mind that it’s very doubtful that you will have the opportunity to bill your clients for 40 hours per week as you would as normal employee. Managing your own business is wrought with numerous interruptions and many small tasks that require your attention and are simply not costs you can bill to anyone. Realistically, your opportunity for billing time directly to a client may be limited to 25-30 hours per week or 1400 hours per year. Your time may also be affected by your network of clients and their requirements. Estimate your billable hours carefully and responsibly.

Once you come up with a practical weekly estimate, extrapolate these numbers out to create an annual figure. When you have this number calculated, divide your expenses ($64,800) by your billable hours (1400 hrs.) to come up with an hourly figure ($45.71/ hr). Once this figure is arrived at, you must consider the cost of growing your business and retaining income for savings. Perhaps, 10% is a good rate of savings (for an annual total of $6,300), and 20% would be a suitable mark-up for investment back into your business ($12,600 annually).

When taking these figures into account, your hourly rate of $59.21 seems like a figure that will ensure you cover your costs, pay yourself, save for the future, and encourage spending on growth initiatives like advertising or hardware upgrades.

Streamlining Your Business

Once you have created a financial blueprint for your business, you are well on your way to making yourself a successful entrepreneur. Your task now is to discover ways to lower your expenses in an effort to gain a competitive edge over your competition. If you can create opportunities to save on overhead costs such as utilities, rent or phone costs, you can choose to pass these savings onto your clients.

In the process of looking for creative ways to cut costs you may discover that these are also ways to reduce your carbon footprint. If this is something that saves you money every month, apart from the obvious benefits to the environment, it may be also be an opportunity to market your organization from a green perspective.

The more you can reduce your overhead expenses, all things being equal, the bigger the advantage you hold over your competitors.

Supply and Demand

Supply and demand is popular term in economics and may be the most practical way of deciding how to price yourself hourly. If demand is high, meaning your phone is ringing off the hook, your inbox is full, and you have more work than you can handle, your hourly rate is ready for a increase.

It’s also worth mentioning that if you have very little work, this is not justification to increase your hourly rate, rather it’s time to find a part time job to help make ends meet. Increasing your rates in this situation, although a short term solution, will not sustain you over the long term as you may end up pricing yourself out of work before you even begin.

Supply and demand should be the only factor that influences your hourly rate. By establishing yourself and succeeding on the premise of excellent design, fiscal responsibility, and great customer service, you are creating a fair economic environment that will grow proportionally with your success and the satisfaction of your clients. These are easily measurable metrics.

Ethics

Although ethical decision making seems to be an out-dated principle in our capitalistic society, it’s an important factor to consider in pricing your services appropriately. Here are some potential situations where you may need to rely on ethics to make a decision:

Use your best judgment, or ask a trusted source, when you are faced with the temptation to charge more than your typical hourly rate or more than what was originally quoted. Remember that supply and demand is the main driver of your services.

Consistent Value vs. Potential Value

There is a school of thought in the design industry that believes you should bill on a sliding scale where cost is determined by the size or earnings of a client. For example, larger more established organizations should pay more for creative services than a smaller, lesser known client due to the fact that they have the potential to make more money from your work. As an responsible and respected designer, it should be noted that this ideal is ethically irresponsible and fundamentally flawed.

Unless a larger organization approaches you with work while demand for your product is high, or negotiations are dictated by a set budget that is higher than you would normally expect to charge, you should not be inclined to charge larger companies any differently than you do your regular clients.

Be aware of this slippery slope as it can cause serious creative difficulties if you do take liberties with your cost structure. The product you provide should always be of a consistent caliber, not one that fluctuates with the quality of your clientele.

Smart Partnerships

Your suppliers are a key element in your cost structure. Choose the people you work with carefully and ensure you can trust them to deliver a quality product in a timely fashion. Whether you outsource printing, web development, or hosting, your clients will be affected by your supply chain decisions. Be sure that you establish a specific percentage mark-up on all outsourced services and do not deviate from this pattern as it is important to create pricing that your clients can count on and budget for.

Responsibility in Graphic Design is an important aspect of our industry that is often disregarded in the passionate pursuit of creative solutions. As a designer, remember that your choices affect everyone and if you run your business with professionalism - everyone wins!