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Keeping the lid on your budget.

Source: This article was written by Luke Hopkins and Philip Jenkinson. Copyright 28/9/2009

How to get the most out of your design agency and keep costs down...

Using a professional design agency for the first time can be a daunting experience. Many questions will be going through your head, and the biggest of them will no doubt be "How much is this all going to cost me?"

For all businesses, from large multinational corporations to sole traders working from home, money is always on your mind. And rightly so. After all, you need your business to be profitable and it's easy for costs to mount up.

Selecting an agency - look and listen.

When selecting a design agency, remember that they are all just businesses like your own. Call up to three of them that are conveniently located, have a chat about what they have done and whether they can help, and raise any issues that you want to discuss.

Request to see previous examples of their work and seek out any testimonials they may have. This will be the biggest indication of the relationships they form with their clients. Many agencies will have this information on their website, however, actually speaking with a current or former client or with a senior person from the agency will generally give you a good indication of whether you feel you can trust them with your business.

Ask to arrange a meeting with the agency, either at your office or theirs, to sit down and discuss your business so that they have a greater understanding of your business and your specific requirements. None of this consultation process should cost you. But ask before you set the meeting just to make sure.

If they ask for payment for an initial consultation then you should probably select another agency that does not charge for this. After all, you really don't need to pay to brief a creative communications provider.

Your first project - set the boundaries.

Once you've decided on the agency you would like to work with, it's time to get things underway. Your first project could be anything from the creation of a brand new logo, or a flyer to promoting a new product, arranging signage for your office, or organising a website to promote your business on the internet.

Always ask for a quote from the agency for the project you're undertaking, before work begins. When communicating with an agency to arrange a quote it is also essential that you are specific in what you would like done, and not done, as setting the ground rules up front will help ensure that the final costs are kept within your budget, and the quoted amount.

The quoting process - what affects the final price.

A quote for any design work will generally encompass three main elements, being... Concepts, Changes and Final Art / Production. These cost centres are usually based on the time it takes to complete the job. Let's first look at Concepts. This is where your designer will present some ideas for the artwork based on your discussions, and they will then present these different ideas to you to gain your feedback.

Next, let's consider the impact of Changes. Once you've looked at the different designs and discussed them, you may have some changes you would like done. This is always accounted for in quotes, and if you're happy with the designs you've received and have no changes, then the final price will be cheaper than quoted.

Finally, there is Final Art / Production. It's the last step in the process, and this is where your designer will refine the artwork to ensure that it is accurate and correct in whatever platform it is going to be used.

Let's take a look at a case study where the design has stayed within the budget.

Judy owns a florist shop and wants a flyer to send out to locals in her community to promote her business. She approaches the design agency and provides them with her logo, photographs of her flowers and her shop. She tells the agency she would like 1,000 flyers printed on glossy paper.

They provide her with a quote for $660 plus GST for the design work. The breakdown of this is as follows: Concept Design - 8 hrs - $480. Changes - 2hrs - $120. Final Art - 1hr - $60. She approves the quote and the agency starts the work. A few days later the agency presents to Judy the two concepts for the brochures. Judy chooses one of the concepts but would like to change the heading and she now has a new photograph she would like included instead.

These modifications are done and sent to Judy for final approval before the artwork is created and sent to the printer. The changes Judy asked for took only 30 minutes instead of the two hours quoted for Changes, so the final price is only $570... which is $90 less than quoted.

Okay, that's a good news angle. However, far too often things go the other way. So let's now look at the type of things that happen to cause the budget to exceed the quoted price.

Judy receives the concepts from the design agency and chooses one of the options. Over the last few days she has written a lot of information about the business and wishes to include this into the flyer. She also has a few more images she wants to include.

Because the flyer was designed with the content originally provided, it needs to be redesigned to fit the extra text and feature the new images. This is done and the revised artwork is presented to Judy for sign-off. She doesn't like the style of font the heading is written in and wants it to be changed. Judy also wants her logo to be bigger on the cover. The design agency recommends against this as it would diminish the impact of the selling line, but after she tells them it has to be done as she wishes, they do as Judy asks and provide her with amended artwork. Later that day, she approves the new artwork and it is then sent to the printer.

Judy receives the final invoice from the agency and is astonished to see the price is now $900. This is $240 more than quoted. This is because all the text changes and the visual redesign of the flyer took longer than was initially quoted for. If you look at the figures you can see why.

Remember that the design agency quoted $660 plus GST that comprised a speculated cost-breakdown of Concept Design - 8 hrs - $480. Changes - 2hrs - $120. Final Art - 1hr - $60. The original design didn't change, and either did the final art cost. It was the requested changes that differed with 4 extra hours at $60 an hour.

Remember, when you brief the agency to do the work, they get to work and are accountable to the brief that they are given. Errors are corrected free of charge, however, changes that are made after the brief has been given and acted upon by the design agency cost extra. The same goes for creative development and preparing print-ready production. Yet the reverse also applies, in that if there are fewer changes to be made, or less time spent developing alternate concepts, then often there is a lower project cost for you.

And the moral of the story is...

Be prepared before an agency is briefed. In the first example, as Judy was accurate and articulate in describing what she wanted and provided the designer with the correct and final text and images, the project stayed within the budget.

In the second scenario things went very differently. The specifics for the job were still evolving after the design agency was briefed. And the more that changes need to be made, the more expensive the process becomes.

This is the first of many informative articles designed to help strengthen working relationships and ensure you're getting the most value out of marketing spend.

Source: This article was written by Luke Hopkins and Philip Jenkinson. Copyright 28/9/2009