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The Business Side of Design Part 2 - Marketing
Bob Nicholl
September 1, 2004
When starting a business, most of us will have a small client base already in place. This usually consists of friends, family and contacts from previous jobs and school. The first few weeks will be reasonably busy, you may even make a little money. Unfortunately this will dry up fast. Uncle Joe won't need any more business cards for a while. At this point you better start marketing yourself if you ever want to be able to quit that day job, rent that first office, hire yourself a couple of designers and become a real agency. You are going to have to build yourself a diverse and substantial client base. The way to do this is through an aggressive and regular marketing campaign. Word of mouth will only take you so far.
There have been many, many books written on the subject of marketing. Far too many for me to get into here. I urge you to visit your library and check out a few. See what has worked for others and then adapt their techniques to your own circumstances. The fact at the bottom of any marketing campaign is this: For every hundred or so people that learn your name and what you do, only two or three of them will respond. Only one of them will actually hire you. Understanding this simple formula is key to your success. A reasonable goal for a new designer is one new client a week. If you can maintain this average you will succeed.
Your budget will determine the kind of marketing you can do. Chances are that at first your marketing budget will be pretty small. So your first marketing tool will probably be business cards. That's all right, they are penny for penny your most valuable marketing tool. Here is a big tip; when you order your cards do not get 500, get 5000. Then give them to EVERYBODY!!! Give them to your friends, family, coworkers, church members, softball team members and your book club. Ask these people to keep a few handy in case they ever hear of anybody needing a designer. Keep a bunch of them on you at all times and give them to everyone you meet. Remember you have to hand out at least 100 of them in order to get that one client. Here is another big tip; Ask for a card in return every time you give one away. Collect these cards and every couple of days enter them into your "Potential Client" database. These cards are little gems of information containing all the contact info you need for a potential client. Imagine how impressed Jill of the big fish widget company will be when you have all of her information immediately at hand.
Most small businesses fail due to a lack of working capital. Most of the time the reason they have no working capital is due to a poor marketing mind set. Marketing is all too often considered a chore. Usually just when a company needs it the most is the time when the marketing budget is slashed. This is an important fact to consider for two reasons:
The first is for you as a designer to recognize when this starts happening to you. You can't allow yourself to fall into this trap. When we as designers don't have any paying work to do it just means that we have more time to be marketing ourselves. I'm going to let you in on a little secret. Marketing can be fun, that is if you treat it as the challenge that it is. It's one of the few areas in business where you can unleash all that artistic creativity that you have bottled up inside you.
The second is so that you can recognize when it is happening to one of your clients. Then it is up to you to change their mind by persuading them that marketing their company through you is the only way to save it. Sometimes it works.
Here's another big tip; Make friends with the gatekeeper. This is the person who controls access to the people you need to see. Whether they're a secretary, receptionist or personal assistant these are the people who can make or break your relationship with a business. Treat them with respect. Any time you stop by to drop off a leave-behind be sure any give one to the gatekeeper too. Chat with them for a few minutes whenever you call. Executives tend to come and go but good Gatekeepers stay. And maybe, just maybe they can persuade the new boss not to go with his golf buddy's son who is really, really good with PhotoShop.
So instead of watching Oprah or hitting the beach during a slow period. Put on some nice clothes, pick a busy business part of town and walk into every business and every office you pass. Don't try to make a sales pitch. If the Gatekeeper is busy just introduce yourself and hand them 3 or 4 cards and some kind of leave behind. Then politely ask them to pass them on to the people who make decisions on their marketing. If at all possible get cards and names from them in return. If they are not busy chat with them first for a few minutes. Treat them as if they are important and not just part of the furniture. If you do it right they will never realize they have just had a cold call sales call.
One final thing, It will be very tempting to abandon your marketing campaign once you get to a comfortable level of success. You will land a couple of Big Fish clients and the money will be rolling in. It will be very easy to convince yourself that you are too busy and it's too much bother. Well believe me, the big fish will go away. He will leave for any of a hundred different reasons. If you don't have another big fish and a few small ones to replace him, your business could be in big trouble. A strong and diverse client base will generally only contract your services once or twice a year. They add up though believe me. A solid client base will make you bullet proof when that big fish you worked so hard to land is wooed away by another designer. A solid client base will always be in a state of flux. Businesses will go under. Businesses will place a new person in charge of dealing with you and this person will know another "much better" designer. For whatever reason unless you constantly add new clients to your base it will dry up fast.
Copyright 2004 Bob Nicholl, All Rights Reserved