Tag Archives: business outsourcing

Logo Specifications: Don’t Pay Up Until You Read This

Congratulations. You’ve assessed the work of your logo designer and have settled on a great logo for your small business. But before you sign the cheque, you need to secure your logo design specifications. Taking the time to ensure you have documented all your fonts, colours and files will save you a big headache in the future, should you need to tweak anything in your logo.

Make Sure You Get Your Fonts, Colours and Logo Files

Ensure You Know the Fonts in Your Logo

Your logo may feature one or more fonts. It is essential that your graphic designer documents which fonts they have used and where. Knowing the names of your fonts will make any future changes easier, PLUS you may be able to use the fonts throughout the rest of your small business to aid branding consistency.

Note: Font sets are intellectual property. If you wish to own a copy of a font set you will need to purchase a licence. It is illegal for your logo designer to send you font sets that you have not paid for. It’s simple to purchase fonts through various online font sites.

Ensure You Know the Colours in Your Logo

A paint store classifies their paint colours with enticing names such as ‘pink innocence’ and ‘baby pink”. To create each of these colours, other colours need to be mixed together in just the right combination. Going to the paint shop and stating that you want to paint a pink wall just won’t cut it. You need to know the exact shade of pink.

Knowing and enforcing your exact logo colours is fundamental to your small business brand. Ask your designer to document all the colours they have used in your logo and where these colours were used. Your designer will need to record each of your logo colours across four colour classifications. These combination include:

CMYK: A four number classification used in paper based printing applications
RGB: A three number classification used in online applications
Hexadecimal (HEX): A further online standard, useful for website coding
PMS: A worldwide standard classification used (mostly) in non-paper based printing applications

Keep these colour specifications documented in a safe place. A signwriter or web designer may call for them in the future. For example, this patch of pink below is classified with the following specifications:

Example Colour Specifications
CMYK: 6,69,0,0
RGB: 234,59,174
HEX: #E272AC
PMS: 232C

Ensure Your Logos are in Versatile File Formats

When you first engage a graphic designer, ensure you request that your final logo files are supplied in three formats. This includes:

For Your Website: A web ready JPG file (@72dpi). A web ready jpg is a low resolution picture file capable of showing many millions of colours. Since it’s low resolution, the file size of your logo is kept low. This keeps your website loading as fast as possible. Aim to keep the file size of your website logo under 50kb. The lower the better. If you manage to keep it under 12kb I’ll give you a gold star.

For Your Print Materials: A high resolution JPG file (@ 300dpi). A high resolution jpg shows your logo in all its wonder and clarity. Requesting a high resolution file (@300dpi) also makes your logo compatible with printer specifications – making it a sinch to include on stationery, brochures and product packaging. Aim to request your logo at a decent size (approx 10-15cm in diameter).

For Everything In Between: A vector file (EPS file). An EPS logo file is traditionally used in print based applications. It’s completely scalable to any size you can imagine. Do you want your logo to appear on a 20 metre sign? Or do you have visions of it being flown across the sky on the back of an aeroplane? Your high resolution JPG won’t be up to the task as it’s only 10-15cm in diameter. But your EPS logo will be able to lend a hand with no trouble at all.

Note: EPS files can only be viewed through graphic design applications. But there is a little trick you can use to preview EPS files through Microsoft Word (this was a lifesaver when I stumbled on it). Check out my tip to preview EPS files:

Artwork Files – It is a good idea to request your graphic designer’s artwork files. Sure, you probably don’t have the design software to use the files, but keeping them allows you to pass them onto another graphic designer in the future. As some designers can be hesitant about handing these files over, make sure you make request this known from the beginning.

Growing your small business,

David Moloney
sbp.strongerbranch.com

Elance: Where to Find a Great Logo Designer

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Now you’ve identified the benefits of small business outsourcing and enthusiastically downloaded your free logo design brief, we need to switch on our search lights and scout for a great logo designer. Time to do some easy research from the comfort of your chair. Grab a coffee.

Finding a Great Logo Designer is Easy if You Know How

How Not to Find a Logo Designer

First it’s worth covering how not to look for a small business logo designer. Pursuing these options will leave you staring at mediocre results.

Logo Design Contests Suck

As Jacob Cass wrote in why a professional logo design does not cost $5.00, canvassing your logo design through a logo design contest is counterproductive. As the logo designers who participate aren’t guaranteed funds, their efforts will only be minimal. Upon the close of the competition… voila, a set of substandard logos.

If you want your small business to be represented by a logo that took a few minutes to create without considered critique… head straight over to a logo design contest.

Giving Logo Design To a Relative

Being able to navigate Photoshop by beveling and merging layers does not make your relative a stellar logo designer. Just like cooking a mean roast with a secret gravy doesn’t earn me the title of master chef. Unless you have a relative who is a great logo designer with results, resist the urge to tap them on the shoulder. Also bear in mind it’s harder to give criticism to a relative that’s served you up a half cooked logo design.

Steps to Find a Great Logo Designer

I am a big fan of the outsourcing website Elance. You can post any graphic design project to the site and have thousands of providers compete against one another to offer you their services. And it’s totally anonymous on your part. What an idea! After a small $10 (100% refunded) verifying transaction, Elance is free to use. Thumbs up!

Below is an overview of the process to post your logo design project to Elance:

The Process to Post Your Logo Design Project to Elance

Posting Your Logo Design Project to Elance

I’ve used Elance on over a dozen outsourcing jobs, including three logo design projects. The process is very simple, below is a short video which takes you through all the steps.

When initially posting your logo design project, keep in mind that your project will be publicly accessible, both at the time of posting and after your project is complete. For privacy, I would advise against publishing your name or identifying details of your small business. Just post a short simple project overview such as:

“Hi, I’m looking for a graphic designer to provide a logo design service for my new small business. My small business operates in the retail industry, focusing mainly on clothes. I require three concepts and a turnaround time of 1-2 weeks. I will supply a full brief upon acceptance.”

Tip: Keep your English simple to avoid confusion as there are some great outsourcers from around the World who use English as their second language.

Once your job is posted you’ll quickly receive interest from many providers from around the World. Some may send you a tailored response to your brief, others may send a standard response. All will indicate a price they are happy to charge to work on your logo design project.

Assessing The Best Logo Designer on Elance

Now it’s your move. You need to choose the best logo designer for your small business project. To do this you need to consider:

1. The responses each provider gives

2. The bid each provider pledges

3. The feedback given on each provider’s past work

4. Each provider’s portfolio

5. Each provider’s skills

I normally develop a shortlist of 2-3 providers after paying attention to their project bid, their response and their feedback rating. After assessing these three items I hone in on assessing their portfolio and skill sets. You should be in a position to make the final decision within 5-15 minutes of assessing the bids. If you’re still unsure, you can even email them to ask them further questions.

Awarding Your Elance Job

Once you award your logo design project, send a congratulatory note to your provider, letting them know you’re looking forward to working with them. It’s only polite, and it sets a good tone for the project. Then you’ll need to send them the final logo design brief along with the timeframes.

If all is well the provider will accept your terms and your logo design project will start. You will then work with the provider via email/MSN or Skype. Good luck for your project. Let me know how you go.

Check out Elance. It’s free to use and browse

Growing your small business,

David Moloney
sbp.strongerbranch.com

Small Business Outsourcing Saved Me $5,000 and My Sanity

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We all love control. Control of the television remote, the amount of sugar in our coffee or the people we’ll sit next to at the next Wedding. It’s natural to want things done our way.

You likely have an accountant who provides specialist advice and knowledge for your small business. You hire the accountant because:

they have specialist skills you don’t have
they save you money
they save you time
they give you peace of mind, taking care of any tax compliance issues

Could you do the work instead of the accountant? Possibly. But chances are accounting is not your specialty. You would be out of your depth, it would take a long time and there’s a fair chance you may screw something up. So you outsource your accounting to your accountant who has specialist skills.

Small Business Outsourcing is Your New Out Tray

Reorganise Your Desk. Business Outsourcing is Your New Out Tray

Small Business Success. Be a Generalist – Not a Specialist

It is simply not possible to learn every skill you need to successfully operate and grow your small business. Sure you can be the accounts director, the sales director, the IT department, the graphic designer and the copywriter, but your results in each field will be mediocre. Mediocre results stunt the growth of your small business. You will never be able to compete with the specialist skills of an accountant, salesman, web designer and proven copywriter.

A great small business owner is a generalist. A great small business owner will understand their core competencies and will overcome their shortcomings by surrounding themselves with specialists. This frees up their focus, time and energy to ensure their small business remains on track.

Surround yourself with the best people you can find, delegate authority, and don’t interfere.
-Ronald Reagan

Benefits of Outsourcing Business to a Specialist

Small business owner can retain their focus on other business critical issues
Certainty of cost
Provides a fast solution within agreed timeframes
Provides you access to specialised skills
Reduces the need to hire or train staff

You can outsource anything from graphic design, web design, copy writing, translation or video and audio production. Some small business owners have even found ways to outsource the operations of their entire online business.

My Small Business Outsourcing Recommendation is Elance

I use Elance for all my outsourcing needs. So far I’ve outsourced over 10 projects ranging from web design, logo design, copywriting, legal documentation and architectural floor plans. I know your cashflow’s tight. Mine is too. That’s the big benefit of outsourcing through Elance. You get control of everything.

Elance is an online hub of over 100,000 outsourcing professionals. This means you’re bound to find the right person for your outsourcing needs. Since its creation in 1999, Elance has generated over $245 million in outsourcing work. Elance was recommended to me by another entrepreneur back in 2007. It’s a life saver. I recommend it because:

You can browse providers for free and post a job for free

Besides an initial $10 sign up fee, you do not pay any ongoing fees to Elance

You can easily view the past work of providers and read feedback on their work

You can set the exact budget from $50 upwards

You have security knowing that Elance audits providers and has payment protection

You can save time and money. I have saved over $5,000 through Elance

Take 2 minutes and check out how it works:

Don’t think Elance is just limited to small businesses either. Large corporations also turn to Elance when they need a quality solution. Elance has helped Google, Facebook, Citigroup, Accenture and Harvard University.

Unsure if outsourcing’s the right option for you? There’s no harm in checking out Elance. Once you make the jump you will wonder how you ever survived without it.

Visit Elance

Have you ever outsourced a project? What was your experience?