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Your website
Your website is essentially your online portfolio. It goes without saying that
if the work you exhibit is good, prospective clients will be interested. But
the copy and structure of your website can also help you to drum up new
business. When a potential client types your URL into their browser, they
are not just looking to take a gallery tour of your past work, they want to
know what you can offer them.
Make it easy to find relevant samples of work.
Think about who you are targeting. Then think about how you can categorize your
online portfolio for maximum accessibility.
The greater the variety of different clients you target, the more general your online
portfolio categories should be. For example, if you’re targeting different sectors,
you may want to segment your portfolio into a menu like this:
- Marketing and advertising
- Products and packaging
- Publishing
- Engineering
If you are targeting just one specific area (such as marketing departments), you
may want a menu like this:
- Advertisements
- Brochures, leaflets and flyers
- Websites
- Point of Sale design
Set up multiple website pages and break up your portfolio into these categories.
Then link each category heading to the relevant page of your portfolio, so
browsers can find what they want by clicking through. Remember, people are
online to save time, so respect it.
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Be specific about additional services you offer.
The type of services you offer should dictate the structure of your website and
how you present your portfolio.
But you may not be able to sample everything in your repertoire. Maybe you offer
additional services that cannot easily be demonstrated in a portfolio. Maybe there
are areas of design you are competent in but don’t have anything to show (in
which case it’s a good idea to work on a mock-brief for the sake of expanding
your portfolio).
This kind of information is too important to leave out, so make sure you include it
in your homepage copy. Remember that busy people won’t necessarily ‘read’
your website, they are more likely to scan it for useful information. So don’t embed
your additional services in lines of prose, elevate them to the top and set them
into a list, like this
Other services I offer …
- Concept development
- Design consultation
- Archiving
List everything you are prepared to offer to new clients. If you have other contacts
specializing in different areas of the artwork business, it’s a good idea to list their
services too, like this:
Ask me about …
- Illustration
- 3D design
- Animated websites and presentations
- Photography
- Copywriting
This not only helps you establish yourself as a core contact for your clients, it will
also encourage your friends to list you as one of their contacts, helping to boost
your freelance job opportunities.
If your list of services is looking thin on the ground, you may want to consider
adding a few more strings to your bow. Here are just a few more services you can
offer without needing to find expert training:
Offer a proofreading service.
Clients often fear seeing mistakes when it’s too late to rectify them, especially
in printed collateral. For $250 USD you can enrol yourself on a decent one-
day proofreading course, or just print out the common proof-reading symbols
and tutorials from the web. Then you can offer a service that will come as a
relief to many clients.
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Set up a good FTP site.
Clients in international companies often need to share design files with
colleagues all over the world, where sending disks takes valuable time. Even
big Fortune 500 companies may have archaic IT departments, where files
stored on internal FTP sites have a limited retention time before they are
automatically deleted to save space. If you can provide an easy way of
transferring and sharing files, clients will want to know about it.
Set up an archive for your clients.
Store everything you receive and do for your clients. Then they can count on
you for images and past files at any time, instead of going to expensive repro
agencies. This boosts your chances of getting hired over someone less
organized.
Archive all the royalty free images you use.
Over time, you’ll have a bank of royalty free photos that you can use in your
graphic design assignments. Save your clients money on images, and you’ll
become their designer of choice.
Offer a photography service.
Your design assignments may call for specific photos you can take yourself
without the help of a freelance photographer. In most cases, you don’t need
expensive equipment, just a decent digital camera and a few good lights.
Read up on your photography, buy the bare minimum, and offer ‘photography’
as one of your additional services.
Offer a copywriting service.
Copywriting is a necessary skill to have in order to promote your freelance
services. It’s also the perfect service to integrate into your design offer, so it
makes sense that you spend some time brushing up on the craft.
For help with writing advertising copy, take my free tutorial at
www.copywriting-designers.com.
Head-up your website pages with a clear positioning statement.
A positioning statement is a line of copy that summarizes your USP (Unique
Selling Proposition), thus communicating the core aspect of your business offer.
Some people refer to a positioning statement as a ‘tag-line’ or ‘strap-line’ or
‘slogan’. However you term it, your positioning line should have meaning. It
should not be a gratuitous play on words. Here are some examples of clear
positioning statements:
Jon Woo
New York’s favorite graphic designer specializing in East-Asian publicity.
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Jon Woo
Call on me for expert publicity design, even on the tightest of deadlines.
Jon Woo
For 2D and 3D design that will blow you away.
Jon Woo
Promotional graphic design when you need it – on-call mornings, afternoons, and
evenings.
Jon Woo
Design & Ideas: Ask about my free graphic design consultation service
If you constantly present your name or business name together with your
positioning statement, your name becomes synonymous with the message of
your positioning line, at least in the memory of your prospective clients.
Give a brief summary of each item in your portfolio.
Browsers will be more interested in seeing your work than reading about it. But it’s
often helpful for clients to know what the original brief was, who the design was
targeted at, and what the results were. This gives them a sense of how well you
can respond to a brief. So with each sample of work, add a caption that
summarizes:
- Who it’s for – How does the look of the design respond to the taste/needs
of the target audience? What age are the target audience? Male or
female? Nationality? Social demographic? What sort of psychological
profiles do they share?
- What the design needed to achieve – What was the purpose of the
design? To sell? To inform? To instruct? Were there any special
requirements in the brief that informed how this should be achieved?
- The result – Did your design help your client to achieve his/her goals? If
so, can you add any specific or statistical information as to how it did
this? Can you add any good testimonials from your client?
Personalize your introduction copy.
Your website will need some introduction copy to head-up your homepage. Too
many designers waste this opportunity by writing inappropriate copy about
themselves. ‘Me, Me, Me’ copy isn’t attention-grabbing—your potential clients
want to know what you can do for them.
To do this, you need to build a picture of your potential clients. What kind of work
are they in? What can you do to help them do their job better? What are they
looking for in a designer?
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The secret of good, targeted self-promotion copy is in your research. You need to
know what will appeal to potential clients in order to whet their appetites for your
work.
Think about your offer.
As mentioned above, prospective clients want to know what you can do for them.
To address this, research what their needs are, then say how your service
responds to those needs.
Start by drawing up a features/benefits table for yourself (exemplified below), then
use this information to inform your homepage copy.
Example of ‘features’ and ‘benefits’:
Feature
I specialize in print, web, 3D, and Flash design.
Benefit
I work across media, so you get one consistent look for your whole campaign,
with everything in on time.
Feature
I use state of the art computing equipment.
Benefit
I have the best equipment, so you can be sure your project will run smoothly
right up to finished piece.
Feature
I have international customers.
Benefit
My design has global appeal, so you get more effective promotions in your
overseas markets.
Feature
I include proof-reading as part of my service.
Benefit
My free proof reading service saves you time and money, and gives you the
confidence that your finished publicity will be free from costly mistakes.
When you have a good list of features and benefits for your service, translate this
list into flowing copy for your website using my free tutorial to help you (available
at www.copywriting-designers.com).
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