What You’re Actually Paying For When You Hire a Designer

Dec 28

Whether you’re just starting your own business or you’ve been at it for a while, having a visually beautiful and consistent brand and website can significantly improve your sales and marketing efforts. It positions you as a professional company, serious about the products/services you provide in addition to connecting you with your ideal clients and customers through engaging visuals and messaging. If you’re in a position in which you need a new logo and brand identity, a new website or marketing collateral, or are looking to refresh your current branding, you may be considering hiring a designer to assist you in this creative process. On the other hand, maybe you have a creative streak and have considered tackling a logo or website design yourself. If you’re wondering what your best option is, it actually comes down to a simple math equation.

First, let’s get the heebie-jeebies out after using the word “math” in a design blog. Ew. But this equation is extremely helpful as a business owner and can also help you determine whether or not you should hire contractors for any reason, not just design. Here’s the first part of the equation:

Your hourly rate

x

hours it takes you to do the job

=

total $ it would cost you to do the job yourself

If you’re not sure what you’re hours are worth, here’s one place to start the process of determining your rate. After all, time is money and even if you’re an employee at a corporate company, it’s still good to determine your hourly rate to compare against industry standards so you can advocate for yourself when it’s time for that raise. But same goes for small business owners. We need paydays too so keeping tabs on your worth within your market is a great way to make sure you’re using your time and money wisely.

Back to the equation. So you now know the cost to you if you were to tackle the job yourself. Now it’s time to get quotes from contractors to see if you can get a better deal. At this point, you may be thinking, ‘can I find someone that can do the job better, quicker and cheaper than me?’ You’re on the right track, but keep in mind, when hiring a contractor you should assume they will always provide a higher quality service/product than you can create yourself. It comes down to the value associated with your time. Here’s the second half of the equation:

Contractor’s quote

-

The total cost associated with doing the project yourself

=

The $ you’ll save or the additional $ you’ll spend when hiring a contractor

Now take a look at that difference in cost. If the contractor’s quote is lower than what you’d spend tackling the project yourself, then great! That makes your decision to hire a contractor very easy. If the contractor’s quote is higher than what you’d spend, there are still some things to consider. If money is really tight, then you may not have a choice but to attempt to do the project yourself. But if you’re only looking to slice some cash off the top of your overhead, you should probably consider how hiring a contractor may actually cut your overhead in the long run based on a few key concepts…

You Pay for Quality

A contractor is specifically trained to carry out the project to the highest quality and to the most customized degree possible. In the case of design, while you may be able to make a pretty logo, you may not know the technical skills and strategic styles that a designer uses to ensure the logo fits your business while also reaching your ideal clients.

You Pay for Efficiency

More likely than not, there are a slew of technical skills and strategies that you’re unaware of that the contractor can implement quickly and efficiently. They’ve done this many times before and can complete a project way quicker than you could without sacrificing quality.

You Pay for Expertise

You’re paying the contractor to know what you don’t know. You may not have the resources and knowledge to figure out the hours it takes to complete a website project because you’ve never done it before. In this case, learning to design a website may take you way longer than you originally thought, thus eating away at precious time that you could spend on service delivery to your clients.

As mentioned before, it all comes down to the value you place on your time. When you hire a contractor, you’re paying for more time to do the things you want and need to do to run your business effectively and actually have free time at the end of the day for family, self-care, exercise, etc. If designing a logo and website is your only option starting off, then that is what’s best for you right now. But if you can afford to hire a designer, the result of their work will last longer, work harder for your business and require less time and effort on your end, which for many small businesses is priceless.

Danielle Hill