When a client contacts us with a job in mind it is our opportunity to extract as much information from them as possible. It’s important at this early stage of the graphic design process to assess exactly what the client requires, what the need is and brainstorm ideas on what avenues to explore.
A phone call or in-person meeting if local to discuss the client’s business needs, requirements and direction. Here we figure out what the project will entail and any details/elements that go along with it as data for the brief. What are the common traits between competitor brands? Do they employ certain colours more frequently than others? Do they usually opt for certain style of fonts? Industries often share common design traits. If yours does, why? Does it serve a specific purpose or is it simply to fit the mould?
The notes and materials previous step will formulate a project brief. This is essentially a roadmap for the project. This stage is where a project proposal / quote is created and provided for sign-off before moving onto 1.3. Typically, 50% of the quote total is invoiced to move forward with the project.
Strategic research reveals the personalities, mood, feel and styles employed by your competition and also uncovers creative inspiration towards the design project. It also helps find areas where we can leverage your brand’s unique characteristics and personality to shine through and separate you from competitors.
This is where the design process really starts to roll, where the good coffee is brewed and where the tunes start cranking out of the studio speakers.
This is where we compile all the elements that were uncovered in the research, creative inspiration and the briefing notes. Things like chosen colours, design pieces/logos we like the direction of and feel have design elements that work. Even mood-specific photographs that fit the theme/brand. We’re looking for some creative sparks to start sketching out.
The result uncovered from the sketching is typically 5+ concepts that are worth focusing on to push towards refinement.
The best concepts from step 2 then go to digital and are refined, finalized then prepared for presentation.
Self-explanatory, you get to finally see what we’ve brewed for you in the design studio.
You will receive a PDF document containing the concepts for review and some design notes describing artistic direction, reasoning etc. At this point we can either discuss over the phone after review, or have a presentation meeting if logistically possible (we often work with clients in other provinces or in the USA – maybe that’s you?).
After you’ve had the chance to review the concepts and perhaps even chose a winning one, we discuss or you can email a list of revisions and/or questions. Revisions get implemented and we move onto the next step.
The refined design is presented again in a PDF document with design notes etc. At this stage, if further edits are required, they will subject to an hourly rate with minimum of 1hour per round. It’s usually rare at this point in the process, but sometimes things do come up. Our goal in this step is basically to reach an “Approved!” status on the design.
With the design process wrapped up, it’s now time to square up the final invoice and deliver the materials.
Remaining 50% is invoiced to be paid before file delivery. Once squared away, we move to 4.2 to deliver the materials so you can get them out out in the wild and have them start working for you!
While we’re getting all squared up on the less fun part of the process in 4.1, all files and formats are packaged and prepared for delivery as agreed upon in the quote/proposal package from 1.2. Once invoicing is squared away, we deliver the goods!