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Design Firm Owners
When you own a design business, you face a whole new set of challenges including: long-term business planning, design management, attracting and positioning your firm for smart growth. David C. Baker, a small business consultant who specializes in the creative industry, wants to help you manage obstacles and achieve success when it comes to your design business. Look for his expert advice here.
David C. Baker of ReCourses, Inc, teams up with HOW to host the Mind Your Own Business Conference. MYOB is an opportunity for small firm principals to network in a non-competitive environment and learn from professional business consultants how to manage and grow their firms. Find out more about MYOB 2012.
5 by 5: Five Steps to Success
In HOW’s November 2012 issue, we profile Minneapolis-based 5 by 5 Design. Here, partners Wendy Ruyle and Diana Lillicrap offer their 5 best pieces of advice after 5 successful years in business.
Cutting Ties with Four Legacies
Now that your design business is up and running, it’s time to cut loose ties with the past in order to really thrive. These decisions are tough, but business consultant David C. Baker has helped many firms do the same in order to grow.
Categories: Design Business & The Industry of Design, Design Firm Owners, Featured
Tags: design business
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Creative Burnout: Traction Control with David Baker
Burnout is widely felt in marketing field. So much so that every individual will face it at some point in his/her career. Some of it stems from a propensity toward short attention spans, developed at an early age. Oddly enough, if you didn’t have access to a TV or hours of video games, you might be more creative now! (So much for the impact of your profession.)
The Impact that Comes with Control in a Marketing Firm
How do you get (money and) impact in a client relationship, consistently, month after month? It doesn’t happen without some measure of control in the client relationship. If you’re an order-taker (that’s the opposite end of the spectrum), you’re not an expert, and your recommendations are not considered as seriously as they could be.
The Advantages of Being a Larger Firm
I’ve always advised firms to view growth (defined as an increased body count) as something largely neutral. It’s not good or bad—just different. That can relieve the inappropriate pressure to grow, grow, grow. Nonsense. That may work for trees, but oceans and rocks don’t really care. So instead of chasing growth as the solution to what ails your firm, consider growth carefully.
The Advantages of Being a Small Design Firm
What better time to point out the advantages of being a small design firm than when the industry is experiencing a contraction. All the more so since we have this strange obsession with growth, captured in phrases like “if you aren’t growing, you’re dying.” You can’t fit deep thinking on a bumper sticker, and that looks like a bumper sticker to me.
How to Stop Caring Too Much about the Wrong Things
Caring is good — caring too much is dangerous. Does this resonate with how you handle client relationships in your graphic design business?
5 Tips to Getting Clients to Listen More
Do you ever feel like clients don’t listen to you enough? Here are five very specific suggestions to turn things around in your design business.
Changing a Client’s Perception of Your Design Business
Do you have a credible marketing plan for your graphic or web design business? Or, do you compromise positioning to get a client? See these 7 Ways to earn respect for your design business.
Marketing Firms Beware: 7 Signs a Fix is Needed in Order to Grow
The world worships growth, but it’s foolhardy to not first fix what you have. Look for these 7 signs to know if you need to fix things at your marketing firm before growth should happen.
