“...Doctor, you are, of course, a candidate of sciences, but I see how to perform this heart operation in a completely different way! It's very simple!!!”

“...If I were a pilot, I wouldn't perform these unnecessary maneuvers before landing, wouldn't wind circles, but would go straight in! Why these unnecessary movements?”

Why do we trust them completely in cases with doctors and pilots, but in the case of advertising design we have our own, always "correct" opinion?

Let's figure it out...

“...Make white much lighter, and black twice as dark!”

Agree, we are all the most brilliant, unsurpassed designers and advertisers in our souls. Can anyone choose wallpaper for their living room or tell about their own company better than us?

It would seem — elementary simple. If I feel and see this way, then the rest must perceive my vision similarly. Is this really so?

Advertising design, like medicine and aviation, is based on rules and laws that have been developed over decades of trial and error. And if a doctor's or pilot's mistake costs the most precious — human life, then a bad design of a website or advertising brochure can be survived. But it can cost your company's reputation.

Next, we will consider a number of important conditions for fruitful cooperation with designers, website developers — professionals who are ready to advertise your business at the highest level.

First and last — put all your wishes, suggestions, and your personal vision into a technical specification, give it to a specialist, and wait for a high-quality and working result. This way you will save your finances, time, and most importantly — nerves and health.

* * * * *

Designers have a joke that has a bit of a joke in it:

DESIGNER'S PRICE

• I do it all myself — $100
• I do it, you watch — $200
• I do it, you advise — $300
• I do it, you help — $500
• You do it, I help — $800
• You do it, I advise — $1300
• You do it, I watch — $2100
• You do it all yourself — $3400

And the point is not at all in the earnings of the contractor. The more you "participate" in the development of the project, the more your expenses for this project will increase exponentially and in 99 % of cases, you will return to the first option that was offered to you. (provided that you really work with a pro).

We will consider how to distinguish a real professional from an amateur a little later, but for now —

What should professional advertising design be like?

 

 

 

Advertising design should be simple and clear.

 

 

 

Professional advertising design should also work. And the efficiency of this design should be at least 200 percent.

“Under the hood” of apparent simplicity, in fact there are serious and fundamental things, such as psychology, human color perception, priorities for step-by-step information reception and a large number of other components that cannot be described in detail within the framework of this article.

A special place in advertising design is occupied by printed products — postcards, brochures, albums, business cards, outdoor advertising.

Without going into the depths of building layouts for printing — grids, typography, etc., I would like to draw attention to two mistakes that 99 % of customers make:

1. The craving for giant headlines, logos, images
2. The phrase “a lot of empty space”

"Empty space" is "air," without which the layout, and most importantly, your potential consumer, will have difficulty "breathing."

And you can solve the problem with giant headlines, logos, images once and for all by developing a professional corporate style.

The next section will cover this.

Corporate or brand style. Why is it so important and necessary?

The idea of ​​creating a corporate style actually arose a long time ago, and just like advertising design, it is based on the foundations of the human psyche, which perceives primarily the image of the advertised product. The perception of the product itself as a physical object is secondary.

In other words, the company's corporate style is an image that is formed in the consumer at a subconscious level. It is extremely important to make this image recognizable, memorable, positive and selling.

And the first thing your potential client encounters is the company logo. A professionally designed logo should look equally good in black and white or in full color, be readable and recognizable at any size — from the ballpoint pen on which it is applied to a large 12-meter advertising billboard.

It is no less important to choose the right corporate colors of the company that correspond to the direction of your activity (again psychology, where can you do without it), a typeface (font), graphic elements and many other necessary components of a professional corporate style.

All these components are combined into a single whole — a guideline for using a corporate style. Many call it a "brand book", although it is a little different...

Why all this? A guideline — a guide to action for designers who will later develop layouts for printing, outdoor advertising, and the Internet. With its help, all subsequent advertising products of your company will form one recognizable image in the consumer.

Creating a corporate identity — is not cheap, but it will quickly pay off and bring tangible results, both in printing and on monitor screens. More on that later.

How much does it cost to build a website?

There are more than 1.3 billion websites on the World Wide Web, and their number is growing every day. Millions of designers and programmers release a digital product into the world every second — from website building masterpieces to...

Of course, there is no perfect recipe for creating a website, but I would like to draw the reader's attention to a few important points.

Today, there are a large number of website builders — both free (supposedly) and not so free. But they all have one thing in common: a website can be made by anyone who has no understanding of either web design or programming. And there is nothing to understand here: drag and drop images with the mouse, type text — and voila! The website is ready! Why pay some webmasters?

Is everything really that simple?

Firstly, when developing a website using a website builder, you can never become its sole owner. As a rule, the name or domain of the website builder will always appear in its domain name (website address). And don't be surprised if one day an advertisement for your nearest competitor suddenly appears on the main page of your "personal" website... Yes, yes. Banner ads are usually an integral part of free website builders.

Secondly, Unlike professional websites, the situation is completely the opposite: a web product is not developed based on the design of your company's corporate identity, but you will have to create your own corporate identity based on what the designer offers.

Thirdly: the program code of website designers is written taking into account all possible situations, and if you look closely, 90 % of it is unnecessary garbage that will never be used, which significantly affects the promotion of the website on the Internet and its loading speed.

This describes the very tip of the iceberg, and my position is not to hate website designers at all. At least if they exist, then there is a demand for them.

Then what is the point of what is written above? Let me explain. Now a huge number of both freelancers and companies have appeared on the IT market that… Ta-dam!!!… make websites using designers! With all the ensuing…

A few years ago, Weblium conducted an interesting study: an example of a simple website (made using a designer) was sent to agencies and freelancers from different countries, with a request to estimate the cost and time frame for developing such a website.

The result was amazing. I will deliberately not name the names of the agencies (if you are interested, this study can be easily «googled»).

So, the result by agencies:

• France — $29,000, 2 months;
• Poland — from $40,000 to $55,000, 2-3 months;
• Netherlands — $70,000, time negotiable;
• Switzerland — $120,000, time negotiable;

The result for freelancers was as follows: from $175 to $2200 and development time from 10 days to 2 months.

Moreover, 62.5 % of developers (both agencies and freelancers) will do this on one very popular free platform, which I will not name for ethical reasons (essentially the same designer, but a little more advanced), 25 % called it simply designers, and only 12.5 % ​​offered development with real design and programming.

What to do?

How can people who are not initiated into the depths of design, advertising and website building find a real professional and not gain negative experience?

• Cooperate with a performer whose portfolio includes at least 100 real projects;

• Pay attention to the accuracy and perfectionism of the execution in this portfolio — this says a lot;

• Track the frequency of order fulfillment: if this is not so important in the production of advertising layouts, then the site, after development, will need to be maintained, and not all programmers want to disassemble someone else's code if the developer suddenly disappeared;

• Consult with friends or colleagues — they probably have such a performer;

• Remember that little things matter!

And most importantly: when you finally find a real professional — trust his experience 100%!

Success is guaranteed!