You've been working for 3 years and you haven't made a dime!  Your web designer is the only one who's making money! The IRS considers your business a hobby! You still don't know who your customers are! Your elevator pitch changes every time you give it! Your accountant does your taxes for free! Your friends constantly ask you... so, what exactly do you do again? And your wife is wondering when you'll get a full time job.  If this is you, IT'S PROBABLY TIME TO END YOUR STARTUP.

OR...

You can decide to take control of your business.  Decide whether  this is something you really want to do.  Perhaps your commitment is not there because you'd rather be doing something else.  However, if you've figured out that you are indeed passionate about your product or service, you must find out if there is a real need for what you're offering. 

It's no longer "build it and they will come", it's now "build it with them and they will stay."  If there is a real need, then you might want to take a closer look at your brand design or branding strategy.  Why aren't you connecting with your customers? Maybe your business model needs to be adjusted.  Sometimes it may not be the product itself but the price. Or it may be your call to action on your website.  Maybe you are targeting the wrong demographics or perhaps your branding does not appeal to your audience.  My recommendation is this: Step back from your Startup, forget all the time, money and effort you've already invested (I know it's tough)  and take a long hard look at your product or service, and find out if there's a real need there.  Once you've established that there's a need, you can move on to effectively targeting your market.

Given the state of marketing and advertising today, most small business sales and marketing efforts are focused online via their websites. I'm currently writing an eBook, The Website Design Guide For Startups - 7 steps to finding the right designer for your Small Business.  It should be completed this summer.  You can be notified and receive a complementary copy when the book is released by clicking the link below (This offer is only good for the first 100 readers that sign up).  It will help you flesh out your sales and marketing ideas, get you thinking about your business branding strategies and provide some step by step guidelines on finding and hiring the right web designer for your Startup.

 Click Here For Your Complementary Copy

Please feel free to share any additional advice you can give young entrepreneurs and Startup companies that are at the crossroads of... Should I keep going or should I end my Startup?

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 Being an entrepreneur for many years, I’ve come to the conclusion that the sooner you accept that budgeting for a startup business website is as illusive as figuring out Google’s algorithm for search,  you’d be in a much better place.

If you’re an internet entrepreneur or any kind of  business owner for that matter,  chances are good that a large amount of your business success will depend on your online presence.  With that said;  the top 3 things young entrepreneurs worry about all the time are…  finance, finance and more finance.  Most entrepreneurs have a business idea and a plan to succeed.  What most of us are lacking is the ability to budget our startup costs effectively.  In our defense though, it can be difficult to predict what expenses a new business will incur as it grows. 

Building or designing a brand these days is more about building an effective online presence.  Which means finding a designer who is both talented and knowledgeable to understand and effectively implement your branding design strategies.  I’m not going to bore you with a branding design lecture at this point, but take a look at this great presentation on the importance of  branding design below.

It is my position that if you’re building a business to succeed, you should be mindful of the core ingredients for success.   Hiring the right web designer to build your website is  one of those core ingredients.

BUDGETING FOR YOUR WEBSITE DEVELOPMENT

Getting Website Design Services For Free

The ideal option is to find a worthy web developer and offer him a partnership in your new venture in exchange for his expertise. This will not only allow for a possible continuous and quality development of your company and brand identity, but also a major reduction in your startup cost.

Hiring a Freelancer or Web Design Firm

If on the other hand, you choose not to partner with a web designer then your next option would be to hire a freelancer or  web design firm.

How To Budget For A Web Design Project

Many young entrepreneurs get the initial quote from  a web designer and allocate the respective funds as their  web development budget.   The problem with this is that the initial quote that a designer gives you seldom proves to be the one you end up paying.  Sometimes it maybe less but most times it ends up being more.  Much more.

As a designer starts a project, he/she may not know the obstacles that will occur as the project gets on-the-way.  This is especially true for custom website design.

Custom website design can sometimes involve lots of programming which is not an exact science, hence, can easily add hours to your project, ultimately increasing your website budget.

So you should be aware about these things upfront as you’re negotiating the terms of agreement.  If you’re on a tight budget (like most young entrepreneurs), try to negotiate a project price instead of an hourly rate.  This way you’re sure to be able to manage your money a little better.  Another way to plan for the unexpected is to create a detailed design brief , outlining your business strategies and project requirements.

Do You Have A Post Launch Budget ?

Another thing most entrepreneurs overlook is the post launch expense of a website.

When a website is launched, aside from the inevitable bugs that will come up, there are many things that will not be apparent until your visitors start to use your website. For example:

·        How user friendly is the website ?

·        Is your call to action buttons in the right places ?

·        Are your signup forms too long or difficult to fill out ?

·        Are the landing pages effective ?

Once you determine that the Buy Now  buttons should be green instead of light blue and that you’d rather have a search bar at the top of the home page instead of a link on the side bar. You’re talking about more time and hence more money. 

These are just some of the things you should be mindful of as you budget, negotiate and ultimately hire  a web designer for your startup company.

What have been your experience with budgeting for a website design project?

Are you looking to hire a web designer for your startup business?  Request a free quote from our designers network.

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 The Styleapple Hire A Designer series continues with Melissa Gerber, a Freelance Graphic Designer with an extensive background in packaging design. She is an accomplished Art Director and Designer, experienced in publishing, packaging, editorial, and branding design. You can read her full profile here.

Melissa wrote a very comprehensive article on the Top 10 things to look for when hiring a Graphic Designer for A Packaging Design Project. If you are thinking about hiring a graphic designer to do packaging design work, this is a must read.  Find a brief excerpt of her article below. You can read the full copy here.

The Top 10 Things to Look for When Hiring a Graphic Designer For A Package Design Project Written by Melissa Gerber Freelance Graphic Designer

 1. Know the style of what you want your product to look like or at least an idea.
Visit stores that carry the type of packaging you are creating. If you find designs you like take notes and pictures if you can. You can also search the internet for packaging ideas and inspiration. Also, sometimes on the back of packages you will see the designer name. If you really like the design it is fairly easy to google the designer's name and most times an online portfolio can be found with their contact information, resume and portfolio.

2. Visit creative websites.
There are a lot of online designer portfolio websites out there now. This makes it much easier for the client to search easily for packaging designers with all types of backgrounds and styles. Some sites include: styleapple.com, coroflot.com, creativehotlist.com, and designrelated.com just to name a few. At these sites you can search specifically for packaging designers and review their work and resume. If you are unsure of what style you are looking for your design to be these sites will also show you different approaches to various packaging.

3. Review resume carefully.
In addition to reviewing the designer's portfolio, pay close attention to the designer's resume. Carefully review the resume to make sure they have the skill set that you require for the project. This will show you the designer's experience with other clients and companies. It will tell you how long they have been designing and their experience level. A beautiful portfolio is promising, but the amount of experience they have is an important factor to consider. The amount of projects they have done over the years shows that they have learned to communicate and understand the needs of their clients. It also shows that people keep coming back to them.

4. Research and communicate with a few designers.
Find 2 or 3 designers whose work you really like and talk to them all to get a feel for who would be best to take on your project. Get a quote from each and discuss the project with them. Then see who you feel most comfortable giving the project to.

Continue... Read points 5 - 10 here  

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The other day I played around with hunch.com, a new website that answers your questions. As I got more into it, I realized that it also allows you to add your own questions to their database, which immediately intrigued me.

First, I had to figure out what the answer would be... and of course, the answer is Styleapple... So what is the question? As I was thinking on what the question should be, I realized that that my mindset suddenly moved from the CEO of Styleapple to the Designer or Design Firms who would be looking to use our branding design services.

So the obvious question was "What Design Portfolio Website Should I Use?" To get to the answer, a user would then be asked a series of questions that would hopefully lead them to the most accurate answer. And it was at that moment, that I realized if Styleapple weren't significantly different from the other design portfolio websites, then this would be all for nothing.

The same is true for your design firm's brand. What questions can your clients ask you about your design firm that would eliminate your competition from the running?  What are you doing, or what services are you offering that your competition is not?  It's really important to know the answers to these questions if you're serious about becoming successful in the design industry.

Branding yourself, or your design business is just as important as starting the business. At the moment you conceive your business plan, you should immediately be thinking about your plans to becoming branded.

Just for fun I've embedded the question I created on Hunch. See if your result is Styleapple. If it is, I'd like to hear about it, If it isn't... well, keep it to yourself.....  ;)

Which design portfolio website should I use? - make thousands more decisions on Hunch.com

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Let's talk about social networking for brand development.  I'm a perfectionist. What that means is that I try to control all aspects of my company at all times, 24 hours a day. My web developer has threatened to fire me many times, but I refuse to let him because he's an asset to my business. But, If I could, I would do it all myself.

From web development, to marketing, branding, to doing my taxes, to taking out the trash ...ok maybe not taking out the trash, or for that matter, doing my taxes. Anyway, the truth of the matter is I can't do it all. And chances are... neither can you.

Designers are designers, we are not accountants, marketers or sales people. I know in the beginning, you may have to wear all the hats, especially if you're working on a limited budget. I understand that. But when you can network and meet people and share resources that will help grow your design company, you should not hesitate to take advantage of that opportunity.

Remember, the internet has made it almost impossible to do it all and still be successful. There are just way too many things to do in order to stay competitive. But at the same time, the internet has made it easier to do much more with a trusted network of people. With that said, your LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook networks has now grown to a gazillion friends and 10,000 followers.

It's time to search your network and find creative professionals that you can collaborate with on projects that will add value to your design firm. Resources that will support and grow your company's brand. It's time to stop "socializing" online and get personal.... Pick up the phone, send a personalized email instead of a direct message or an@reply.

Connect with people you can mutually benefit from. If you take the time to explore your network of friends online you'd be surprised to see the talent that you are already connected with. Chances are good that the next Steve Jobs is already in your network. Your social network can help you grow your design business to new levels, just by getting offline and getting on the phone.

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My last blog post was about Google releasing its 2001 search engine for show for their 10^th  year Anniversary  and how their logo has changed since then -  pointing to current company growth and design trends as two possible reasons for the change.  I was since energized to find other top company logo design that has changed over the years.  What I found was that in most cases the logos were noticeably similar to their predecessors as expect  but still showcased a modern spin that appeal to the current design trends in their respective industries.  What I found kind of funny was the Starbucks coffee logo changed from a practically x-rated half naked mermaid to a more censored version as their demographics grew.   I wasn't sure whether they wanted me to get a cup of coffee or  get a room  ☺ Anyway, check out the list, let me know what you think.

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I was reading the Techcrunch blog this morning and they had an article on Google " Google Takes A Leap Back to 2001".  Google has released its 2001 search engine for show for their 10^th  year Anniversary.  Most of you know that I'm a huge fan of Google for many reasons,  including but not limited to the way they've taken the internet by storm.  But what's cool is the transformation of Google's logo from 2001 to 2008.  

Speaking in ‘car' terms It's as though Google's 2001 logo was equivalent to  a Volkswagen Beetle,  bubbled and cute - the kind of car you get when just getting out of college and on your way to face the ‘real world'.  If you work really hard and make lots of money you can trade in that old Beetle for a brand new 2008, fully loaded Mercedes Benz. 

The logo is sleeker, more modern and 'tricked out' with the famous  "I'm feeling lucky"  button. Of course there are many reasons a company will change their logo; sometimes for simple esthetics and other times for brand survival, I've outlined a few cases below: 

• Company has simply changed - The product or service or demographics has changed
• Company mission has changed - maybe they've decided to "Go Green"
• Logo is dated, old and doesn't reflect new  or modern trends in design

 A company's logo in most cases will change to reflect it's current growth position as well as the current design trends relative to the industry the company competes, i.e. Google.  But, It is still very important to make sure to not change your logo so much as to alienate your customers who have gotten use to your brand image.  To be honest, Google's logo changes has been so subtle over the years that the average person  looking at it probably wouldn't think that it changed at all.  The beauty of a great brand identity and logo design is the fact that even though the logo has obviously changed, it's still the same in the customer's eyes.  A great logo is a ‘living' image/identity that grows with your company's brand. 

I'm curiously to know  your thoughts from a graphic or logo design, branding perspective why Google has changed its logo over the years and what message is Google sending now that it didn't send back in 2001?

Need A New Company Logo or Change Your Existing One? Get A Free Quote From Our Designers Network:

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