How To Start A Graphic Design Business – 10 Simple Steps

Starting a graphic design business can be a tricky yet exciting process. No matter what you are trying to achieve, whether you want a full-fledged business or you want to work for yourself on the side or even full-time. You can learn how to set up a graphic design business with ease if you’re up to the challenge and willing to work hard towards your goal.

You can achieve your desired result by following these easy-to-follow steps that we highlighted for you.

1. Find Clients To Start A Graphic Design Business

You should not get distracted with your portfolio or business name up front, and while that can be important, the first step should be to find clients. It’s easy to get distracted by how you present everything and lose track of the goal. 

For this reason, it is vital to get a few clients willing to work with you. Once you have that covered, you can move on to more of the aesthetics of the business you are setting up. 

It’s important to not be too picky with the clients you have the chance to work with. Some people feel strongly about only accepting high-quality work, but that might not be the most profitable way to start up. Once you have a good footing, you can then streamline the work you accept and decline. You can use the easy-to-use features and tools offered by Adobe Express, to make Instagram story designs, Facebook posts, your original logo design, and many other things that relate to social media marketing.

This is also a great way to gain experience and build a portfolio for yourself to present to the clients you actually feel passionate about working with. 

2. Set Your Price

The next step in the process is setting up your payment structure. Consider if you want to charge hourly or by the project. What’s the value of your work? What’s the market value of the product you are offering them? 

Most people opt for hourly as it’s the easiest way to go about it, but it is all dependent on what you’re working on. Consider if the design is something they will be permanently attaching to the company name, usually that type of work entails a higher price. 

The general rule of thumb is to shoot a number and adjust as you get more clients based on their reactions. If they don’t try to lower the number you offered, maybe go for a higher figure in the future. If they back out due to the price, maybe lower it in the future. Eventually, you will figure out the right price for your work. 

3. Name Your Business

The best way to go about naming your business is to follow this formula:

• Easy to say
• Easy to recall
• Easy to spell

You don’t have to be too clever or intricate, it just has to be catchy and stick in people’s minds. It’s best to stick to simple options. It’s also helpful in referrals, and references.

You should also make sure the name you choose is available on the web. It can be a problem if your business name is taken by another company, whether it’s in the same field or another. It can affect your ranking on search engines, as well as availability in domains and social media usernames. 

Additionally, it should encompass your vision of the company and fit in with what you imagined the company to be. In simple terms, it should speak to you. 

4. Build A Website

You should create a simple website for your new graphic design business. You should make sure it’s simple so that you don’t overcomplicate things for yourself and get stuck on this step. 

There are many websites that offer templates to create a portfolio website, you can choose one that is to your liking and quickly put it together. It serves many purposes and is easy to create.

5. Develop A Business Plan

The reason why this is so far down the list is to make sure you don’t get stuck visualizing and planning the business you want to create. Once you have the foundation laid out, you can go into how you want things to work and make everything right. 

This is when you can be specific about what types of services you’d like to offer, you can streamline your client list and work on projects that you want to represent your business. In this stage, you can also create a finalized payment structure, set goals in regard to revenue, and get creative about how to attract new clients and retain them. 

6. Communicate With Clients

Communicating with your clients frequently can ensure the most pleasing experience for both you and the client. A lot of things can get lost between the lines, it is vital to make sure everything is going the way it’s planned so that you don’t have any last-minute mistakes or misunderstandings. It’s better to be safe than sorry. 

7. Deliver On-Time And With Quality

This one is pretty self-explanatory. The quality and timeliness of your work speak to the reputation of your company. It is vital to keep everything in tip-top shape because most businesses grow due to word of mouth. While marketing campaigns can be great in generating new clients, organic growth is the best and most sustainable way to run a business. 

8. Write Professional Invoices

This step also speaks to your professionalism, you want your invoices to look good. The simplest way is to use Google Docs or Word and send it over email. But there are also websites you can use that allow you to create and send invoices very quickly. You might want to look into those options as they can be functional and timely. 

9. Collect Payments

When the project gets to the payment collection stage, it is important that you make the payment method as easy to use as possible as people tend to be busy and lazy. They tend to not want to put too much work into making payments. Depending on the country you’re in, you have a variety of options to use that allow for quick money transfers that you can deposit to your bank account. 

10. Ask For Referrals

As we have mentioned already, word of mouth is the greatest way to grow your business. This is why asking your clients to give you referrals can be an excellent way to organically grow your client list and revenue. 

We hope these tips will help you with how to start a graphic design business and if you need to hire website design professionals be sure to contact Matchbox Design Group here in St. Louis, Missouri.