Five Secrets to Being a Successful Designer

Want to know some of the secrets to success as a graphic design freelancer? We’ve spoken to successful designers in the community and in our team to provide the best advice to help you survive and thrive as a freelance graphic designer on DesignCrowd and beyond.

Learn that criticism is a great tool to become a better designer. Like all creative fields, graphic design is subjective, and a customer may not always like your design proposal. If a customer doesn’t like your work, it’s not the end of the world.

Separate yourself from your work after completion. Listen to the client’s critique, move forward and develop your concept further. This is not to say that customers are always right. If they ask you to use more Comic Sans, you should probably accept defeat and move to a new brief! (Joking)

In a nutshell:

• Don’t get discouraged! You are participating in a design contest so your design proposal will not always win.
• Learn from your experiences and continue improving your skills, you will see how odds begin to change in your favor.

2. Critique yourself

To consistently have quality work as a designer you have to brutally critique yourself. Step back from your design and ask questions Is this the best I can do for the design brief? Am I rushing this just to have it completed quickly?

Know your skills! Graphic design has many career branches. You can focus on print, digital, UI/UX design, animation, branding, product and more. If you’re a print designer creating a web design, make sure you learn skills like HTML & CSS try Code Academy. Look up the principles of human-centered UI/UX design. Don’t just randomly start designing something that is outside of your field without first learning the skills.

Dedicate time to reading and understanding the creative brief. Ask the customer questions to make sure you understand what they are looking for.

Do your homework! Research will make you a better designer, so find out about the customer’s industry, competitors and target market to come up with a design that is coherent.

Importance of Originality:

4. Engage with the customer

Friendly and professional communication with the customer is an important skill designers must develop. Ensure you provide timely revisions and timely responses to a customer once they engage with you. If they are reaching out, it very likely means they are interested! They may even ask you to create other designs.

Important: On DesignCrowd, do not pressure your customer to guarantee a project, give you a good star rating or select you as winner. Let the quality of your work do that for you.

5. Work smarter and faster

Quality is still the top priority. However, to be a successful designer, you need to learn shortcuts and design tips to become quicker in creating your proposals. With this approach, you can focus on reviewing and participating in more design briefs.

Working faster allows you step away from your work and you won’t be as precious when you may not win.

Conclusion

• Researching your customer’s industry will allow your designs to have a clear vision.
• Know your skill strengths to help you work faster. Are you quick at hand drawing? Or are you quick at vectors?
• Protect your time. Avoid distractions like emails, text messages, memes etc.

Know what your time is worth and align this with the cash prize on offer in a contest. Then you’ll be able to participate in more contests and increase your chance of earning money.

Want more?

How to Interpret and Respond To A Logo Design Brief

Six Digital Design Trends for 2018

15 Design Websites To Turn You Into a Pro

Five Common Mistakes Graphic Designers Makes

Designer’s Guide To Submitting Work to Design Contests

How Crowdsourced Design Projects Work (Infographic)