How can a designer make more money today?

_{Photo Chrіs Martіn .}

Is it possible, with a constant level of quality of work, with all other identical indicators, starting to earn more right now? Not after a year of training, not after a month of attempts, but tomorrow to get the "extra" money? My answer is to all freelancers and many studio studios without exception - yes, it is quite possible!

There is hardly a designer who would not like to earn more by doing the same job. Well, would you give up the "extra" money? If yes - I envy your “Zen” and can close this page, and we will focus on pieces of paper with dead presidents :)
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The main feature is the need to correctly count the money. Any work (by the way, not only a designer) is an exchange of a part of a person’s life for a certain amount of money. It all comes down to the fact that you spend time on work and earn a certain fee for it.

I will open a few Kung Fu designer tricks that can allow you to earn more today. The numbers in brackets show how I managed to increase my earnings.

Crazy reception number 1: Take more money (+5 ... 15% $)

- What? How? I will lose all my clients!

Usually, the first reaction to this recommendation is just that. Yes, you will lose from 1/3 to 70% of clients depending on how much you increase the price tag. Nevertheless, the rest will agree to your prices, and new ones will come, who are satisfied with such a price.

If people made a choice, focusing solely on price, the world would be buried under Chinese plastic. Many of us work on rather expensive Macs, and in their pocket lies a multi-core smartphone. Think about it, for some reason you did not buy yourself a cheap 2 SIM card for 300 hryvnia? ;-)

Cunning trick number 2: To do faster (up to + 50% $)

You spend time - get money. The intermediate stage is the Result for which you are actually paid. In other words, if you give Result faster, then you will earn more per unit of time.

The key to tricky tricks is routine automation . Begin, in the end, to make full use of scripts, actions, frameworks and your own templates !

Home task

Take a sheet and write down in all details the process of working on the design. From reading the brief to packing the archive for the maker-up . Analyze what can be done from this point automatically, or semi-automatically.

For example:

• Do not draw the base mesh, but use the template;
• Start using paragraph and text styles in Photoshop CS6 (very handy for adjusting colors and sizes for all layouts with one button);
• Roll up a set of basic icons for prototyping (I use the Web Symbols font for this);

Never do the same job twice! Every minute and even second is important!

Hard reception number 3: Do less (+50 ... 200% $)

Pareto's law states that 20% of the work gives 80% of the result. This is true for any process in life, from the harvest of tomatoes and ending with the production of space Shuttles. Analyze how much time you spend on each stage of work, and boldly throw away what does not bring the maximum amount of money.

After such an analysis in my company, we completely abandoned the stages of site design and programming. They took these two points and threw them away, because they occupied 80% of the time, and brought only 20% of the profits. Now we are engaged in the development of interface prototypes and advertising campaigns, as a result of which we began to earn much more than during the “full cycle” times.

Of course, the site is ordered completely and on a turnkey basis, and the client doesn’t need an extra hemorrhoids with the search for designers and programmers, he wants everything in a “complex”, and we get another effective method.

Killer Reception # 4: Delegate (+ ∞% $)

At that moment, when the artist turns into a seller, there comes an understanding that it is not necessary to paint the paintings yourself in order to earn money from them.

Find yourself a partner in spirit, to whom you can give a part of the work, maybe even one that you don’t really like, and he adores her. Together you will do everything faster, each of you will do less, and for this you can take even more from customers!

Most of them are psychologically very hard to give someone a piece of work (and their earnings), but this will give you the opportunity to untie your hands. You will have extra time, no, not for PlayStation, but in order to do everything that brings you the greatest amount of money (hello, Pareto 20/80) and satisfaction!

A big plus of these techniques is that as soon as you start using them, you immediately feel the result. There was nothing - to take, and to do!


_{Jerrod Maruyama illustration.}

Jedi Reception number 5: Positioning (+ 50% $)

Who makes the best sites for banks? Specialist in the development of sites for banks. Who best makes websites for fashіon? Specialist sites fashіon. Who is the best ... well, I think you understood :-)

The point of positioning is to distinguish yourself from an entire army of your own colleagues and help the client choose you . Finding your niche, you firmly bind to yourself a certain type of customer.

You do not have to go to a specific area, you can choose a specific style, or another “difference criterion” (design for 14 days, design sites with 100+ layouts, design for a female audience, design by feng shui ...).

There is a good example - Stuart Hobday , a British designer who works in the same style. If I need a design with such a strict block layout, I know a specialist in this particular direction, and I will be ready to pay this specialist more than anyone else who will assure that he “can do that too”.

Jedi Reception number 6: Glory! (+100 ... 500% $)

A strange thing, but when you become famous - you get money just like that.

The overwhelming majority of designers neglect this technique, they say, publicity is not for them. They create cool things that are slowly placed in the portfolio, but the world does not know about you and your work until you tell him about them. And he won't find out about you either.

Think about what you can do so that as many people as possible can be heard about you as a specialist in your business? Perhaps you can tell the world about yourself and your work by writing an article on Habrahabr? How did you do one of your favorite projects? What rake came and how to solve problems? And it will be interesting to us, and it is useful for you - glory easily turns into money :-)

The main thing , remember: knowledge without their use does not cost anything . Make at least something from this list today, and I give you my word - you will immediately feel the effect!