Five Essential Questions to Rule Out Fake Creatives

So, you need a designer. As small business owners, we all do at one point or another. The problem is, it seems anyone and everyone can call themselves a ‘designer’ these days; and even worse, anyone can put a sign outside their office with the word ‘Studio’ or ‘Media’ on it, and call themselves a creative agency. 

Over the years, I’ve been burned more times than I’d like to admit, hiring what I thought were local, experienced design studios, only to find out they outsource all their work overseas, don’t employ a single in-house designer or creative director, and only have experience designing their mate’s window washing flyers in Microsoft Word.

So, how can you tell if you’re hiring a real designer or agency, and not just someone who’s played on Photoshop for three hours, or god forbid, an inexperienced middle man who’s hiring freelancers for a pittance to do all their ‘agency’ work for them (and pocketing most of your hard-earned cash)?

The answer is pretty simple: ask questions, and then ask some more.

If you’re a small business and need something professionally designed – whether it’s a flyer, a logo, a website, or your entire brand strategy – you need to treat the project like you’re hiring an employee, because essentially, that’s the relationship you’re going to have.

You wouldn’t hire an employee without being impressed by their CV, so why would you hire an agency without being impressed by their portfolio? You wouldn’t hire an employee who’s not transparent about who they’ve worked with, so don’t hire an agency or designer that can’t give you solid, straight answers about their experience and team.

And for goodness sake, you wouldn’t hire an employee with a half-finished, ugly-ass personal website with no experience listed and grammar errors every six words, so please, please use the same standards when hiring a designer.

Here are our top five essential questions to ask when hiring a creative to rule out the fakes:

1. In a nutshell, tell me about you and your experience.

You should be looking for a designer or agency with multiple years’ experience, with knowledge of industry-leading software, and who keeps up with current trends and tech. If you’re a mid-sized company, you want someone who’s worked with mid-size companies. If you’re a sole proprietor, you want someone familiar and comfortable with working with small businesses. Make sure who you hire not only has the experience needed, but the time to deliver the project when you need it.

2. Can you show me some work you’ve done that’s similar to my project?

As mentioned above, hiring a design agency is much like hiring an employee; you’re going to want to see finished projects that demonstrate their ability. If you need a school prospectus designed, ask to see multi-page brochures or magazines they’ve designed. If you need an e-commerce website, make sure to ask to see a variety of online shops they’ve created. 

3. Do you contract work out to freelancers?

This isn’t always a bad thing, but if the answer is yes, ask if they have an in-house creative director, or who manages the design process. The reason you hire an agency is for the team, which usually includes junior and senior designers, specialists and a creative director. The whole team will work together to make sure your project is perfect. If the agency you’re using doesn’t have an employed, in-house creative director, there’s no point using the agency at all – you might as well go straight to a freelancer.

4. Can you tell me about the design team who will be working on my project, and can I meet with them?

This is a great question to make sure you’re getting the most bang for your buck, and to ensure you’re getting a complete and experienced team and design service. A collaboration of minds is better than a single mind, so ideally, if you’re hiring an agency, make sure you get to know the whole team behind your project. If your one and only contact at the ‘agency’ isn’t a designer (i.e. just a salesperson or business developer), run. Run far, far away.

5. Could I have some of your clients’ details to contact them for references?

Feedback means everything. If they won’t give up their clients’ deets for a reference, well, what the heck’s up with that? Either they don’t have enough good references, or they haven’t done enough work, or maybe they’re just weird; all reasons are enough to make you want to move right along.

Don’t forget…

You want to work with someone who fits your style and vibe. Are you feelin’ it with who you’re looking to hire? Or do you have that thing in the back of your head telling you something’s not quite right? Listen to your inner business guru – inner guru knows best.