Creating content is an excellent way to promote your graphic design skills. It can be tempting to write posts for graphic design services and publish them on your own website. However, unless you already have a large following, this is not the best way to get started. Look for established websites that accept freelance content instead.
Marketing Strategy for Graphic Designing Services
Simply establish yourself as an expert on the subject. I wrote about color theory, graphic designing, branding, graphic services, and nonprofit design. Make certain that whatever you write demonstrates your command of that particular skill/service. Consider the following factors when organizing your strategy for promoting your graphic designing business and graphic services:
Your Goals/Objectives: Do you want to work in graphic design full-time or part-time? Are you looking for your first clients or expanding your client base?
Your Target/Market: Do you specialize in a particular type of graphic design, such as focusing on specific business types or areas? Do you have any experience with a specific type of graphic design service that could help you excel in certain niches?
Your Budget: Those just starting out as a freelance designers may want to stick with mostly free options, whereas those who have a few clients and want to expand their base may be able to secure more funding for expanding their client list.
The answers to these key questions may assist you in determining the best strategy for marketing your graphic design business. Let’s look at some of the most important platforms and strategies you can incorporate into your overall marketing strategy and how they can help your graphic designing business grow.
Conduct Competitor Research
Following consideration of your ideal customer, you must consider your competitive landscape in the graphic design business. Graphic design is a highly competitive field. There are many extremely talented artists in the area. Unfortunately, many of these talented individuals will be competing for customers with you. Begin your competitor research by identifying three to seven direct competitors. These should be companies that operate in your industry and target the same types of customers. You should examine each of these companies marketing strategies separately. There are numerous frameworks available for competitor analysis. The SWOT analysis is the most well-known. If you are just starting out and have never conducted a competitor analysis, keep things simple.
Examine their social media platforms. Determine which social media channels these companies have a presence on, are active on, and have a high level of engagement on.
Examine their company’s website. Examine the type of content they publish on their blog, case studies they create, website traffic, and so on. The goal of this research is to discover commonalities between competitors.
Social Media
Social media platforms provide excellent marketing tools for graphic designers looking to grow their businesses. Because graphic designing is all about creating images and capturing the attention of your audience, social media can provide an instant assessment of your abilities. If you don’t have the resources to invest in advertising, you can build a following and community by creating free profiles and regularly promoting them with engaging images and examples of your work. Those with a larger budget can use paid advertising options on social networks to entice people to visit their profiles and interact with the page. This can help you target business owners or marketing professionals who are looking for a graphic designer.
Your Website & SEO
As we all know that creating a website and optimizing it, is one of the best decisions ones can make to advertise his/her work. Search engine optimization of a website (if it’s good) provides the best opportunities to build a concrete online identity to engage with potential customers who are interested in your graphic services and design work. A website provides a graphic designer with an excellent means of promoting his/her skills. A graphic designer should have an online portfolio to feature on his/her skills and past work. This provides customers with something to browse when they consider hiring you for your services. As one creates his/her website for graphic designing services, one should consider creating his/her professional profile on independent platforms, like Upwork.
Graphic Design Blog
Blogging allows you to speak about your industry on a regular basis, demonstrating your expertise and increasing brand awareness for your small business. You use these platforms to position yourself as a knowledgeable professional, answering common questions about your industry and providing insight into current trends. Blogging entails creating posts with images and text that directly engage your audience. Blogs are typically hosted on your main website, but you may want to create guest posts for other popular blogs in your industry to build name recognition.
Networking
Networking can be extremely beneficial in the development of any business. Reaching out to others in your industry and related industries can help you build your name and reputation. Use the professional networking site LinkedIn to nurture the connection and to preview additional opportunities to expand your network. When engaging with a new connection in person, make sure you have business cards on hand. This helps to promote your design firm. It can assist you in finding work because potential new clients may prefer to work with someone, they know rather than a new professional. You can also get work by convincing professional contacts of the importance of hiring a graphic designer when planning a new marketing campaign.
Email Marketing
Email marketing can be a highly profitable method of promoting your business. To make email marketing work for you, you must first build a high-quality list. The first step is to collect contact information from people who might be interested in your services. Consider offering incentives to entice people to give you their contact information, such as:
- Gated material that will pique their interest as they learn more about the importance of graphic design.
- You have the option of receiving regular newsletters or other information from you.
- Access to one-of-a-kind materials and content that will assist them with the remainder of their marketing strategy.
As you build your email list, you’ll discover that segmenting the list based on what people want to receive and where they are in the buyer’s journey can assist you in sending out content that is most likely to interest potential clients. Sending irrelevant material to potential customers will likely turn them off, so creating segmented lists can help you focus on delivering value. This is a long journey and it will eventually nurture your leads toward conversion.
Client Referrals & Reviews
People prefer and trust recommendations more than promotional materials. They understand that companies are more likely to say only positive things about themselves. Other clients who have had a positive experience, on the other hand, carry significantly more weight. It is possible to increase your chances of receiving client referrals by focusing on providing exceptional services to clients. When you have clients who are pleased with your services, contact them and ask if they are willing to provide referrals or reviews.
Grow Your Graphic Design Business with Marketing
Offering graphic designing services and building a graphic design business necessitates effective marketing strategies that allow you to showcase your talent and expertise. You can excel by understanding the value of integrated marketing campaigns and how to use your talent for creating visuals to enhance your client marketing efforts and the messaging you produce as you establish your startup.
Don’t Be Afraid To Experiment
Experimentation produces the most effective marketing strategies. Don’t be afraid to experiment with new ideas and strategies. Look at how others are marketing themselves (both competitors and completely unrelated businesses) and try similar things if they appeal to you. It’s important to remember that marketing takes time. Expect no immediate results from your first ad or your new Instagram account. Consider it a long-term investment and keep experimenting until you find a formula that works.
I hope you found this guide to creating a marketing strategy for your graphic design business helpful. Best of luck.
