067: 5 Things To Simplify In Your Design Business

Get Back To Design: Design Business | Designer | Creative Business

Running a design business can get overwhelming fast. If it were just the design work that would be one thing, but we all know there’s a lot more that goes into it. Simplifying your business can take a huge weight off your shoulders and free up time for generating more income or getting a chance to relax, so today we’ll go over 5 things you should simplify in your design business!

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1. Onboarding

Onboarding is a big piece of what you do for your clients and plays a large part in getting projects off to a strong start. Unfortunately, it can be insanely stressful and time-consuming.

Krista here! I used to take at least 4 hours to onboard each and every client. I used a ton of different systems and did a lot of manual work.

Think about what you can do to simplify your onboarding process if it currently takes you longer than 15 minutes.

• How can you make communication go more quickly and smoothly?
• What can you create templates for?
• What software can you use to replace several others and automate steps?
• Are you completing any steps that aren’t completely necessary?

Remember, you don’t have to reinvent the wheel each time. It should be easy!

2. Gathering Client Content

A huge complaint among designers is how hard it is for them to get content from clients. But 99% of the time, it’s not the client’s fault.

It’s your job to make it easy on yourself and your clients.

Remember, your clients don’t understand everything that goes into designing a website. Provide them with folder templates, checklists, and examples so they can get you what you need.

3. Services

Not having your services laid out well can complicate everything related to your client work.

Either you don’t have specific packages and simply list off the tasks you can help with or you have way too many services. Either way, this leads to things like sending custom proposals, invoices, content checklists, timelines, and pricing when all of those things could instead be made into templates.

Instead, have a few specific services listed out for clients to choose from. You’ll always get clients who want to customize things, but you’ll have a solid starting point.

4. Outsourcing

Outsourcing is supposed to make things easy, but if you aren’t prepared for it you’ll find yourself more stressed and overwhelmed than before. Managing people takes planning.

Having a clear process and systems makes things so much easier. Instead of having to double-check someone’s work or remind them how to do something repeatedly, you can have written systems for them to follow every time.

Even if you aren’t currently outsourcing, start documenting your systems now!

5. Your Entire To-Do List

Last, we have one that’s the easiest, but maybe the most important. When I talked to a handful of designers about what was stressing them out, it was their to-do list. And for most people, it was stemming from having far too much clutter surrounding the important tasks.

To help, make sure everything on your to-do list is giving you some kind of return and be realistic about what you can actually get done. Get rid of tasks that don’t impact your business or tasks that someone else could take care of for you.

Don’t Settle for Difficult

If you take a minute to think about it, you’ll probably find that almost everything you’re doing can be simplified in some way. However, it’s easy to just continue on.

But instead, start working towards simplifying. Don’t settle for things being more difficult than they need to be just because they “work”.

It might take some time and effort up front, but it’s less time and effort you’ll have to put in moving forward.

Action Steps

1. Choose one of the things we talked about today and get to work simplifying it

Resources

• Dubsado – This is the tool we both use to automate our client onboarding process! Everything from lead capture to sending contracts and invoices to keeping track of emails. Use the link above to get 20% off your first month. (That is an affiliate link because we love Dubsado!)

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