The Challenge with Outsourcing
Clients blame creatives. Creatives blame their clients
I just want to say - it's both their faults.
But ultimately - who owns the problem?
The Client does.
In my seven years of working with small to medium businesses, I’ve seen many outsourced projects end in disappointment. Often, clients are so eager to kick-start the project that they rush the onboarding process without:
Clearly defining the problem they want to solve
Identifying specific objectives
Ensuring the creative they’re hiring aligns with their vision and mission
Providing the creative with everything they need to deliver a customized and practical solution
After the disappointing outcome, clients often revert back to doing things in-house. Even if the work is mediocre, it becomes a more comfortable setup because they have control and avoid the high costs of outsourcing.
Eventually, their desire to achieve bigger and better things resurfaces, or a new, enticing creative collaboration appears, and the idea to outsource becomes appealing once again, only to relive the same cycle over and over.
Break the cycle! Communication is key.
Whether you’re hiring an interior designer, marketing strategist, graphic designer, or any consultant, YOU, the Client, must make it as easy as possible for the creative to understand your business.
The good news is, consciously or not, business owners infuse their persona into their business. Naturally, they use their tone of voice when writing content for the business, or develop their visual identity when selecting colors, fonts and photography preferences to display their products and services, or creating their pricing strategy when deciding who they want to serve and how accessible they want to be.
So, it’s all there. All you have to do is define it for others.
Think of it as crafting a capsule that allows them to perceive your vision as clearly as you do.
The most interesting discovery from my work with clients was that they were never really prepared to communicate what they wanted. I had never been given a written brief by a client. I have only had meetings where the client verbally expressed what they wanted, and then it was up to me to write a proposal and present it back to clients along with an estimate.
So although they expected me to understand and solve the problem creatively, I was hardly ever provided the relevant information to do so. Not because they were careless, but because they didn’t know all the things that could impact and inform my design. I learned the hard way that my first deliverable was developing a project brief if I wasn’t provided one. And yes - I charged for it.
I’ll give you a small example, I was working on a concept for a client, they were building a hub for artists - a hub for them to meet, have discussions and host informal events.
After interviewing the target client and developing an entire concept based on all the research, I was taken aback when, on the day of the final presentation, the client revealed a crucial aspect of their business model: selling popular best-sellers in the cafe. A product that contradicted all my findings that showed artists usually had niche preferences.
The project lost coherence. There was no clear link between the insights gathered from the artists and the requirement for best-selling books. If I had been aware of this earlier, I could have factored it into my design process, ensuring that the concept created would tie both in.
Source: Marketoonist
Business owners, here's my two cents:
If you leave the task of understanding your needs up to the creative, you're missing an opportunity to provide clearer direction from the start.
You don’t have to know exactly what you want, but you do have to paint a picture of your Business’ vision & reality.
Use the list below and respond to each category. Even if you're uncertain about some things, it'll help the creative understand your expectations and allow them to address them accordingly.
Project Overview
Summary of the project and its purpose.
Objectives
What are you trying to achieve? Think of tangible and non tangible outcomes.
Target Audience
Who is this for? Mention age, demographic, pain points.
Brand Information & Resources
Overview of the brand.
Your Golden Circle: vision, mission & values.
Brand guidelines (colors, fonts, tone of voice, etc.).
Any specific requirements, tools, or resources needed for the project.
Scope of Work
What deliverables are you expecting? Minimum and maximum.
Timeline
Essential dates the creative should consider.
Budget
Budget constraints and payment terms if unique.
Key Stakeholders
List of people involved in the project and their roles.
Business Background and Context
Relevant information that provides context for the project.
This project’s role in the business roadmap.
Competitive Landscape
Information about competitors and market positioning.
Success Metrics
Criteria for measuring the success of the project.
Communication & Feedback Plan
Preferred communication channels
How involved you want to be
Once you've brainstormed responses to all these points, share them with the creative you're working with and let them review them at their own pace.
Encourage them to bring any questions to the next meeting and to challenge or suggest alternatives to your responses. Make sure these align with you and your business.
“A problem well-defined is a problem half-solved.”
Don't hesitate to invest time in these early stages; having a clear direction is crucial for success.
For a printable copy of this checklist, click here.
