The Design and Marketing Podcast – Graphic Design, Web Design, Running a Design Business, solopreneur, entrepreneur, micropreneur

The next guest in my series of interviews for the Design and Marketing Podcast (please subscribe and/or leave a review) is Jon Phillips.http://youtu.be/ksXa6_IINv8These interviews are mainly of designers who run their own businesses. While Jon may not spend all his time running a business now (and we'll get onto that later) he certainly fits into this group very well.He's a native of Montreal, Canada and picked up web design by teaching himself while working at a call center.Jon's background and hobbies strike a familiar chord (get that one!) amongst those I've interviewed so far. Jon is a guitarist and has a love of creating things and "seeing how things work".It's amazing how many of the web designers I talk to are musicians and love all sorts of creativity. They also usually have an interest in the technology of the modern world. Jon is no different.After a few years of making websites for family, friends and clients he stopped working at a call center and became a fulltime freelance web designer.It's funny because I thought I "knew" Jon from corresponding with him so regularly online for maybe 5 years. But having just talked to him I realise that what I knew was only the tip of the iceberg.So, just for the record, here is the order of sites that Jon started, built up to be successful, and sold in order to move on to bigger and better things.FreelanceFolder Design-Newz SpyreStudios MediaLootIf you look at those four sites, you'll find that each one is highly trafficked (and we're talking tens of thousands of visitors a day) and has an extremely high authority within the design niche.This is testament to Jon's ability not only to set up and maintain hugely useful blogs but also to know when and who to sell them to. It's important to note that Jon didn't throw them out to Flippa and see who'd bid the highest price. He sold them to people he knew, for example, he sold FreelanceFolder to Mason Hipp who was already an advertiser there.Jon is very modest about his involvement. But, especially when you consider English is only his second language, setting up these amazing sites has been an incredible achievement.Working with a teamJon now has a job! Setting up and selling four successful websites secured him some incredible contacts. He used these to get some amazing freelance gigs, but these contacts also led him to working for BuySellAds the online advertising network.After being shut in a room working by himself for so long, Jon has really warmed to chatting with a team everyday. He obviously really enjoys the camaraderie of getting together with like-minded people to build a great product. And, who wouldn't?You can do it – just go with the flowBut let's go back to Jon's amazing achievements. Jon modestly puts this down to "going with the flow" and I think there's something in that. Now, "going with the flow" doesn't mean laying back and seeing where life takes you. There's a proactive element to starting loads of sites and seeing what works.This philosophy reminds me of the spirit of the book "Screw It, Let's Do It" by Richard Branson, where you really get a sense of the enjoyment of entrepreneurial activity. I seem to remember the Virgin boss saying something like, "Wouldn't it be fun to start an airline? Let's do it!"A lot of these successful sites started with a thought in Jon's head. For example, one day he thought: "wouldn't it be great if there were quality design resources all in one place at a reasonable price?" And so he created it.That's not to say it's easy or that all these ideas come off. Most of them don't. But you've got to keep trying. :)

I was absolutely sure that this Design and Marketing Podcast interview with Paul Jarvis was going to be excellent. And, I was right – don't you just love it when a plan comes together?http://youtu.be/B1EqcGHbFkUI knew that Paul was great in i...

http://youtu.be/tFZhND9Pw4QOne of the very many benefits of interviewing various creative business people for the Design and Marketing podcast is that it takes me away from my small world.During the last few years on this website I have mostly ...

The latest in my oh-so remarkable series of interviews with design business owners is a great one. OK, I know I keep saying that but this one is great, believe me.http://youtu.be/1H6N22DHVyEThe fantastic thing about this interview was that I didn't really know Matt Shuey before I spoke to him. We were introduced via Google+ which is becoming a remarkable place to network.It was wonderful to speak to someone half way around the world about web design business and find that we agreed on so much.Here's one bit of advice to web designers that I very much concur with:Learn the basics!It's important to learn how websites work. Web designers should learn about design (how the website looks and functions for the user) as well as development (how the website works "under the hood", so that's HTML, CSS, PHP, JS, WordPress, etc.)You should always be able to create a beautiful visual of a website in a graphics program first. Matt and I believe that this work in the primary stage will stop problems occurring later.We both agree that web designers need to learn how to code and that they should understand both the design and the development sides.Both Matt and I struggled with static HTML sites. Matt then went on to learn PHP server-side includes before coming to WordPress via an unfortunate Joomla detour. I lucked out by being introduced to WordPress back in 2006.How to compete against website templatesMatt has been in the business for a long time. He's gone from static HTML to WordPress-based sites for his clients. Recently he's recognised potentially stiff competition from the WordPress template business. Nowadays, virtually anyone can buy a template from WooThemes, bung a logo on it and charge a client $700 for their "new, bespoke" website. This is competition at the lower end of the market (and I've warned against cheap and easy website builders) but it's competition none-the-less.His answer? Build templates.Matt is now in the process of creating multiple templates for his own clients. Eventually his clients will be able to buy templates directly from his site, which is a form of web design business passive income that interests me.With templates, Matt points out, that clients need to choose one that is 99% what they want, otherwise a custom solution will be necessary.SEO and diversificationMatt has kept up with SEO since he first started designing websites in 2002. And it's changed so much in 10 years – hell, it's changed so much in the last 10 months!In order to compete and ensure constant income streams, Matt has had to diversify his web design business into other areas, like SEO.The SEO industry, Matt concedes, has a terrible image problem of fly-by-night, salesy-types offering high Google rankings by dubious means. You need to work hard with a client, persuading them of the on-going effort that is necessary. Matt provides his clients with content for their websites which is then linked to and shared in a natural and white-hat manner.As Matt provides value in this way – both to his clients and to the internet as a whole – he is rewarded with repeat income and ongoing recommendations.10 Worst Websites of 2013Matt mentions in our interview a great post on his site that is a example of "link bait" or an article that will attract a lot of links or social media shares. The 10 Worst Websites does have some painful examples of awfully badly designed sites.Above is my "favorite" – only the fifth worst website of 2013 (1995 more like!) Surely there aren't 4 worse than that?You can do itYou can stay in business for as long as Matt has, but only if you are prepared to really know your stuff and stay ahead of the game by observing the threats and maximizing opportunities in the way he has.

I have been pestering my latest victim interviewee for the Design and Marketing Podcast (subscribe or leave a review, folks) for weeks and weeks before she gave in!Louise Myers is a fantastic example of a designer who has never stopped learning.You have to listen to this interview because there is so much to take from Louise's inspiring story.http://youtu.be/GmqVJrjscaAThe main points I got from her story were:Everything changes Have a cushion Be flexible Specialise And keep trying!Everything changesLouise's background is in catalog design and at one point in the 90s she probably thought she could go on doing that forever. However, that work dried up for several reasons – not the economy, for once. But, it shows you that you can't really rely on anything – and especially not in this business.Have a cushionIf you have a good year and make lots of money – put half of it in the bank! This is the way Louise was brought up (and me as well!) and this is invaluable advice for freelancers.Be flexibleAlthough Louise had set up her work from home business around catalog design she had to adapt to survive and she branched out into all sorts of other areas of graphic design. She has diversified in order to grow her design business.SpecialiseHowever, you don't want to be a jack of all trades and a generalist because then clients won't be able to pigeon-hole you and never know when to call you! All successful graphic designers have some sort of specialty that people can associate them with.And keep trying!Success is the ability to go from one failure to another with no loss of enthusiasm, as Winston Churchill would say. Louise can bear testimony to this. She may say that her success was in part due to luck but I'm not so sure.So how did she do it?The thing with the traffic? Simple, she kept on trying. This time last year, Facebook was moving all its (fan)pages to the timeline layout. Louise wrote a post about it. Bang! The rest is history.If you blog and blog and blog, sooner or later, you'll hit on a subject that has huge demand. Because the Facebook timeline page design was so new, there wasn't so much written about it on the web. Louise had chanced upon a goldmine of visitors – that later became a goldmine of subscribers, and then and a goldmine of customers. Learn more by listening to the interview.You can do itAs Louise has shown us, if you score a blogging "home run", you've got to pick up the ball and run with it. That terrible mixture of sporting metaphors means: if you're getting great traffic blogging about a particular subject, blog more about that subject. And then, productize!Pay particular attention to social media. And by that I don't mean tweet, share and like, I mean react quickly to any social media changes to layout and visuals. I have found out myself these are a particularly rich vein of traffic. Just last week, I posted about the new YouTube channel art and already I've had over 1,000 visitors to that page here and over 500 video views of the movie at YouTube.Social media is going more and more visual and graphic designers can capitalize on this!Don't be ashamed of your naked Facebook page! Go to LouiseM.com and sign up to her mailing list to find a host of cool social media design tips. And I would also advise you to get her great e-book: "Create your Facebook Timeline Fan Page to Look Great and Engage Fans" on PDF or Kindle.

This is my 8th podcast and interview with an independent graphic designer. In this episode I talk to Karen Mareš, née Karen McDade, about travelling, Photoshop, design, clients, websites and life!Click here to subscribe to my "Design and Marketing Podcast" on iTunes!Have laptop, iMac, Cintiq; will designIt's probably misleading to describe Karen as a "travelling graphic designer". But, as you'll see from the interview, Karen has lived and worked in 4 different places in the last 7 years – Johannesburg and Durban in South Africa, Ireland and Gibraltar. And during this time she has successfully set up office, found clients and run her graphic design business for her existing clients without any interruption.(More about running a design business whilst travelling here.)One of the familiar characteristics of the successful graphic designers I've been speaking to recently is that they all provide an exceptional product for their clients, which ensures repeat business. You can only go so far with marketing and web presence. Karen has consistently relied on the quality of her work to get more work. She does great work for one client who recommends her to the next client, and so on.Working while travellingShe's "taken" her original clients with her everywhere she's been. She was working for her Jo'burg clients in Durban; took her Durban clients to Dublin; and now she's in Gibraltar she's working for clients in South Africa, Ireland, Britain and the US!She picks up work wherever she is but picking up work from the host country hasn't always been as easy. Karen described Ireland as a "tough nut to crack" in terms of getting work, until she realised that you have to get out and meet people (usually in the pub) in order to secure contracts.Getting clientsThe work comes from recommendations, meeting people face-to-face, 3rd party design sites/social media and the website – Karen has her portfolio at OmegaRed.co.za and her blog at KarenMcDade.com.Karen has been very active on "social" design sites like Dribbble, DeviantArt, Behance, etc., which gets her name out there and secures her reputation within the community.She has also had her work used in Advanced Photoshop magazine on three separate occasions. She found being published in a high-profile industry magazine extremely validating and all this exposure leads to getting more and more work.You can do it!It's clear from the interview that Karen finds herself in a blessed position. She is running a design business, working from home doing something that she loves to do.Of course it helps to have a talent like Karen's but she'd never received any formal training. She just sat down in front of Photoshop after she'd left college. What happened after that was a mixture of hard work, persistence, talent but, above all, a passion about what she does.If you are passionate about your digital creations you could do a lot worse than to listen to the interview and get inspired! I was. :)

I'm really excited to welcome Alex Mathers to the Design and Marketing Podcast. Alex is a freelance illustrator who has been on my radar for many years primarily because of his excellent RedLemonClub site for freelance creatives. I joined his mailing list back in 2009 (I don't think I've been on any other list for so long) and I've benefitted from all Alex's tips for finding work.http://youtu.be/NHX9OD4z49kAlex is an illustrator (he actually also works for some Californian company that have something to do with search). Interestingly, he first started making money as a freelancer by submitting illustrations to iStock.Now, Alex runs several sites – as well as the aforementioned RedLemonClub, he also runs ApeOnTheMoon showcasing contemporary visual art as well as the eponymous AlexMathers.net. He receives passive income from sales of various e-books, including Promo 3.0 [Kindle] which about how freelance creatives should promote themselves (I've read this and it's excellent!) and his Google+ Guide which is about winning great clients through Google+ mastery. How freelancers should find workWe talked about Alex's philosophy on internet promotion in 2013. First of all, Alex was at pains to emphasise the importance of having a quality product. It might sound obvious but, believe me, many people don't get this. Marketing is all about producing a quality product that people want to buy. Everything else is piffle.So, if you're a web designer, you must concentrate on making the best possible websites first and foremost. Strive for excellence. To a certain extent a great product is great marketing because people will see your sites and talk about them.After that, Alex highlights the importance of developing real friendships with people rather than selling your wears in the traditional way. It doesn't matter whether the relationships are with potential clients or not – but they need to be within your targeted niche. Then, if you provide value to these people, they will amplify your reach and potential.Location independenceAnother interesting side to Alex Mathers is his travels. Alex lived in Sweden, Barbados and Jamaica during his childhood. However, more interestingly, this time last year Alex suddenly decided to go to live in Japan. He'd always loved certain Japanese illustrators and had friends there.What happened to Alex while in Japan? He found putting himself outside his comfort zone extremely important and inspiring. Putting yourself in a difficult situation which you then live with and overcome can make you feel really alive and improve your productivity. I found this while living in Brazil for a month at the end of last year.What you can doAt the very least, you must head over to RedLemonClub to download Alex's free book: "9 Things Freelancers Absolutely Must Do to Land Lots of Quality Clients". And let us know what you think about this interview in the comments below!

Here is my 6th show in the Design and Marketing Podcast where I speak to Aussie web designer and passive income fiend, John Romaine from BringTheDonuts.We talk a bit about John's background in the east coast of Australia as well as contributory factors that led up to his decision to quit his stable government job to run a web design business on his own.John is at pains to mention two books that led to this decision and they need to be read in order! Both books are by Robert Kiyosaki.The first book (which I'd read but I didn't have the heart to tell John I'd not gotten much out of it! :) ) is Rich Dad Poor Dad. The second is the Cashflow Quadrant. Both books explain how to acquire income generating assets to make money work for you rather than the other way around. I have just ordered the Cashflow Quadrant from Play.com (I'm boycotting Amazon). John made a point of mentioning these two books so I'm definitely going to give Robert Kiyosaki a second chance.The big switch Once you have decided to leave your job, the big conundrum is – when? John and I have different experiences of this but we both agreed on one thing: there's never going to be a perfect time to do it, so "now" is always a good time!John recalls the horror of leaving a $80,000pa job for life by saying he "crapped his dacks", which translated from Australian into English means he pooped his pants! Here is some sage advice for those thinking of making the big switch:Only leave your full time job when you already have some great clients under your belt Only leave your full time job when you've cleared your debts and have a substantial amount of money in the bank (maybe 3-5 months of your current salary) Only leave your full time job after you have your brand, website, business cards, etc., sorted out Try to sort out some part-time work to give yourself a smooth transitionThe sudden realisation of having bills and rent to pay with no money coming in drove John to get out there and bang down doors. John didn't have the luxury I had of a two year smooth transition. While I was able to have clients find me over a period of time, John had to go round local businesses to find work straightaway. But, when something has to get done, it usually gets done.Now John runs a thriving web design and development business – but that's not the full story. Passive income As with every other interviewee so far in my Design and Marketing Podcast, John is a designer who is earning passive income. He is forever looking at how he can provide value in a product for which there is demand.A lot of John's products came from his "active income" or client work. For example, John created a CMS for an estate agency (realtor) and then sold it as a product to other estate agencies online.With passive income, it is so important to create a product that there is demand for. If you have been asked to do something by a client, there is a chance that other people in the same industry will want the same thing. Running a web design business I couldn't let John go without grabbing a few assorted tips and tricks from his books. John has some really great ideas for managing projects like:priority surcharges late payment charges and adding additional features to projects properlyJohn emphasises that putting these extra clauses in a contract can save you from a heap of problems in projects and earn you more money! What you can do This really has been one of my favorite interviews so far. I urge you to listen to as much of it as possible if you're running a design business or thinking of doing so. In fact, there's great advice here for small business owners generally.Please if you have any questions for John or myself, leave them in the comments below.

My guest for the fifth episode of the Design and Marketing podcast is the wonderfully witty Wes McDowell. (Duration: c. 45 minutes.)Wes runs a design shop in Los Angeles, California, and is known for having one of the best design podcasts on iTunes, The Deeply Graphic DesignCast.But only a few years ago Wes was freelancing in Seattle. How did he get here from there? We talk about that in the podcast, here are some of the main points.Offering other services Wes has found that in order to attract and keep the quality, well-paying clients you need to diversify your service offerings. His company, the Deep End Design, offers print design, SEO, copy-writing and a host of other services instead of just web design.If you are just offering web design you are almost irrelevant in today's market place. The allied areas of SEO, copy-writing, social media profile design, etc., are just as important to a website's success as the design is. So if you aren't offering the complete package to your clients you're really short changing them – and you're earning less money.Outsourcing In order to be able to provide this one-stop service to the best clients you're going to need help with development, SEO, copy-writing, you name it!Wes explains how to communicate effectively with outsourcers and potential outsourcers in order to find the right people with whom you can form lasting relationships and grow your business.Promotion It was amazing how similar our experiences had been here. I found that by putting out good content that designers would like I was able to get good links to my site and gain exposure that way so that clients find me. Wes finds that by putting great content out with his podcasts he has ensured the same.Doing great workProbably the best part of the interview is where Wes explains how he's stayed in business by continually impressing his best clients. He spends hours researching each new project. He looks at similar work online. He sees what's worked in the past, what hasn't worked, what's been done to death. He gets inspired. He doesn't just open Photoshop and go plonk, plonk plonk!Dedication and pride in his craft have obviously served Wes well.The interview with Wes McDowellAs I explain in the podcast, I was in Brazil when we recorded the interview and a fire had started outside my apartment just before. I was stressing about the Skype recorder as well as worrying about being burnt alive! Wes was so great at putting me at ease.http://youtu.be/gLC3Foi4BvwYou can do itHave a listen to the podcast as it will definitely give you some great advice about running your own design business. And, if you have any questions about this or the podcasts in general, don't be afraid to ask!

Ever since reading The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss a few years ago I've been fascinated by the location independent lifestyle. It has occurred to me many times that, apart from the odd occasion I go to meet clients, I can pretty much do my job anywh...

Here is our third Design and Marketing Podcast where we welcome back Tara Roskell, who we featured on our first podcast, to talk about designing logos. Tara and I have been "blogging buddies" for a long time, by the way. :)http://youtu.be/llkSbwexFOETara, a highly experienced graphic designer, has a hit course on Udemy called How to Design a Logo - a Beginners Course. The course shows you how to design a logo from brief to completion. Tara actually takes a logo design brief from a client on Skype and then breaks down the whole process into simple steps.I have read many books on design and done many courses, but I haven't seen "designing" broken down into a step-by-step process in this simple way before. If you follow these steps every time you design a logo you will come up with more ideas and are likely to have a better end product. The logo course may be for beginners but I think designers with many years experience will find value in her course.Both in Tara's logo course and the above interview there is information on the following. The process is gone into far more detail in Tara's course than we do in our short interview.How to generate initial ideasTara and I are both devotees of mind-mapping when trying to come up with logo ideas. Tara talks extensively about her mind-mapping technique, which she uses for word associations and visual connections. Tara also talks a lot about doing mood boards.How to use sketching to get your ideas down quicklyA lot of great logos come about as a result of sketching various ideas. Lots of great ideas can come this way. Tara talks in her course about not only sketching out ideas with text but also finding and sketching different symbol ideas. She also really breaks this important process down to include many different ways of doing it to generate new ideas.About different fontsWe didn't talk too much about fonts in the interview but Tara explains how she goes about choosing them for the logos she designs and her favorite places to find good typefaces.Putting it togetherIn her course Tara explains all the different ways to sketch a logo: combining two or groups of letters, type positioning with symbol based logos, the use of geometric shapes, working with a single letter to form an icon and other ways you can put the logo together.Tara stresses that it's always important to consider every type of logo during this stage as otherwise you could miss that "killer idea".About different color optionsIn the course, she talks about color theory as well. She explains how to experiment with and choose colors or combinations of colors.How to work up the best ideas in Adobe IllustratorThis is the very important stage of turning your sketches and scribbles into perfect vectors in Illustrator. There are some alternatives to Illustrator but the important point is to work on logos digitally in vector not as bitmaps!How to send the ideas to the clientFinally we talk about how to send the ideas to the client ... and the dreaded client feedback. What to do if the clients says, "I don't like any of them!" (This doesn't often happen!)Tara Roskell's Logo Design CourseThe course, entitled How to Design a Logo - a Beginners Course, already has over a thousand happy students. It has the maximum 5 stars after 29 reviews on Udemy!This course also includes a bonus 60 page e-book guide of how to design a logo including warm up exercises and a sample logo project. There is a 30-day money back guarantee. And the one-off payment gives you a no limits lifetime access. You can ask a question at any stage of the course and Tara will answer it personally.But wait, there's more! If you want to get a 51% reduction on the course (and who wouldn't?) get this coupon / redemption code: robcubbon22 and paste it in on this page here – and you'll only pay $22 instead of $45!

The second show of my Design and Marketing Podcast has an interview with Andy Sowards, a web designer and blogger from Virginia, USA.If you haven't checked out Andy's blog you really need to – it's going to be one of the top web design blogs out there.The great thing about Andy's story is that he was working in Subway after having left college only a few years ago. Fast forward only three or four years and he's a sought after web designer with a blog getting thousands of visitors a day.Not that there's anything wrong with working at Subway, of course, and definitely not for Andy because that was where he met his wife. And this brings me on to another amazing part of the Andy Sowards story – that fact that he's the father of four very young children!http://youtu.be/QmnF9gG8vQsIn the interview we talk about:How he got started How he learned the basics of web design both by himself and in his first design job How he set up his own business and started working from home How he finds time to work and blog with 4 kids! Thoughts about the future and passive incomeIt was really great to talk to Andy who, although busy, is a very relaxed and easy-going guy.Before the interview started I couldn't get Skype to work. I spent about 15-20 minutes messing around and finally, after restarting my mac, I was able to do the interview and Andy was super cool about that!Hard work and engagementProbably the two things that have the biggest contribution to Andy's success are: hard graft and his ability to engage with people. Andy says in the interview that if there's one thing he's learned while blogging is to keep at it!You can see his gift of engagement, too, through his Twitter stream. One of the ways Andy first started getting his name about as a web designer was through Twitter. I have found Twitter great for information but not great for getting work. Andy, however, really helps people out on Twitter. He answers queries and gets involved in conversations.He also engages a lot through his Facebook fan page. This is obviously the way forward with social media.Of course, you have to remember that the blog is the most important thing of all when getting your name and business out there. But you can learn a lot about doing social media correctly by following Andy's Twitter or Facebook.How am I doing?The podcast with Tara Roskell was downloaded 232 times and the video was viewed 122 times!Tell me what you think of my interview with Andy. Or tell me if you'd like me to interview anyone in particular.Here is the subscription link on iTunes.

Drumroll please! Yes, this (above) is my first podcast. The first of the imaginatively titled Design and Marketing Podcast.What the first episode is about ... The subject of my first interview is the very wonderful Tara Roskell. Tara is a graphic designer with many years experience who is based in Northamptonshire in the United Kingdom. She has been running her successful design business from home (she calls it freelancing) for many years now. Tara also runs IdeasUploaded which is a site for inventors, ideas people, artists and designers wanting to license their work or get it to market place.http://youtu.be/skHdj96dc5kIn the interview we talk about:how Tara got started as a designer how she found clients initially where she plans to take her business in the futureOne of the directions Tara is taken is creating courses. Tara explains how there's a lot of information around about design software but, alas, not so many courses on the design process.The first of these courses Tara has done is called the Logo Design Course for Beginners. Tara stresses that the course is for complete beginners but I would say that seasoned graphic designers can learn something from her meticulous presentation of the logo designing progress.Tara will be coming back for my third podcast to talk specifically about logo design.The Design and Marketing Podcast is about ... The Design and Marketing Podcast will be concentrating on how graphic and web designers and others can market their business to increase and vary their income streams.As regular readers of this blog know, I set up a full time design business 6 years ago thanks, primarily, to a WordPress blog. Since then I have been learning about blogging, social media, SEO, email marketing and monetization. I've also been sharing my knowledge and results with the wider community. One of my special interests is passive income and this podcast will interviewing individuals who are specifically successful at maximising their passive income with effective marketing and creative design!Where these podcasts are going ...I'm really pleased to finally get this podcast up and running. It's another platform to explore. I'm going to try to improve the audio quality and get some better music. I'm sure my interviewing technique will improve. Oh and, by the way, I had a cold when I recorded the intro and outro for the show so that will improve as well!My next podcast will be with Andy Sowards. You should check out his design blog as he has done so well in such a short space of time.What you can doPlease, if you have time, listen to part or all of the podcast and let me know what you think. If you have any questions about podcasting please ask. Otherwise, I'd love to hear who you'd like me to interview. See you in the comments!And, if you think you'd like to hear more of my podcasts, please subscribe on iTunes and you'll be able to access them easily through iTunes without even having to come to my site!