I would like to tell you a story.  It is going to be roughly 800 pixels long, 250 pixels wide.  The color palette of this story is going to consist of colors from within the Trumatch and Pantone books.  We will start with a typeface that will grab your attention, but will not be so far away from the brand that you have already built that it will intimidate your target market.  Once we are done here you will end up with an Encapsulated Post Script, Portable Network Graphic and Graphics Interchange Format for utilization in print and web collateral.

Not really, but now you see how some Graphic Artists will speak with their clients.  I recently wrote an article on the importance of having a graphic designer create business cards for your company rather than trying to produce them at home.  In one of the responses that I received to that article it was suggested that I write an article on how to communicate to your graphic artist so that they know what you're looking for and you get what you want.

I am now starting to understand why there seems to be such a great rush to get away from utilizing these professionals, such as myself, to assist you with your companies branding (really just a fancy way of saying logo with an icon or special font and colors that can be utilized in other materials for your company),  business cards, brochures, website and the list goes on and on and on...

The best place for me to start is the same place that you should - The beginning.  Let's face it if your company is suffering from an identity crisis you need to fix a couple things before contacting a graphic artist.  Yes we are the creative ones, yes we do run on caffeine and nicotine and most of us perform our best work while the rest of the world is ridding the bottoms of their eyes of those nasty bags and dark circles, but we can only perform miracles every 3rd harvest moon.

Some of us may seem psychic, but we are just intuitive

Prior to contacting a graphic designer get yourself a pen and paper and start by writing down some ideas of your own.  Write out everything that you feel you are going to need.  This can (and should) start with a logo, and no I don't mean that web graphic that you downloaded 3 years ago that looks like 2 Nike® swishes intersecting each other that is why you are here reading this...now when I snap my fingers you are going to call a graphic designer...*snap* - thought it was a worth shot.  But seriously write down everything.  It's never too late to have a professional  logo and business collateral created.  If you look at some of the big players in the business world a refresh or rebrand can be a good thing.  Companies like Fido, Jack in the Box, Apple, Nokia - the Sci Fi network went so far as to rename and rebrand themselves as Syfy.  It's kind of like Botox for your business.  Now you have your list of things that you need to have designed we're going to get your preferences.

If you want the Emerald Palace start with the yellow brick road

Now that you know what you are going to get designed start thinking about the specifics.  What colors do you want?  What colors do you NOT want?  Do you know of any designs that could be helpful as inspiration ( I said inspiration, you should not get an exact copy, nor should any designer be willing to directly copy any existing work, inspiration and copyright law are two separate things)   This can be useful in assisting you with what you want and what you don't want.  A professional designer will always give you their opinion.  What works and what doesn't work.  If you own a company that creates and distributes baby clothes then fire-engine red may not be the best choice of colors for you.  On the other hand if you are the distributor of high performance auto parts you should stay away from leafy greens and baby blues.  Does that make sense?  Don't leave any aspect of the design open to interpretation.  We are the professionals and will let you know if what you want to see is not going to work.  As the business owner you need to know what you want - as the graphic artist I need to inform you about what works and what doesn't.

If the fine print is too small turn on the screen magnifier

The more research that I performed on this subject to find out what information graphic artists are looking for the more I was amazed at the fine-print I was finding.  -Price includes 1 revision - Price does not include ownership of final files - Price will be dependent on amount of time input - Are you kidding me.  Can you imagine going to buy a car and the salesperson tells you that the car you just bought only comes with steel rims but no tires? Or even worse you can take the car home, but we still own the rights to the car and might need to use it on long weekends or holidays?!?  Yeah?! Right?  Get all the details.  I know numerous graphic artists that do not charge for revisions, supply numerous different file types at the end of the project and sign over all ownership to the buyer once the job is done.

This article gives you a great foundation to start the communication with a Graphic Artist.  I am going to continue on with this subject in more detail in upcoming articles.  If you have a suggestion or question about this or another topic relating to graphic design please contact me I would be more than happy to assist you bridge the gap between you and your graphic designer.