Working with a freelancer. A boon or a bane?

If you’re working with a freelancer, I’m sure you know what the heading is talking about. Although hiring a freelancer has its own perks, but it has a look of disadvantages too. And sometimes it really brings you to question if it makes any sense at all! 

But luckily enough for you, we are here to help you get rid of this dilemma. Here are some of the reasons why you should consider before hiring a freelancer for the graphic designing project of your firm.

Conflict in ideas

To be able to work on the graphics of a brand, a graphic designer needs to know the brand inside out. The main challenge a freelancer faces lies in the understanding of the brand. Since a freelancer doesn’t work full time with a brand, it becomes difficult for him to be able to pay attention to details. 

Branding is not just about making logos and websites. It is a long process that requires an intensive understanding of colors, target audience, and the market. This doesn’t only require the expertise of the design software but a great deal of research and study. Branding is everything that satisfies the needs of the customers of a company. Starting from creating visuals and graphics, branding comprises all the activities that help form the definition of what people think about when they head the brand name. Advertising is also a part of the branding and enables send out a strong message to the customers as well as the investors and vendors of a company.

Inattentiveness

Freelancers have a lot on their plate. They deal with a lot of companies. It becomes difficult for them to give their 100 percent to just one company. Their attention is always divided as they juggle between different projects. In this process, they are bound to be exhausted and not be able to pay attention to. It is a widely known fact that a cluttered mind may do more harm than benefit. Especially, in the kind of world we live in today, the Internet has connected the world through a thread of its networks, and any kind of representation of the brand which might conflict with any group of people or culture may prove to be more disastrous than anyone can imagine. Hence a company needs to be carefully branded, keeping in mind the interests of all groups of people so that the company doesn’t end up in a lawsuit. 

Ineffective communication 

Because of not being able to work full time with the freelancers, the disputes faced while branding cannot be adequately addressed. This leads to ineffective communication, which in turn leads to a wrong message being sent to the public. This doesn’t only cost the company a lot of its valuable time, but also millions in its financial resources. Additionally, it takes years for the company to rebuild its image. 

Take, for instance, the example of how a company which had to spend millions in a lawsuit just because of one wrong spelled word used in the advertising. Yes, you read that, right! This is the sad tale of Red Bulls, one of the leading energy drink companies in the world. They were advertising their drink, saying it gives “wings,” which resulted in one of the consumers slapping them with a lawsuit, which he won. And subsequently, the company changed the word to “wiings” after learning an advertising lesson worth millions!

Time constraint

Freelancers continuously have to hop from one place to another. Hence they are constantly on the clock and are not able to take care of the company’s needs fully. This sometimes leads to unsolved problems. Any creative process like graphic designing requires hours and hours of both the client and the designer’s time together to be able to come up with an effective strategy. Therefore, if the graphic designer has a time constraint, the process can’t be effective and may not yield the best possible results.

What’s more, is that sometimes freelancers need to be paid on the basis of the time they invest in the company! This causes massive drainage of the company’s financial resources and time, which is completely different from the conception of why freelancers are hired because of the affordable financial edge they have over others. 

Accountability 

Freelancers are their own boss. Hence they are not answerable or accountable to anyone. Sometimes, this causes a problem if the person in question is not responsible enough. The company might have to take an extra incentive and make sure that their needs are being catered to. This doesn’t only cost the company additional time but is also an unnecessary occupancy of manpower. On the other hand, if a graphic design firm is hired, the person appointed to do the job is more responsible as he is answerable to his firm.

Hence, on the one hand, hiring a freelancer doesn’t make sense for the company for practical reasons. And on the other hand, although hiring a graphic design company makes perfect sense in terms of its effectiveness and efficiency, it is a substantial financial burden on the company. 

Therefore, the most pragmatic decision is to get an online graphic design website to do the graphics for your company, which doesn’t only eradicate all the above problems but is also highly cost-effective.