If you ever tried doing many things at once under tight deadlines, you probably know from experience that it’s not the best option. In this case, the chances of missing a crucial detail, doing something wrong, or simply not delivering the expected excellent outcome are pretty high. 

But imagine if someone could lend you a helping hand when you’re feeling overwhelmed and stressed with the number of tasks to finish. Sounds nice, doesn’t it?

That’s how outsourcing works: you find a person, a team, or an agency and hire them to do a particular piece of work for your company or brand. They get paid, and you get the job done quickly without sacrificing quality. 

If you haven’t outsourced design work before, you naturally might have some concerns regarding whether it’s actually worth the time, money, and effort invested. And that’s what we’re going to discuss. Being an outsourcing design agency, we at TodayMade naturally know a lot about the process. So we want to share our small piece of wisdom with you and help you figure out if outsourcing is your go-to.

What’s so good about design outsourcing? 

These are the most common benefits of outsourcing graphic design.

1. It helps you deliver projects on time

It’s quite common for projects to have either tight deadlines or not enough people to support them. While this challenge can easily be solved with the help of team extension, such a solution isn’t always time- and budget-friendly. 

Outsourcing, on the other hand, can help you quickly find the right professionals to join your team and handle part of the work, resulting in a timely delivered project.

2. It allows you to find designers with specific skills

Your company may already have an in-house designer or even a whole design team. But designers are not jacks-of-all-trades. Some create stunning graphics but cannot animate them. Some specialize in designing amazing websites, but brand identity is not on their list of strong skills. 

Surely, you can fill the skill gap by hiring another in-house designer. But outsourcing might be a better option if you need a specific skill for just one project. 

3. It allows you to get new insights and a fresh perspective

If your in-house design team has been working together for a while, they may already have their own system and work approach. This is great for delivering stable results on time, but becomes a bottleneck if you need to come up with new ideas or are seeking areas for improvement. 

Outsourced designers, on the other hand, can become a breath of fresh air for your in-house team, sharing their expertise, insights, and new ideas. They can point out things that can be improved or suggest ways to combine recent trends with your existing branding. 

4. It helps save costs

As you probably guessed from the points above, turning to outsourced professionals can also benefit your budget. It takes time and money to find, hire, and onboard an in-house designer — and it’s worth the effort if you are looking for a permanent addition to your design team. 

But this isn’t always the case. Small businesses and startups often cannot afford to expand their team permanently whenever they need a professional with expertise in motion design, 3D, or other skills the existing team doesn’t have. And even if your company has the money to hire a new in-house employee, it might not be reasonable if you need them for one or two short projects.

With outsourced professionals, you get the right skills, expertise, and help for as long as needed — a month or two or even half a year. And you can cease this cooperation whenever a project finishes. 

In general, outsourcing is a flexible solution that can help companies of all sizes and forms. Let’s take Slack as an example.

Before Slack became the popular communication tool for many businesses worldwide and a well-known unicorn, it was a small startup with a great vision and a prototype. But they didn’t have in-house design experts to turn it into life. That’s why in 2012, Slack founder Stewart Butterfield turned to design agency MetaLab for help. MetaLab’s experts designed the brand, the mobile app, and the marketing website from the ground up, giving Slack its neat and stylish design. 

What challenges come with outsourcing?

Despite the apparent benefits, there are still some controversial thoughts on graphic design outsourcing. Here are the most common worries companies might have when deciding whether to outsource some of their workload.

1. Outsourcing design work can negatively affect quality

Sometimes, turning to third-party agencies with tempting prices can result in subpar designs that do not effectively represent a brand’s identity or vision. In some cases, even a few rounds of edits are not enough to fix that, and the only alternative is to redo everything from scratch with the help of an in-house team. This, in turn, leads to missing deadlines and eventually failing to deliver a project on time. This could be critical for some projects, for instance, seasonal marketing campaigns.

To prevent that, you must figure out what makes the pricing appealing for an outsourcing specialist or agency. In some cases, low prices translate into worse quality, but not always. For instance, experts from other countries can charge less for their services due to different costs of living, while still delivering high-quality expertise. 

2. External designers may not fully understand or align with a brand’s values and objectives

This is especially true if you’re working with outsourcing specialists from afar. They might lack the cultural context needed to deliver a brand message, find it hard to communicate with you due to language barrier, or simply not fit your company’s culture. All these cases can lead to poor performance and unsatisfactory collaboration. 

What can help you solve this problem (or at least minimize its impact)? First, choose outsourcing specialists with a solid command of the English language. This way, you’ll still be able to overcome the culture gap, knowing they will understand your messages and points clearly.

Second, consider creating training programs for your outsourced staff and ensuring clear communication channels. The training programs can help outsourced professionals fill in the gaps regarding cultural aspects, your company’s vision, and values, while regular communication will ensure that everyone’s on the same page. 

3. Choosing the wrong outsourcing model might result in a poor cost estimate

There are many ways to outsource graphic design. You can turn to freelancers, agencies, or subscription services, hire specialists to work on an hourly or monthly basis, or pay them per project. The choice is yours, but remember that the wrong choice can lead to overheads or even budget losses.

For instance, working with designers who charge hourly might be a cost-effective solution for small tasks, such as logo redesign, presentation design, and so on. However, if you need someone to work with you long-term (for instance, to help your company complete a particular project), switching to monthly payments or a fixed-priced project contract could be cheaper and, at the same time, will help ensure that the designer will be available for cooperation for as long as you need them. 

So before you hire someone for design support, estimate your project. Estimate how long it will last, whether there is a chance the deadline will be extended, or new tasks will emerge along the way, and so forth. This will help you understand which cooperation model will best suit you. 

There’s also a general tip that can help you minimize the risk of all the problems described above: always do your research before turning to an outsourcing professional or agency. Check out the vendor’s website, projects and industries they’ve been working with, and look for the reviews and Clutch reviews if they are available. This will help you verify their expertise level and confirm that you found a good professional match. 

Picking the right outsourcing solution for your needs

While concerns about graphic design outsourcing are valid, they can be overcome by finding suitable solutions. These solutions are the following: 

Freelancers

They are individual self-employed designers offering their services to companies and brands. Freelance designers can specialize in one specific niche, such as branding or motion design, or cover several of them. They can be hired for as little as a few hours per week to a full-time basis lasting for 6 months and above.

Pros of hiring freelance designers:

• Flexibility. Freelancers can normally adjust their schedule to your needs if necessary. Upon agreement, they can work on weekends or during specific hours in your timezone;
• Niche specialization. If you are looking for a professional with a specific skill, a freelance designer can come in handy;
• Cost-effectiveness. As freelancers work independently, they have fewer operational expenses than an agency and can charge less for their services.

Cons of hiring freelance designers are:

• Dedication. If you don’t hire a freelancer full-time, you might not always have them available when necessary. Usually, such specialists work with several clients at once. This also means that if you finish working with a freelancer and later discover that you need some extra work from them, they might already be busy with another project;
• Reliability. While this isn’t the rule, many freelancers fail to meet the deadlines, so you should be prepared for this scenario, as well. As freelancers are individual workers, they usually don’t have anyone to cover them when they fall ill or several deadlines overlap.

Design agencies 

A design agency is an established business that provides outsourced design services to various companies. When you turn to a design agency, you get a professional designer or two who are part of a bigger outsourced design team supported and led by art directors and project managers. Some agencies provide only design services, while others can take on a larger scope of work, including content creation, brand positioning, and similar. 

Pros of collaborating with design agencies:

• High level of expertise. Agencies hire designers with different skill sets that share their experience and knowledge with the rest of the team. If a challenge occurs, an agency designer can turn to their colleagues for help and solve it quicker than a solo professional;
• Project management. With agencies, you don’t have to invest time and effort in managing outsourced designers. The agency does it for you, ensuring that the deadlines will be met and covering up for any unexpected issues (for instance, finding another designer to support the project if the initial one got sick);
• Guaranteed results. Design agencies work hard to build their reputation and do their best to leave the clients satisfied with the result;
• Experience in various domains. Building deep expertise within a particular sector takes time, especially if it’s something relatively new, such as blockchain, AI, and big data. As agencies have a large pool of designers with different experiences, they can offer you professional support from someone familiar with your specific industry.

Cons of working with design agencies:

• Cost. As design agencies have a team of diverse professionals to support, they are generally more expensive than freelance designers;
• Not a fit for small-scale projects. Design agencies are an excellent option for outsourcing graphic design projects that are long-term but usually don’t work with smaller or shorter ones. For instance, if you need someone to quickly design a logo for you, an agency most likely won’t take on that task.

Subscription services

Subscription services are similar to design agencies. They are usually provided by companies with their own pool of designers and match them with clients needing their assistance. Just like agencies, subscription services manage projects and make sure that the clients’ requests will be completed on time. 

But here’s the difference. With agencies, you settle for a particular scope of work, projects, and edits, while subscription services offer you an unlimited range of work for a monthly or annual fee.

Pros of working with subscription services:

Subscription services offer the same collaboration benefits as design agencies with an extra perk — cost predictability. You can request unlimited designs and edits as long as your subscription lasts. The turnaround is also very quick.

In some cases, subscription services can be even more beneficial than design agencies. For example, here are some advantages we at TodayMade may offer in comparison to the web design firm:

Cons of working with subscription services:

The scope of work and the complexity of designs are also limited by your subscription — if a paid period ends and something is not finished, you’ll have to prolong your subscription, even if it’s just for one or two designs.

Also, if you end your subscription and decide to return later, you might be unable to work with the same designer.

TodayMade as your design support

TodayMade is a design subscription service that gives you the support you need when the projects keep launching and the deadlines keep pressing. We faced these situations ourselves and know how stressful they are — and how difficult it could be to find a great design specialist to help you quickly. 

That’s why we solved this problem for ourselves and might solve it  for you. Our graphic design outsourcing company addresses all those challenges tech marketers experience: delays in design delivery, heavy workloads, and the need for creative assets ASAP. 

Designs created by TodayMade professionals look great, perform great, and can save you from stress, thousands of edits, and missed deadlines. Curious to learn more? Reach out to us and discover how to boost your marketing campaigns with your help.