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General |
DesignCrowd is an online marketplace for logo design, web design and almost any other
type of graphic design you can think of. Businesses/people that need a designs
can use DesignCrowd to run a Design Contest and get the best design possible or run a Multi Quote project to save money.
We have hundreds of logo designers, web designers, graphic designers and brochure
designers from the USA, the UK, Europe, Australia and India. You can harness the collective creativity of these designers, and find best design available, by running a Design Contest on DesignCrowd.
You might also use DesignCrowd to run a Multi Quote project to help you save money or find the best designer available by Requesting Quotes. Requesting quotes can help you find a student, offshore or work-from-home designer (so you save money) or you might select a premium design studio / freelancer with a strong reputation.
When you use DesignCrowd to get a design, you manage the whole design process, end-to-end, through the DesignCrowd website. From brief definition to communicating
with designers, from to receiving your designs to payment - the DesignCrowd marketplace is all you need. In summary, use DesignCrowd as your agent to help you find the best design possible, reduce your risk and provide protection.
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DesignCrowd is better than alternatives because you can get hundreds of designers working
for you from around the world and you are given protection when dealing with them. These designers compete with eacother on DesignCrowd which gives you a better, cheaper
and faster result. With a DesignCrowd Contest Open Brief you get unlimited designs,
you set your own budget and you minimize your risk. When you run a Multi Quote project
you save money and you (and your payment) are protected against unprofessional practices.
When you use DesignCrowd you can:
- Get Unlimited Designs
When you run a design contest there is no limit the number of designs you can get! Because DesignCrowd has 100s of designers from around the world, and we invites them all to compete, you will get
tons of designs for your budget!
- Set Your Own Budget
You get to set your budget when you run a Design Contest so you are in control. If you want lots of ideas
and the best designers set a higher budget. If you have a small budget, only pay
what you can afford. You offer your budget and the marketplace will respond accordingly!
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Minimize Your Risk
When you run a design contest you are never committed to 1 designer. If you don't get any designs you like you can extend the deadline, invite more designers to submit and get more designs.
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Get Protection
Furthermore you are using DesignCrowd your agent/buffer with designers. You
get the correct file formats because we require designers submit certain file formats.
We don't do designs in-house so we're not biased about the work - we're on your
side!
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Save Time
You get access to designers from around the world and there is always someone ready to start work. When you run a design contest, there is no quoting - designers start designing immediately.
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Save Money
You save money when you use DesignCrowd because: we don't employ designers in-house, many of our designers are freelancers, work-from-home, student or offshore designers and the whole process is online (so everyone has low overheads).
By using DesignCrowd you are accessing a virtual design firm that is larger than any
other traditional firm. Harness the collective intelligence and collective
creativity of 100s of people. Get diverse ideas and maximum creativity!
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Businesses use Design Contests to get many creative designs from multiple designers
while Requesting Quotes is used to find one designer. See the table below
for a comparison of Design Contests and Multi Quote projects.
Table: Comparison of Design Contests and Multi Quote
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Item |
Design Contest |
Multi Quote |
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Initial cost
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US$30 |
Free |
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Project budget
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Set by you |
Agreed by you and your designer |
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# of designers
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Unlimited |
1
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# of designs
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Unlimited |
Normally <5
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Process |
- Post a project and deposit your budget
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Watch designs come in
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Provide feedback to designers
- Select your favourite design
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- Post a project
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Watch quotes come in
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Select your favourite quote
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Deposit budget
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Get designs
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Approve work and release budget
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Best used for |
Med complexity jobs / jobs requiring creativity |
Very low or very high complexity jobs |
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Benefits |
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Unlimited designs: there is no cap to the designs you can receive
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Low risk: only buy a design if you find one you like
- Get the best design possible: get 100s of designers working on your project and get unlimited
designs
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Faster: there's no quoting, designers start working straight away
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Save money / find the best designer: designers submit competitive bids and show you their portfolios so you can find the best value
offer or the best designer
- Protect your budget: deposit your budget
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Build a relationship with a designer
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Businesses use DesignCrowd by posting projects on our website. These projects are then published for
designers to respond to.
You can choose from two types of projects:
- A Design Contest project; or
- A Multi Quote project
Running a design contest allows you to get designs from multiple designers and only buying a design if you like one. Requesting Quotes helps you find the cheapest offer or the best designer available.
For more information read How do Design Contests work? or How do Multi Quote projects work?
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To get started you need to post a project. Select the "Post a Project" link
from the menu.
You need to complete four steps to post a project:
- Select the type of design you want and the type of project (Multi Quote or Design Contest)
- Complete the project brief
- Register your business / personal details with DesignCrowd
- (For design contests) Pay any posting fee and deposit your budget
You only need a few minutes to complete these steps and you can do it all from your desk!
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A brief (sometimes called a 'creative brief') is an explanation of your requirements for a particular piece of design work. Briefs are written by a client and provided to creatives / designers to guide them in completing a piece of work. When you run a project on DesignCrowd, you are required to complete a project brief.
Your brief may include the following elements:
- A description of what is needed (for example, "a logo with the name ABC Company"). Note, you may provide a lot more detail for a website or brochure design brief.
- A description of where your design will be used (for example, "on outdoor signage and staff uniforms")
- Objectives of (for example, "to persuade people we are the market leader in leather manufacturing")
- The themes of your design (for example "premium, classy, exclusive")
- A description of your target market
- Background about your business, product, competitors
- Additional information (such as links to your website or marketing documents)
- Examples of other designs that you like and dislike (for example, competitors' logos or logos from other industries)
When you use DesignCrowd, you fill in an easy-to-use form that will guide you in writing your brief. When you publish your brief, designers will ask you questions to clarify what you've provided and 'flesh out' more detail.
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You should start a Design Contest if:
- You want creativity or lots of choices;
- You are not sure what you want your design to look like and you are open to ideas; or
- Your design task is of low to medium complexity and just 1 or 2 files (such as a logo,
a business card design or a website design mock-up)
You should run a Multi Quote project if:
- Your design task is a very simple, specific task where you have a definite view of what you want (such as, "a vector file with the name Steve Smith in Verdana font and the color yellow");
- Your design task is very complex and you don't want to pay the world for (such as a custom,
very detailed illustration or a large completely functioning website);
- You are really unsure how much you should pay
- You need a website that requires special functionality or programming (such as accepting payment or recording customer registrations); or
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You will receive different files depending on the type of project you run and the
type of design you are requesting. DesignCrowd has Minimum Design Standards
that specify certain required file types (see the lists below) that you will receive
for each type of project. You will receive these file types unless you specify
otherwise in your project brief. You may also receive some additional files ('source files')
depending on the designer who submitted the design.
Table: DesignCrowd Standard Files by Type of Design
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Type of Design |
Files |
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Logo Design
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- 1 EPS file vector file - fully scalable and editable for use with printers
- 1 Large JPG file - for use in high quality documents
- 1 Small JPG file - for use on the web
- (Additional) Original source file - normally an AI or CDR vector file also used
with printers
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Web design (HTML & Layout)
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- 1 or more HTML files
- (Additional) 1 or more images files - JPG, GIF or PNG files
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Web design (Layout Only)
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- 1 JPG preview file
- 1 source file - a PSD File or other source file
- (Additional) 1 or more images files - JPG, GIF or PNG files
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Other graphic design
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- 1 JPG preview file
- 1 Source file - EPS, PSD, AI, INDD, CDR, HTML or a ZIP file containing these files
- (Additional) 1 or more source files - JPG, PNG, GIF and/or a ZIP file containing
these files
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For Design Contests you will, by default receive these files unless you request other file types in your project brief. For Multi Quote projects you will by default receive these files but you may receive
more files depending on your project and designer.
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How much you pay will depend on your project type and what budget you set. You will need to pay the amount you budget/agree upon to the designer(s) and you may also need to pay a posting fees to DesignCrowd if you run a Design Contest. The budget you set should be different depending
on the type of design, the complexity of what you require, the quality of design
and the creaitivity. The more you pay, the more designs you will get and the better designers you will attract.
The cost for:
- A Design Contest project = Your Budget + Posting Fee (US$30)
- A Multi Quote project = The Budget You Agree on With the Designer
View DesignCrowd Fees for more information.
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When you buy a design from DesignCrowd, ownership of that design transfers to you. Note that you do not own all the designs submitted to a Design Contest, only
the design that you eventually select, purchase and download. Note that before you select a design, the copyright of the designs is held by the respective designers.
Web, brochure and other non-logo designs may include components/artwork for which
the copyright remains with the original designer. These designs may include
photos, icons or artworks that the designer has purchased the right to use (i.e.
they do not own the copyright) or that the designer owns but publishes elsewhere.
The copyright of these components may remain with the designer or the original 'third-party'
designer. In such a case, the designer is contracted with DesignCrowd to ensure
you have the right to and you will be granted a right to display those designs.
Logo designs should not include third party stock components or vector works and
DesignCrowd designers have entered a contract that binds them to this. Any fonts
used in logos should be owned by the designer or the designer should but the ownership
of these fonts may not be transferred to the client as part of the purchase.
Please read our User Agreement for more detail on copyright and site usage.
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DesignCrowd offers three types of protection to customers:
- Payment Protection
Whenever you make a payment to a designer, DesignCrowd acts as your intermediary
and provides payment protection. You deposit your money with us and this money
is only sent to a designer once the files containing your designs have been transferred
to DesignCrowd and are ready for you to download.
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Risk Protection
When you run a Design Contest you are protected by the DesignCrowd business model.
You only pay for a design when you like what you see. This minimises your
risk.
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File Quality Protection
When you purchase any design on DesignCrowd, we check that design to make sure
it is in the file format that you require and that the files meets our Minimum Design Standards. This involves checking that file
contents match and that vector files are scalable and editable. You do not get this
type of protection when you use traditional graphic design firms or use designers
directly. When you use DesignCrowd, you are using us as an independent third-party for quality control.
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Yes of course! Revision requests work differently for Multi Quote project and
Design Contests. Here's an explanation of the difference:
Design Contest Revisions
There is no cap to the number of revisions you can request for projects over
US$200 in value. There are three types of revisions:
- Free Minor Revisions (Any Project)
You may send messages of feedback and requests for revisions to designers.
Designers are almost always willing to make minor changes (to color, layout, font
and the words used) to the designs they are submitting. If designers do not
want to submit revisions you may need to guarantee them that you will award them
the job (see Guaranteed Revisions below) or need to pay them for the revision work
(see Paid Revisions below).
- Guaranteed Revisions
For projects over US$200 If you are sure you want a particular design you can guarantee
that you will select that design if a certain number of revisions.
- Paid Revisions
Designers of projects where you do not want to guarantee revisions may request
payment for the revision.
Multi Quote Revisions
When you run a custom Multi Quote project you will be given an automatic 2 revision
rounds. You may agree with the designer on more (or less) revision rounds
before the project commences and designeres might list a different number of revisions
in the Conditions section of their quote. It is the responsibility of the
designer to give unlimited revisions until of their submissions so that they fully
meet your requirements that you listed
in your project brief.
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Design Contest |
Design Contests help you get the best design possible and minimise your risk.
A Design Contest involves explaining your requirements for the design that you want
(such as a logo for your new business) and setting a budget (such as $500) in a
'project brief' which is then published on the DesignCrowd website for a small, flat-fee
of US$30. You then sit back and watch tons of designs (created by 100s of
designers from around the world) pour in! You select your favourite design
and pay! If you don't find a design you like straight away you can invite new designers to respond!
There are four steps to running a Design Contest:
- Post your project and deposit your budget - you can start a by selecting the Post
a Project link from the menu. Fill in our easy to use project form and then
pay the contest posting fee and deposit your budget with DesignCrowd.
- Watch designs pour in - hundreds of design firms, freelance designers
and student designers registered on DesignCrowd will read your project and then begin
designing straight away. You don't spend time reading quotes.
- Select your favourite - look through the designs, show your friends
and pick your favourite. The great thing is you haven't
committed to any one designer so you will have a diverse range of designs to choose
from. Your
Your budget may be 'split up' on some projects. Depending on the size of your budget, we may use 1st, 2nd, 3rd participation payments. We may also offer minimum participation payments which designers can reserve as incentive to encourage designers to respond.
Keep in mind that you will probably need to interact with designers during the process
and their may be some other steps (like revising designs) somewhere along the way.
Sending designers feedback on their designs (whether you like the designs or not)
and responding to their questions helps you get the best result.
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If you don't like any of the designs submitted you can:
- Extend the deadline to get more designs
- Invite other designers to respond
This is one of the main benefits of using DesignCrowd over
a traditional graphic design firm - you are not committed to a single designer and you minimise your risk.
Keep in mind that you should communicate clearly what you want in your
project and give feedback to designers along the way. If you do this, and the designers
don't deliver you have the right to move on. You are not allowed to use DesignCrowd
with the intention of getting just the ideas. You should only post a project
with the intention. To post a project with no intention of purchasing a logo
is a violation of the DesignCrowd
User Agreement.
If you are unhappy with the initial results, the best approach is to extend your deadline, provide feedback to designers and/or post more information. Working
and communicating with the designers always achieves the best results.
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You get a number of unique benefits when you run a Design Contest:
- You get unlimited designs - you may get 20 designs, 30 designs or 100 designs
to choose from - there is no cap! You set your budget and the market and creativity
of designers decides how many designs you will get. When you run a contest
you are inviting all designers, design firms or creative people in the world to
respond.
- You minimize your risk - you are will get tons of designs from around the world and you are never committed to one designer or studio.
- You get the best design possible - when you run a design contest you get
multiple (normally at least 10) designers working for you. This has two benefits:
1) they are competing with eachother so they work harder and 2) you will get diverse
ideas as designers come from different countries (such as Australia, the US, the
Ukraine, Singapore and India) and are not vulnerable to 'group think'. You
are getting the maximum number of ideas and value for your money as the number of
designs you can get is unlimited, and anyone can respond,
- You save time - there is no quoting, designers get started straight away!
We have designers all around the world so you will often get your first designs
overnight!
In summary, design contests are faster, cheaper and better.
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If you receive no designs for your design contest we will refund your US$30!
Note that this has never happened. DesignCrowd has a 100% record of projects
receiving designs and the average number of submissions is over 30! If you
get no submissions, or if you get a low number of submissions, it probably means
the amount of money you are offering is too low and you should increase your budget!
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All designers on DesignCrowd have agreed to strict Terms and Conditions that require
them to submit completely original work for some types of design and partially original
work for other types of designs. Designers are required to submit unique designs,
but not neccessarily a unique typeface, for logo designs that they submit on DesignCrowd.
Other designs (such as websites) are required to be partially original but may include
stock photography, stock graphic art (such as icons), a template structure or a
template color scheme. If you do not want any templates or stock components
in your web or brochure design, just specify so in your project brief!
There is a risk that any designer you use (whether it is a designer on DesignCrowd,
a freelance designer in your local area or a design firm) may use artwork that is
not unique or artwork that they should not be using. Using DesignCrowd gives
you an extra layer of protection against this behaviour. DesignCrowd can help
you spot unwanted template designs. We are independent from our designers
and are interested in protecting you. As designs submitted are viewed by 100s
of designers (experts in their field) they are also able to report non-unique designs and unprofessional behaviour.
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It's up to you! You do need to pay a posting fee of US$30 to run a Design
Contest but you set your own budget before the project starts. In summary:
Total Cost = Your Budget + Posting Fee (US$30)
You pay the posting fee at the start but you don't pay the budget until the
end! We charge designers a commission. View DesignCrowd Fees for more information.
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Minimum participation payments are guaranteed incentive payments that designers can reserve before entering a submission to a Design Contest. If designers that reserve a payment submit a design, they are guaranteed to receive a small payment (regardless of whether their design is selected by you or not).
DesignCrowd will use a small part of your budget for these payments. However, you have no obligation to pay extra for these minimum participation payments. If you don't buy any of the designs, we will use your project posting fee to cover any participation payments or we will pick up the tab ourselves.
Note that as these payments can be reserved, so you may see them going down (and perhaps reaching zero) before any designs are submitted. Don't worry, it means there is work in progress. If a designer doesn't submit a design after reserving a participation payment (or that design is of poor quality) that participation payment will be offered to another designer.
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The best answer is: as much as you can afford. View our Recommended Budgets as a guidline of what you should offer
but remember, the more you pay the more designs you will get to choose from, the better quality
and more creative those designs will be. Getting the best design possible design
is important so you can market your business, organisation, product or event with
confidence. If you set the largest budget you can afford, the DesignCrowd marketplace
will get you maximum value, quality and creativity possible!
Your budget should vary depending on the type of design and the complexity of what
you want. If your design is more complex (for example a poster including an
original illustration or a website with 10 different pages) you may need to pay more.
If your design is easier to do (for example a text only logo) you might be able
to pay less.
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Your project budget will determine the number of designs you receive. The
exact number of designs will vary from project to project and other factors like
the complexity of your request and your project deadline will also affect the response
you get. Extremely long deadlines (greater than 4 weeks) or very short deadlines
will reduce the number of designs you will receive (unless you have a very large
budget).
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Yes, there are two types of web design Contests on DesignCrowd 1) HTML Design Contests
and 2) Layout Only Design Contests. You select the type of contest depending
on the type of website you need.
Low to Moderate Difficulty Websites
If you need one of the following, a HTML Design Contest is a good idea:
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An information only website with 10 pages or less
HTML Designs are fully functional and include menus and links as well as the buttons
and graphics required. Contests are not setup to take any designs with programmed
functionality. However, if you do require a complex website you can use a
Layout Only Design Contest to get the 'front-end' designed on DesignCrowd and find
a web designer or programmer to build the 'back-end' functionality (see Complex
Websites below).
If you need one of the following, a Layout Design Contest is a good idea:
- A website with an important role within your marketing plan (i.e. it needs to look
very good); or
- The layout and images of a website (a mockup) but not the functionality or content.
Layout Only designs do not include the HTML code but focus only on the way the site
looks and the graphic art it uses. If you choose a Layout Only project you
will receive more responses (because they are easier to create) but you will then
need to create the HTML code (or get a programmer or web designer to do this for
you).
Complex Websites
If you require complex website functionality that requries programming (such
as a shopping cart or user registration), you could run a Layout Only Design Contest
and limit its scope to the 'front-end' (i.e. the way it looks) of your website.
Once you have the layout and the way it looks you could then find a programmer (through
DesignCrowd or another means) to turn that design into a working website. Alternatively
you could run a Multi Quote project on DesignCrowd to get all the work done together! Although
you miss out on the, you'll get lots of.
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Multi Quote |
Requesting Quotes helps you find the best available or cheapest available designer
anywhere in the world and gives you protection when dealing with designers. Requesting
Quotes involves you explaining your requirements in a project brief and inviting
designers to give you their best quote (price they would charge you and pitch) for
doing the job. You then select your favourite quote/designer, deposit your
budget with DesignCrowd and watch the designer get to work!
There are seven steps to running a Multi Quote project:
- Post your project - you can start a by selecting the Post
a Project link from the menu. Fill in our easy to use project brief and follow
the instructions. It's free to run a Multi Quote project and you have no obligation to
select a designer so there's no risk!
- Watch quotes pour in - hundreds of design firms, freelance designers
and student designers registered on DesignCrowd will read your project and then submit
their best quote.
- Select your favourite quote - look through the quotes, the designers'
portfolios and their history and then choose your favourite. If you don't
find a designer you like, you can just walk away.
- Deposit Your Budget - pay the agreed project budget via PayPal
or credit card to DesignCrowd. We hold your budget until the designer completes
the work. By paying DesignCrowd (and not the designer directly) you are protected
and the designers know they will get paid.
- Receive Designs - watch the designer begin work and submit designs
online. Receive email notifications as the designer submits their designs.
- Revise Work - you can request changes to the designer's work (by
default you receive 2 revisions)
- Approve Work and Release Budget - once the designer completes the
work and you are happy with the design, you approve the work and download your designs.
Once you have done this, your project budget will flow through to designers.
Unlike with the Design Contest, a Multi Quote project does not give you unlimited designs
and you do not get designs from multiple designers. Using a Multi Quote project involves
running your whole project - from finding a designer through to payment - on DesignCrowd
and working with 1 designer. You are using DesignCrowd as your agent and are
protected if something goes wrong.
A Multi Quote project works better for very simple tasks or very complex jobs. Keep
in mind that you will probably need to interact with designers during the process.
Sending designers feedback on their work (whether you like the designs or not) and
responding to their questions helps you get the best result.
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Requesting quotes is better than finding a designer directly because:
- It saves you money - when you run a Multi Quote project you are asking designers to compete with eachother. Market forces will dictate that they offer you the best price they can. Designers will offer you the best deal they can because they know it is competitive. If you were to contact designers (outside of DesignCrowd), they will probably try and charge you as much as they possibly can. But when you contact them through DesignCrowd they will try and charge you as little as they possibly can.
- You are given protection - when you use DesignCrowd your budget is protected. you don't pay the designers
upfront and then hope that they deliver. You deposit your budget with DesignCrowd
and we act as an intermediary that protects the rights of both parties. If
the designer does not complete the work, meet deadlines or meet your requirements
your budget will be returned to you. Designers can be confident that you will
pay and you can be confident that the work. Normally, when you work with a designer directly they will require upfront payment.
But what happens if they don't do the work? What happens if their work doesn't
match what you asked for? You are protected against this when you use DesignCrowd
as we act as your agent
- Designers are accountable - You can provide honest feedback on designers that do work for you. This keeps
designers accountable and gives them a further incentive to do their best, communicate
regularly and meet deadlines.
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If the designer doesn't do the work you can get a refund immediately or try and
use an alternative designer. You will also have the right to provide feedback
about the designer that will be published on DesignCrowd for future customers to view.
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It is free to start a Multi Quote
project, the only cost is the budget you agree with the designer to complete the
design work. Note that you need to deposit this budget with DesignCrowd before the designer
starts work.
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Easy! When you deposit your budget, you pay DesignCrowd using your credit card or PayPal. We then pass
the budet onto the designer once they complete the work and you approve what they've done.
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