Your business deserves more than a
design contest

I’ve been in a couple of meetings recently where the concept of crowdsourcing creative work has been raised. It’s a topic that I think we should address with our clients rather than simply ignore, so here’s my take on it…

If you’re unfamiliar with crowd sourcing, there are quite a number of different companies offering crowd sourced design services over the Internet. How they work is by facilitating what they call a ‘design contest’ situation. The client posts a creative brief wanting a logo for their new business, offering a one-off prize for the winning logo. Designers then submit designs; with the prize awarded to the winning designer in exchange for the rights to use logo the client like the best.

On face value, it’s a pretty attractive offer from a client’s perspective. They see it as an opportunity to set the price the want to pay, engage the talents of multiple designers, and receive a large volume of designs to choose from.

To many new business owners it sounds like a great way to develop the identity for their new brand – but is it really?

The downside to developing your brand’s visual identity by creating a ‘contest’ is the amount of time and professional effort that will be put into work on it. Design becomes a commodity in the context of a ‘contest’. Earning a living becomes a numbers game for the designers involved. Surely your business’ brand identity deserves more respect than that!

If you’re considering going down the crowd-sourcing route to develop your new brand identity, here are a few  things to consider…

Moral Forces v. Market Forces.
Most people would agree that using free labour for profit is wrong in principal, but this is essentially the principal that business models of crowdsourcing websites are based on. They rely on soliciting designers to submit ideas for free. Clients then only pay for the winning design with the ‘prize money’. The websites take a percentage of this, but without the free labour, they don’t actually have a business.

Calling it a ‘design contest’ is very clever brand positioning, because it’s really a commercial transaction where someone is profiting from designers working for free. Some might argue that the success of these crowd-sourcing design sites is proof that its ‘what the market wants’, but when it’s exploitative does that make it right?

Is it original, and are you protected?
Unless you’re dealing with a professional designer who will take responsibility for their work and stand for its authenticity then you really can’t be sure what you’re getting is original. Crowdsourcing treats design as a commodity with an emphasis on quantity over considered, tailored or unique solutions.

What happens if you find out that your brand’s new logo looks an awful lot like something else, or worse, someone claims that your design infringes their copyright? Well, after a quick look through a number of the terms and conditions across the various crowd-sourcing websites, here is a clause to be aware of that I found in some form on the crowdsourcing websites I looked at…

You indemnify [The Company] its agents, officers, employees, and third party providers (“Indemnified”) against any loss, cost, expense or damage (including legal costs on a full indemnity basis) which any of the Indemnified suffer or incur as a direct or indirect result of:

– any breach by you of any representation, warranty or term of this Agreement;

– any infringement by you of the Intellectual Property Rights of a third party including in respect of any Third Party Work; and

– any legal proceedings threatened or initiated against [The Company] by a third party as a result of the events described in above;

– any breach by you of your obligations to a third party, including another Customer or Designer.

What does this mean? Well it means that you’re on your own. In accepting the design you also accept all responsibility for it’s authenticity and copyright. You have no right to a refund, and should you need to start again and develop a new logo then you’ll have to throw out that stationery and all those brochures that you invested in and re-print them too (never-mind any of the brand equity that you worked hard to associate with your logo).

So there are some risks to consider, but I’ve left the most compelling point until last…

Do you know what to look for?
Let’s say that you’re not concerned with the ethical implications, you’ve run your competition and have received original designs from your contestants. You’ve received 20 or more designs, from 5 different people from around the world—what a bargain! All of them are a response to your creative brief, but they all look completely different. So how do you choose your ‘winner’?

Will you choose the blue one because you like blue, or will you choose the logo with the bird on it because you like birds? You like the font Arial, but is that the right font to choose to represent your brand? Is that the correct slogan? Where does it position your brand? What is it communicating to the marketplace? How do you know you’re making the right decision?

What you can’t get from crowdsourcing is the knowledge, expert advice and experience that is part of working with a professional. Great branding is as much about knowing what ideas to discard, as it is about knowing what ideas to put forward and why.

The value of a professional relationship.
The value in a one-on–one relationship with a branding professional is the knowledge and experience they bring to the process. This business relationship will ensure that your new creative is done correctly and it becomes a valuable asset to your business that you will benefit from for years to come.

If you’d like to talk to someone about the merits of a real-life, face-to-face business relationship that will build your brand and grow your business then why not give us a call?

Dean Millson; Di Marca Senior Account Manager.