The question for many business owners is how to find a graphic designer that can help you make an impact.

Here are some tips on how you can find and hire a graphic designer.

Identify Your Project Requirements

Most designers know how to make logos, infographics, page layouts and websites. However, there are also designers that specialize in a specific field.

Before hiring a graphic designer to do a job, it is best to know what you need. For example, if you need a layout for a website, it is best to find a designer who is an expert in this field or somebody that has a lot of experience. The same is true if you need a branding expert or a logo.

Be thorough in identifying your needs. Not only will it help you find the right designer, it will also help you avoid potential communications problems in the future.

Find The Right Skills

Many graphic designers are versatile and well-versed in using programs such as Adobe Creative Suite, PhotoShop and Illustrator. They are the so called “gold standard” when it comes to graphic design software so most designers would know how to use them.

However, being a good graphic designer is not just about knowing how to use software. A good designer should also be able to communicate well, be creative, strategic, be a good team player and take a criticism well.

Check out their portfolios too. Try to see if they have past projects that are similar to what you want. Candidates should be able to show past work including the process they use from planning to conclusion. Find similarities between candidates’ past jobs and your company’s work. This will give both parties a reason to think that working together will be mutually beneficial.

Shortlist Potential Candidates

As the interview date draws near, you will want a shortlist of candidates from among the many applicants you have received. You need to look for:

• Professionalism – you can already get an idea of this by looking at the way a candidate has submitted their application.
• Talent – graphic designers create visual content and this should be clear in their proposal, portfolio and profile.
• Experience – is the candidate versed in design software? Do they have experience with working in your industry or with what you need?
• Feedback – what do previous clients say about them as a professional and about their work? Getting feedback from past employers through their references will give you a good idea on how they work and how they are at work.
• Portfolio – art is subjective just like design but it is also important that people are able to understand what they are trying to communicate. Their portfolio should contain a description of each of the project. Check out projects that have elements of design that you want.

Interview

It’s now time to prep for the interview. This is the best opportunity to learn about their approach, creativity, experience and talent. It’s best to prepare questions ahead of time so that you can ensure that you’ve covered everything you want to learn about them.

Good questions include:

• Tell me about 3 of your best projects.
• What is your timeline for projects?
• What makes a great project?
• What do you think about our past work?

Observe their responses for all the questions you ask. Using their responses and engaging the candidates can help you find a graphic designer that is well suited to your company and its culture.

Do you have any more tips to add? What is your experience in hiring a graphic designer? Tell us by leaving your comments below.

The post How To Hire A Graphic Designer appeared first on Creativ Digital.

Despite the designers—who have jumped on the bandwagon of “Less is more” concept for web designs—there exist some minds who are experimenting new practices in order to provide their users what they actually want. To make this possible, they have to stay acquainted with the latest—looming on the horizons of cutting edge.

Without making a fuss, let’s get a sneak peek at what design innovations can provide your e-commerce store with a major upsurge in 2017.

1.     Prioritize Your Mobile Design:

The design is king when it comes to magnetizing customers to a website. Not long ago, shoppers were buying different products from their computer; back then, the design of most websites was optimized for desktops. Today, with such a huge number of mobile website users existing today, a mobile-first approach has become the necessity.

Some trends of mobile first approach are:

a)     Negate the negative spaces:

We’ve all been a fan of negative space, but now is the time to fill up it up. The desktops will take up all horizontal spaces by applying full width of the screen. This will make the site looks appealing on mobile as well as on desktops.

b)      Larger Icons

A tricky part about buttons and menus on mobile and on the desktop is to arrange them judiciously in order to make the navigation easy and intuitive. Larger icons and buttons also look great on the desktops.

2.     Google’s Material Design:

The Material Design motif, created in 2014 by Google, has been on the scene for quite some time now. We are anticipating that until the end of 2017, we are going to see some smaller web projects embracing Material Design as-is. Website design with overlapping layers, contrasting, strong colors and strong shadows are repeatedly predicted as a big trend in early years. In this regard, the material design is definitely going to stay.

3.   Long Scrolling Layout

Scrolling on mobile is easier than switching between multiple pages. This makes long scrolling layouts useful for mobile websites. Media such as HD images—that are slow to load—will help accelerate the scrolling practice. Moreover, the users will be able to see a plenitude of products that they wouldn’t otherwise see, without loading a new page.

4.   Cinemagraph

Cinemagraphs are the still photos comprising of elements demonstrating repeated movements. They have been taking the industry by storm, and rightfully so; a powerful cinemagraph can be visually appealing. It can either be a GIF or video file.

5.   Placing hamburger menus to left

For layouts, where you want to save space, using hamburger menus is the best decision. Many designers are now shifting them into the upper left corner considering the fact that left is a more familiar pattern on the phones, and that familiarity would breed user-friendliness. You can place it on the right; the position totally depends on yours site design. All you need to focus is on “consistency”.

https://cdn.dribbble.com/users/87229/screenshots/2269450/solveburger-kojo.gif

To wrap up

The trends, tricks, tips, and hacks for digital designs and development shouldn’t be the matter of concern for the designers only. If you are getting someone does the design work for you or even if you outsource design projects to other companies, considering what’s in and what works is important.

These were some practices that are playing a substantial role in defining the web design trends of 2017. But! The year is not over yet! There may be a bundle of more trends to sprout. So, let’s just keep our fingers crossed and see what’s yet to see in 2017.

If there’s anything that you think we have missed, do share it in your comments!

Author Bio:

David Paul is a tech-geek and a UI architect by profession. He works in a custom logo design company from past 2 years. Alongside designing websites, he loves sharing informative articles and design-oriented blogs to raise awareness among the readers.

The post Top 5 Ecommerce Website Design Trends in 2017 appeared first on Creativ Digital.