April 5, 2023
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We hear from a lot designers who wondering if they should accept retainer clients or not. There’s a fair bit of confusion out there! On one hand, retainers can bring a stable stream of revenue, while on the other hand, they can be a headache to deal with.
Retainers can definitely be worthwhile to pursue, but there’s a few things we need you to consider before diving into a long-term relationship with a client (especially if you haven’t even met the parents yet).
Let’s dive in and clear a few things up for you!
Retainers can be a win-win for both clients and designers!
For designers it can provide a sense of stability by providing a reliable income. When you’ve got retainers in place it’s much easier to forecast cashflow and plan out the months ahead. It can also feel like easy money (compared with deep strategic work), especially if you already know the brand inside and out and the work flows intuitively.
From the client’s perspective, they get the benefit of having a dedicated designer who can work on their projects consistently. This builds trust as you and your client get to know each other better, which is essential for long business relationships.
The consistency of the retainer will mean you’ll better understand your client’s needs, so you’ll be more likely to come up with better, faster solutions (more profitability for you!).
And super importantly, clients will also feel supported and nurtured because they are getting priority service and extra attention from you.
The best clients for retainers are ones that you have already worked successfully with before. These are the clients who tick all the boxes for you — they are open and communicate regularly with you, they trust and respect your work and procedures, and projects flow smoothly.
Here’s an ideal scenario for a retainer client:
Your client is a leading restaurant and you created the brand assets from the ground up. After the initial project phases (brand identity, signage, website) have been completed, your client regularly reaches out for more work. This looks mostly like menu updates and smaller add-on projects such as social media graphics and event promos. The work you have been creating for them is flowing with ease, and you feel in sync with the client and their brand. Up until now, you’ve been quoting on an individual project basis, but you can now see that they regularly and consistently need your help. This is the time to transition your client into a retainer agreement.
When you know a brand and their voice inside and out, doing additional items on a retainer can be really efficient and rewarding.
So for retainers think: updates to existing collateral, maintenance design, modifying exisiting brand assets and implementing template-based design.
We don’t recommend retainer agreements for brand new clients. When we’re at the beginning of a client relationship, it’s difficult to know if they’ll be a good fit for your business. Even if it feels like client love at first sight, you might end up with a personality mis-match or a needy, demanding client.
The last thing we want for you is to be stuck in an ongoing contractual agreement with a complex, time-consuming client.
So you may be thinking, great! I can service all my lovely existing clients on retainers. Well, no. Another rule of thumb is to avoid doing NEW creative work on a retainer. Even if the new creative project stretches over a couple of months, it shouldn’t be considered as part of the retainer.
In order to do considered, high-end work, we need to go through our deep dive process. It’s very difficult to break new ground and deliver an elevated response on a retainer.
Using the restaurant client example again, you might have a monthly retainer agreement where you update menus, create posters and social media posts based off of already established design guidelines. Just say they ask you to do a website or signage overhaul, this is NEW creative and should not be completed under the existing retainer agreement.
So provide your client with a separate, project based estimate and include a time-line and stages. Once approved (and a significant deposit is paid), run it alongside of your retainer.
Before you consider a client for a retainer, ask yourself these questions:
It’s important to take these things into account before committing to a long-term retainer agreement.
So, lovely ones, where do we stand on retainer clients for designers? We say yay and nay! It really depends on the situation, the client, and the kind of work you’re doing. Remember:
YAY = Existing clients and brand implementation projects
NAY = New clients or brand new creative projects
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