With the economy on the rocks and recovery still on the horizon, most fiscally responsible companies are reviewing their costs. Unfortunately, creative services is one area where many companies see high costs with little return. And those companies often decide that they can do it themselves and cut out the middle man. As much as it pains me to say it, if you're on a tight budget, Microsoft Word or Publisher can get the job done - good enough for government work anyway. However, there is a better way...

First, make sure that you're getting what you pay for. Collect as much data as you can so you can get a good feel for what you spent to acquire new business versus how much business you acquired. It may actually turn out that you ARE getting what you paid for. In which case, cutting your creative services budget may actually hurt your revenues.

Then, there is always the worst case scenario.

Case in point, I have a friend - let's call her Jane. Jane works for a Fortune 500 company with over 20,000 employees and revenue in the billions. The company has in-house marketing but outsources all creative services (brochures, direct mail, email campaigns, etc.).

Recently, this company reviewed its creative services vendor. The current vendor's presentation was somewhat lackluster, however their responsiveness, turn-around times, customer service, quality and price were all excellent and extremely competitive. The competing vendor came in with an awe-inspiring presentation. It was a larger company with greater caché, and in the end, they won the contract.

Now, Jane frequently complains about poor service and inflated prices. Projects that used to cost $5,000 now cost $20,000. For example, she recently had to approve $18,000 for their new creative services company to copy and paste text that SHE had written into a standard HTML email template. There basically were no creative services involved (other than basic typesetting), they told her it would take a week, AND that cost didn't include the price of sending the email. On top of all that, this was the cost of a single email newsletter - they do one a month. That's over $200,000 annually to copy and paste.

Jane has lots of these little horror stories and it gets me steamed every time I hear them. I jokingly tell her we would do it for half, but the truth is, we'd probably charge closer to 1/10th for the services she needs. I don't care if you're GSD&M, if all you do is copy/paste into a template and reformat the text, you can't claim that it took you a full week and cost $450/hr. In this case, you're paying TOO much to work with a high-profile company and getting poor service for the privilege.

Now, that I have that off my chest. Don't assume the worst, but it might be time to shop around for a better deal. This doesn't mean that you should go with the lowest bidder. I'm a firm believer in the old adage "you get what you pay for," so if you go cheap, you get cheap. Instead, try to find a balance between price, service and quality of work that fits your budget. Also, ask your agency or creative services vendor if they can suggest any cost-cutting changes they can suggest. I guarantee that they will be willing to work with you if they can keep your business.

Here are some ideas to help you streamline your creative services costs:

• Have your agency develop templates for Microsoft Word or PowerPoint.
  This way, you can get well designed documents, but you can manage the content yourself without having to go back to your agency for every new document or change.
  
• Consider updating your web site with a content management system
  This would allow you to maintain the content of your site without having to go back to your agency for changes and updates. Be careful though, the cost of converting your site should be inline with the savings of making changes yourself.
  
• Negotiate specific rates for routine changes to your marketing documents or website.
  If you are a returning or long-time customer, your creative agency may be willing to work with you on price in return for the steady revenue stream.
  
• Negotiate a retainer for a specified level of service each month or quarter
  Again, your agency may be willing to work with you on price if they can forecast their revenue and know how much time to schedule for your projects each month.

Boldface Creative will work with you in all of these areas. So, give us a call or send us an email if you'd like to know more about how we might be able to save you some money on your creative services - without compromising your corporate image.