The Logo Process Part 2: Creating a Contract
Posted: February 17th, 2010 | Author: anthony | Filed under: Logo Articles, The Logo Process | 1 Comment »Logo design is supposed to be fun, challenging, and creative. Logo design isn’t about legal talk and contracts. If only that were true. The contract is one of the most vital parts of the whole project if not the most vital part. But what goes into a contract? In this part of the series, The Logo Process, I will dive into the detailed and tedious work of what to include in a contract.
This article is centered around logo design, for anyone else doing creative work make sure to include the things that are related to your industry.
Discussing and setting the details
After you gather information from your client you can start to crystallize things such as timeframe, cost and other details that you will need to discuss with your client. Once you agree on the details it’s time to place it in written form and get it signed by the client and yourself.
When creating a contract you don’t want to have to write it from scratch for every client. It’s a good idea to have a template that you can use over and over again and is made up of two main things I like to call constants and variables.
The constants are the things and policies that you control about your business and don’t change client to client. Refund policy, who owns what rights etc.
Variables are things like cost, time and items that are different for each client.
Constants
Payment Method and Structure: How do you get paid? Do you get paid through PayPal or another method? How do you invoice your clients? If you require that a down payment be made before work gets done, explain it in the contract. If it is a smaller amount do you just require payment in full before any work is done? What about revisions? how do revisions work? During the course of your business it is unlikely change your payment methods and structure. And when you do change it is usually for the long term.
My preference is to have a separate payment structure for each item. I like to keep things separate. For example; logo design is a lot more money than business cards or stationary. I break down the logo payments into two parts. 50% down payment and then the other 50% once the logo is completed along with the cost of any revisions.
Other items like stationary tend to cost less therefore I require full payment before hand. Usually once a project gets to this point the client has already been through the process of working with me so they tend to be more comfortable making a full payment before hand.
Refund Policy: You have been working with a client for two weeks. Things have been aren’t going too well and concept after concept is rejected. Your client decides chooses to cancel the project and no longer wants to work with you. How much of their money do they get back? 100%? 50%? Do they get any refund?
For my contract, clients are entitled to a 50% refund up until the final approval. After final approval clients give up their right for any refund.
Again, to keep things organized I work with one item at a time. If you tangle payments for logo design, business cards, and stationary all into one you could find yourself in a confusing situation if you have to issue a refund for one item but not the others. Once the logo is complete, I start on the next item and the refund policy “resets” for that item.
Registration and Trademarks: A client comes to you for a logo design. Their company name is Bio-Tech Solutions. You assume that they are the only one with that name. In the design you decided to shorten the name to just BT Solutions. Six months later another company named BT Solutions claims that the logo you designed infringes on their logo. At the time you had no way of knowing that. Are you liable or is the client liable? It’s unlikely that this situation would happen to you but in the rare event that it does you should be prepared.
Rights and Final Design Availability: During the design process you legally retain the rights to any work you create until the project is completed and you give the rights to the client. Again, it is a good idea to enforce this in your contract. When does the client get ownership of the rights? I hand over rights after final approval of an item but before final payment. Make sure you make this clear and make sure you get paid before you hand over the rights to your work.
If you would like to display your work in your portfolio make sure you include a clause that states that you retain the right to display any final designs and concepts in your portfolio for promotional purposes only. If you had a rough time with a client and it was like pulling teeth to get the project completed, they might tell you that you can’t display their logo in your portfolio. You have no power of preventing that unless you state otherwise.
Privacy and Confidentiality: Let the client know that their information is safe with you and that any business secrets, practices and strategies are kept confidential.
Project Termination
Nobody likes when this happens, but in the rarest of circumstances it does. Either by an act of God, or by your own free will how does a project get terminated? I broke this down into three scenarios:
An act of God: A hurricane wipes out your home, or your house catches on fire; does the client get their money back or just a partial amount? In this scenario I give back a full refund to keep things simple and people happy. If something like this happens, I would have much bigger problems to deal with than calculating refunds and unhappy clients.
At the designers will: If things are just not working out between the client and myself and I can’t complete the project. I might have to resort to terminate the project. For instance if there is a personal emergency. It’s good to be able to terminate in a worse case scenario. In cases like this I also refund the client in full. However, if the client wishes to terminate the process it is considered under the refund policy above.
Cease in Communication: You are working with a client for a few weeks, you send them an email to approve a revision on their logo. No reply. A few weeks go by and there is still no reply. You call their number and get no reply. What do you do in a situation like this?
For my contract I state that after 30 days from the last contact with the client and there is still no response I place the project is placed on hold. If the client responds after the 30 days but before 60 days, I just pick up where we left off. However, if after 60 days and I still get no reply, I terminate the project and no refunds can be issued. The last thing you want is six months to go by and then your client that was missing in action is demanding a refund.
Variables
Items: What are you providing for the client. A logo? Business cards? Both? All these thing need to be included. Items vary from project to project
Timeframe: How long is each item going to take and what are the deadlines. I like to break each item into a separate timeframe. It keeps you organized and keeps things on track.
Concepts: My personal preference is not to state a specific amount of concepts that I am going to present to the client. Some designers do. If I only have two great concepts that I want to present but I promised four, that’s two concepts I need to create for the sake of it. What is worse is that the client might choose one of the lesser ones.
Revisions: How many revisions does a client get? After a certain amount how much are they charged? If your strict with this you can also consider this a constant.
Cost: How much are you charging for an item? What’s the down payment amount etc. State what the client is paying for, such as prepress, design, research. etc.
Client Name, Company Name, Contact information: Don’t forget this. These are the first things that get filled out. Usually I fill this information in myself and then the only thing the client needs to do is to look over it, approve it and sign.
Scheduling and Phases
I owe credit to Mayhem Studios for this idea while reviewing their contract template. It was such a great idea I decided to include it in mine as well.
Think of the contract as your guide for completing the project. Throughout the project you can go back to the contract to see how far you have come and how far you need to go. When listing an item such as logo design. It is wise to structure the process into phases and include a payment schedule.
You want to arrange these variables is in an orderly and easily understandable way so that you and your client can quickly glance at it and understand the process.
Each item should state the following:
- The Name of the item
- The initial cost
- Timeframe
- Phases
Once you state the basics for that item the next thing you want to layout is the payment schedule and design schedule. A good way to lay out the process is with phases along with when payments are due.
Instead of trying to explain it in text it is better to just see it. Below is how each item can be structured.
Logo Design
Item: Logo Design
Initial Cost:
(Cost include art direction, design, layout and pre-press production)
Timeframe:
Down payment due: 50% of initial cost
Phase 1: Logo Concept Development
- Logos are presented in black and white
- Includes 3 revision rounds
- Additional rounds +$50
Phase 2: Logo Color Development and Final Approval
- Approved concept is presented in six color choices per round
- Includes 3 revision rounds
- Additional rounds +$50
Remaining 50% of initial cost + sum of revisions due
Phase 3: Logo Delivery
- Final logo files are delivered to the client
Business Cards
Item: Business Card Design
Initial Cost:
(Cost include art direction, design, layout and pre-press production)
Timeframe:
Full payment due: 100% of initial cost
Phase 1: Press Company Selection
- A printing company is chosen to determine size specifications to ensure proper printing and coloring.
Phase 2: Business Card Concept Development and Final Approval
- Business Cards are presented in four different color concepts
- Includes 3 revision rounds
- Additional rounds +$50
Final payment of sum of revisions is due
Phase 3: Delivery
- Completed Files are sent to the client
Putting it all together
Writing it up: When writing up the contract make it look neat and organized. Use headings, bullets and write in way where it can be easily understood by you and the client. I tend to break it up into two parts first I list the terms and conditions at the top and then the variables and schedule made up the other half.
Things to Include: Don’t forget your information. Include items such as your name, company, Creative Service Agreement for the title, and any other contact information. Display these things in the header, footer or a combination of both. Include a page count so the parties involved know that they have all the pages of the contract. Don’t forget dates, not only for the contract as a whole but for timeframes and payments. You might also want to consider late payment fees as well.
Getting it Signed
Here is the part of no return. Your client looks over the contract they approve now where do they sign? Well, for the most of us, our clients may be in a completely different state or country. Most of the time you wont have the luxury of a traditional signature. There are a number of ways you can get a signature other than in person.
Snail mail it: It might take long but for those old fashioned clients they still might prefer you send them an actual hard copy. Before they do this you could send them a copy by email to get it approved. Once approved then mail it. It would not be good to wait a few days to only find out that they need something changed and the process of mailing and waiting starts all over again.
PDF and the Digital Signature: If you have the ability and your client is tech savvy enough, request a digital signature. Compile the contract into a PDF and then in Adobe Acrobat or another program place a signature field for them to sign. This also requires the client to create a digital ID that they will use to sign the document.
Acrobat and Adobe Reader both have the ability of signing documents and to verify that the document hasn’t been altered since the signatures were placed. Create two fields, one for the client and one for you to sign.
Make sure that the info in the digital signature matches the info for that client. For instance if your client’s name is John Smith and the signature belongs to someone named Bill Jones. Something fishy is going on.
If your clients don’t know how to digitally sign but are willing to do it this way guide them through it. Adobe has a good help section that can walk anyone through the process correctly.
In conclusion
Creating a contract and getting it signed can be a tedious task and is usually not the greatest aspect of logo design, but it is a must. If you write a proper, neatly organized contract you will be able to sleep better knowing that you have your bases covered in the event of an emergency, issuing refunds or other circumstances.
A well organized contract can provide as a guide as you walk through the project. It also makes it easier on the client; for they will know exactly where they are during the process as you work through the project.
Use this article as a starting point. Different designer have different methods. Here are some other resources to consider in regarding contracts:
- Mayhem Studios Sample Contract
- AIGA Standard Form of Agreement for Design Services
- Creating A Web Design Contract by ReEncoded.com
In Part 3 I’ll cover researching for a project.
Related Posts:
- The Logo Process Part 1: Gathering Information
- Logo Design Process
- The Logo Process Part 6: Presenting Concepts
- The Logo Process Part 8: Finalization
- The Logo Process: The Complete Guide
- The Logo Process Part 3: Researching
- The Logo Process Part 4: Brainstorm and Sketching
This was really helpful, thanks!