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How much time should I spend on Admin for my business?

Posted on by Phil

Admin is a necessary evil for any business. A company simply can’t be viable without record-keeping, contacting customers, and of course, a way to accept and send payments! Many business owners, however, feel like they are drowning in paperwork and admin duties. Yet admin is essential. So how much time should you spend on admin for your business?

There are a lot of variables, and the short answer: the minimum time necessary! It makes sense; the less time you spend on admin, the more time you can spend on your core, money-making tasks. Polls from business owners around the world show that small businesses spend about 40% of their time on admin. Some polls put that even higher, over 50% even.

Ideally, you’d be doing extremely well as a business if you can spend less than 20% of your time on admin and necessary but non-income-generating tasks. If you could cut down your admin time significantly, would you do it? That sounds easier said than done. Where do you even start?

There are a few ways that you can reduce time spent on administrative tasks–some that might take very little effort but can provide significant results!

Use software for record-keeping

Filing by hand is difficult, takes time, and physical space. Software can cut down this time substantially. A common argument against using software for things like records is something like “But what if my hard drive malfunctions? I could lose everything all at once.” True point. But a counter to that is “What if you have an office fire or earthquake and your records are destroyed? You could lose everything at once.” As a backup, ideally you’d make copies and keep them in separate places.

Fortunately, you can do the same thing digitally these days. Depending on how important the files are, you can make virtually infinite copies and store them all over the internet. Cloud Services like Google Drive, OneDrive, Dropbox, and pCloud can all store files, and all have a free plan that includes at least 5 GB of storage. That’s a decent amount of space if you’re only storing things like records such as client and employee data. While it’s true that the data could be at risk if one of these services goes out of business, Google’s only likely to go out of business if the internet itself dies, and old records probably won’t be a concern if that happens!

If you want to go a step further, you can always back up your files on an external hard drive or USB storage stick that only you have access to. There are several programs that can schedule certain files to be uploaded to external storage that you have plugged in. So if you wanted your Client Records file backed up, you’d simply say you want Client Records backed up at 6:00 PM every day and it would copy only that file and back it up for you.

Make use of automation

If you find yourself doing the exact same thing over and over, chances are, automation can do it for you. When combined with a tool like Zapier, you can find that a lot of repetitive tasks can be done on their own with no input from you. While automation can significantly cut down times for some tasks (or even make it take not time at all!), some of the software does require a little bit of learning on your end. But there are options that are simple to use–just keep in mind that typically the less you have to understand for the tool to work, the more permissions it requires, and the more it costs to use. So it’s important to find the balance between learning a new program and the price not to have to learn it.

Find out more about automation in our blog, How can automation save you time and money?

Electronic forms are faster and can be automated

Nowadays, you should move as many processes as possible to be done digitally if you haven’t already. Digital forms are easier and faster to fill in and can be saved where they need to automatically. Plus you don’t have to try to decipher handwriting that doesn’t look like any known language. You can even opt for digital signatures, which are legally binding in many countries, including New Zealand.

Turnaround time is significantly faster when digital signatures are an option–some experts claim as much as 25x faster turnaround! These are ideal when someone isn’t going to sign the document right away. It’s much easier for someone to sign something electronically and have it be finished than to sign it and find a way to post or deliver it in person.

Iron out core processes

Sometimes a rule exists just because it always exists. If you have a drawn-out process because “It’s the way it’s always been done”, it might be time to take a look and see if it needs to exist–or if it can be improved. One popular business philosophy says that it’s important to work ON the business, not just IN the business. Essentially this means that instead of doing work as it comes in the way you always have, improving the processes and fundamentals can save time and money in the long run. It may seem a bit counterintuitive to delegate a chunk of time to activities that don’t make money, but streamlining your processes can save you big in the long run.

Since admin is such a big part of every business, it’s usually one of the places with the most potential for improvement. At times this could mean more steps for a process, but if that saves time when you have to come back to it later, it may well be worth it.

Have a strong file management system

File management is one of the most important parts of a business. It’s also one that many businesses don’t take the time to develop. According to Business.com, document challenges account for over 20% of wasted time. This includes professionals who collaborate on projects. Many still rely solely on email for task management, and it’s easy to lose track of an email. What was that weird subject line again? If you have multiple people working on the same project or file often and use email, consider upgrading to something designed for the job. Monday.com, Teamwork, Trello, and nTask can significantly simplify task management. We use Teamwork here at Back9 and have seen extraordinary improvements in task management, better team collaboration, and fewer tasks dropping off.

As helpful as those tools are though, they’ll hit a roadblock if you don’t take the time to develop a file management system. This is important both for digital and physical documents. For digital documents, have a folder system that’s simple, intuitive, and relevant. Something like “Client Projects > Client Name > Project Name” works well for many businesses.

Keep a record of policies, procedures, and instructions — and follow them!

It’s a good practice to regularly review policies, procedures, and instructions. Most business advisors suggest doing this annually at a minimum, or whenever there’s a major change; even if it’s a quick skim to make sure everything’s all good. If you notice something out of date or have changed how things are done since it was written, be sure to update it. It will save a lot of time when someone new comes aboard.

While updating these documents is important, what’s just as important is making sure to follow the new procedures. If a document is updated in a business and no one follows the update, did it really update at all? This is particularly important for time-saving when the new method will cut back on admin time. Sometimes changes come with a learning curve and that’s expected, but taking the time to understand how to do something more efficiently will save time and trouble long-term.

Use an external admin company

One solution that some businesses have turned to for cutting down admin is turning to an external company to handle most of it for them. This can be particularly helpful for people who hate or put off admin or aren’t familiar with using the latest software or tech. Outsourcing can free up valuable hours letting you focus on working on tasks that generate income. Just make sure you understand how the company is handling your invoices etc… You’ll want to make sure you can be the one to answer any questions from the customer if they come up.

Combine these solutions to cut back on Admin

If you’ve noticed there are one or multiple things here that you aren’t doing yet, setting aside the time to focus on streamlining admin can help in the long run. But what if you know there’s a problem, but can’t identify where to improve? Sometimes, an external viewpoint can make a major difference. There are several business development companies that can take a look and help you out. If you’re in New Zealand, Malloch McClean has a fantastic reputation for helping you build a smarter, better business.

Once you make your admin processes more efficient, you’ll find a lot more time to focus on what matters. You may even have a little extra time on your hands! If that’s the case, it’s an excellent opportunity to take a look at your marketing. When done right, marketing is an investment, not a cost. If you’ve been wondering if you’re spending the right amount to maximise your return on marketing, take a look at our article How much should I spend on marketing? and see if you could spend more–or could cut back a little.

Read the article, How much should I spend on Marketing?

Why is my website not converting?

Posted on by Phil

So you’ve got a website – great! A website is meant to drive visitors, give you new leads, and increase sales. But what if it isn’t converting? You’ll surely want to know why it isn’t! The most common reasons come down to design, content, and usability. In this article, we’ll break down a few key areas that can contribute to why your website isn’t converting as you hoped.

What are your goals?

It’s easy to get a website these days as there are tons of options from do-it-yourself to custom-built like the websites we do here at Back9. But there’s a lot more to it than just getting online. You’ve got to have goals. What do you want to achieve with your website? Do you want sales leads, to sell more products, or to educate? Whatever your goal is, it needs to be S.M.A.R.T; Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time-bound. By planning your goals out ahead of time, you’ll know if your website is doing what it’s supposed to–or if it needs some work. If you want some help creating these types of goals, take a look at our SMART Goals Template–it can help you get started!

Get a FREE S.M.A.R.T. Goal template

Just pop your email in and hit submit and voila! We’ll redirect you to the template

Review and update your goals over time

An important part of goal setting is to review your goals regularly to see how they’re going. Did you achieve them? If not, how come? Were they too ambitious? Or is there something wrong with your website? If you can’t see any reason why you didn’t quite meet your goals, it might be time to review your website for a few key things.

Great design is key

We’ve written about this topic many times but we can’t stress it enough. If you have a well-designed website that is user-friendly and visually appealing, your website is more likely to convert.

A lot goes into the design of your website. It’s more than just looking pretty. It has to be intuitive and easy to use too. One thing strongly believe in at Back9 is growth-driven design. In this way of thinking, your website is constantly growing and improving. Digital technology is one of the fastest-changing industries there is. But with growth-driven design, when something changes, you’ll be ready to adapt quickly!

Too many options

Something that we often see is a “more is more” approach but unfortunately, this could be another reason why your website isn’t converting. If your potential customers have too many options, it can be overwhelming. For example: the main navigation (home, about, services, etc), and then underneath that you’ve got sub-categories for your services and then you’ve got a product banner with a few buttons that users can click – am I painting a clear picture for you?! It’s too much!

It might seem counterintuitive, but in good design, less is more. Fewer options is often better because, let’s not forget, the average user is very savvy. We don’t need to over-complicate their experience or underestimate their abilities to navigate a website. Finding the right balance is essential. The design should help guide users to other parts of the website, but not overwhelm them with decision paralysis.

Review your website content

Are you producing content that helps your customers or answers those burning questions about your business or service? More than likely you’ve answered no to that question and that’s fine, we know how hard it can be to take the time to produce internal content that is interesting and informative for your potential customers. If you can invest in Inbound Marketing your business will reap the benefits and you will attract the right sort of customers. Educating your customers before you’ve ever interacted with them helps you build trust and it is also a huge time saver for your organization. Find out more about why this is important in our article, 9 reasons why you should educate your buyer.

There’s no clear conversion path

If you have a good design and educational content and your website still isn’t converting, what gives? You might be giving users a lot of information, but what do they do with it? What’s the next step? You need to tell visitors what they need to do next. On almost every page you’ll want a call-to-action (CTA). This will tell someone what you want them to do next and then an easy way for them to do it.

For example: you write an article and at the end of that article, you have a message to book a meeting, or to buy now, or get a free quote. Then you have a link or a button that goes to a calendar, or your shop page, or the contact form. If you don’t have a CTA on a page you might lose some leads on that page instead of moving forward. You might even direct them to the next article in a series and have your contact CTA at the final one. Whatever your goal, make it as easy as you can to achieve it!

My website’s broken, now what?

If failure to plan is planning to fail, overlooking testing is sure to get you overlooked. Yup, you need to test and test and test your website. Remember that people are using different web browsers, different mobile devices and your website can have glitches across these different platforms. We also use/interact with websites differently, that’s the beauty of being human but it also means that just because you as the business owner do it one way and it works, doesn’t mean that it works another way for your customer. Often we see websites being launched without proper testing and wouldn’t you rather find out that your ‘Learn More’ button doesn’t work than your customer? It can have a massive impact on the trust level a customer has for you if there are issues and bugs with your website.

Follow best practices to get your website converting

As you can see, there are a lot of things to do with your website. If your website isn’t converting, it could be one or several of these things that need fixed. But how can you tell? Reviewing data like Google Analytics can be helpful, but it takes some practice to understand what to look for. Something else that can help is to regularly audit your website.

This can be done internally but we recommend an external provider as a fresh set of eyes will provide the most insight and constructive feedback. It can also be quite hard to look at your own business subjectively and truly put yourself in your customers’ shoes. A website audit will review your website design, user experience, content, ranking on Google, data in Google Analytics, and more. Once you’ve had an audit, you have real data that can help to improve your website and start converting.

There are several places where you can get a website audit, but we can do one for you for free here at Back9. This will include an analysis of your site and where you can make improvements. Or you might find the site is doing well already! Interested? Click the button below and fill out the quick form to get your free website audit.

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What is Inbound Marketing? [VIDEO]

Posted on by Phil

Inbound Marketing is a different way of thinking, a better way! Everyone in business wants to increase brand awareness, that’s a no-brainer. Traditionally what we have seen and heard in our local market over the years is the age-old quote, “I want to get my name out there!” But… “Where is there?”

‘There” has usually meant a mass market. That place that is saturated in marketing messages and ruled by the world’s biggest brands. It is known as outbound marketing. It is interruptive and expensive. Big Brands can afford to spend millions of dollars in advertising to reinforce their name. For most, (if not all) smaller local businesses though, this ‘scattergun’ approach of telling everyone “I’m here and this is what I do!”, it simply isn’t financially viable. Not only does mass marketing seldom bear fruit for smaller businesses it’s near on impossible to measure!

So what is the answer? How do you get your name out there…? And where should “there” be?

First, you need to understand and more importantly accept that marketing has changed! This is a result of potential customers (or leads) having so much information at their fingertips–and NO, I’m not talking about the Yellow Pages where you used to let your fingers do the walking–With a phone in our pockets and access to an abundance of information, the consumer is in total control.

And the smartest, most successful companies around the world understand this.

Inbound Marketing Simplified

Simply put, Inbound marketing is a business methodology that attracts customers by creating valuable content and experiences tailored to them. While outbound marketing interrupts your audience with content they don’t always want, inbound marketing forms connections they are looking for and solves problems they already have.

To win at marketing these days, successful businesses are adopting this Inbound Marketing methodology.

What is the Inbound Methodology?

The inbound strategy – or methodology is the method of growing your organization by building meaningful, lasting relationships with consumers, prospects, and customers. It’s about valuing and empowering these people to reach their goals at any stage in their journey with you.

Why? Because when your customers succeed, you succeed.

The inbound methodology can be applied in three ways:

  1. Attract. Drawing in the right people with valuable content and conversations that establish you as a trusted advisor with whom they want to engage.
  2. Engage. Presenting insights and solutions that align with their pain points and goals so they are more likely to buy from you.
  3. Delight. Providing help and support to empower your customers to find success with their purchase.

When customers find success and share that success with others, it attracts new prospects to your organization, creating a self-sustaining loop. This is how your business builds momentum, and this is why the inbound methodology serves as a strong foundation for your flywheel.

AED Flywheel

What Is the Flywheel?

The flywheel is a business model adopted by HubSpot to illustrate the momentum your business can gain by prioritising and delivering exceptional customer experience.

AED Flywheel Strangers

You can spin and build momentum in your flywheel by investing in strategies that acquire and retain customers — these work as forces for your flywheel. They keep it moving.

The opposite of this is friction. Anything that slows your flywheel is friction. Often the biggest sources of friction for your customers come in the handoffs between teams. This means alignment and communication between teams are key to keeping your flywheel spinning.

AED Flywheel Spinning

When your flywheel is based on the inbound methodology, your marketing, sales, and service functions can add force and eliminate friction throughout the attract, engage, and delight phases. All organizational functions are also responsible for removing friction from your flywheel.

For example, in the attract phase, marketing will likely play the biggest role by doing things like blogging, event marketing, and running paid ads. Meanwhile, your sales team can also add force by engaging in social selling. And your customer service team can add force by making it easier for current customers to make referrals.

Once you attain enough customers and engage and delight them, they can keep your flywheel spinning by promoting your organization and bringing new customers to you. Over time, your flywheel allows you to grow without continually investing in customer acquisition. Often, your customers will help by sending people your way by word of mouth!

Examples of Inbound Marketing

Now that we’ve talked about the philosophy of Inbound Marketing, it’s time to see some real-world examples. One of the most important aspects of inbound is making sure that you send the right message to the right person at the right time. A good way to do this is by segmenting your audience. First, you need to know who you audience actually is compared to who you think it is. Sometimes those two match up, but other times you might discover there’s a different group that’s attracted to your business. A target market workshop can help you nail down the right people for your specific company.

To reach the kind of people who are a good fit for your company, create messages tailored for them. Then send the message out to them. Digital platforms like Google Ads and Facebook Advertising have these features built-in. Digital platforms like these have fantastic measurement too. You can easily see how many people saw and engaged with your message. Those combined with a great website that informs and educates your buyer can attract, engage, and delight the right people for your business.

Adopting an Inbound Marketing approach

Adopting an Inbound Marketing approach is a long game. it involves really investing in delivering what your potential customers are wanting or needing. Then marketing to them based on which stage of the buyer’s journey they are on. Since Inbound Marketing is a philosophy, it can involve making some big changes. But these changes are worth it! Companies that adopt the inbound approach get better leads and repeat customers.

Many businesses find working with a marketing agency helps make the transition easier. But how do you choose the right one for you? Take a look at our article about how to choose the right Marketing Agency for your business to find out more.

How to Choose the Right Marketing Agency

9 reasons why you should educate your buyer

Posted on by Phil

Updated 8th July 2024

Shoppers these days have more choice than ever before when it comes to buying a product. But with so much choice also comes with some confusion on what product they should buy. Buyers now rely on self-education before they step foot into your store and speak to a salesperson. In fact, some experts say as much as 70% of the decision is made before getting in touch with a business. By the time they get to the store, most buyers have an idea of what they want; if not the exact product they need. So how do they find out this information ahead of time? The way that they educate themselves is with content that they find online. This means it’s important to educate your buyer so they can get the information they want.

3 Women with linked arms walking outdoors carrying handbags and shopping bags.

If the information is available online, the buyer will find it. But does it matter where they find it? In this article, we’re going to cover some of the most important reasons why you should be the one to educate your buyer, and how it can help them – and you.

1. It’ll save you time

A lot of businesses will say that they are too busy to create content. The reality is often that they are so busy because of all the phone calls or in-store visits from customers or potential customers who just want to know more information about a product. By creating content that will answer your most frequently asked questions and making it easily available, you’re saving time and money and likely answering those questions to a much larger audience than ever before.

2. Buyers want to learn for themselves

According to market leader Hubspot, only 29% of people want to talk to a salesperson to learn about a product, while 62% will consult a search engine. This outlines that while it’s still very important to have well-trained salespeople, you can not dismiss the fact that creating content online holds so much weight in the sales process. You might get lucky from a customer being educated by a competitor, and your company still getting the sale. But you don’t want to base your sales on luck, do you?

3. They can see the product or service in action

Very few customers will respond positively to an email they receive from you telling them how amazing your products are. But instead, if you were to send them an email that included a how-to/product demonstration images or video, they then can decide for themselves how amazing that product is. Seeing the product or service in action is a lot more visual than having them guess what the benefits are for them. After all, there is an entire industry based on infomercials.

4. Become an authority in your industry

The more information you have about your products or services, the more reputable you are. Creating content for your products gives you authority and trust regarding the very challenge that your buyer is looking to solve. You start to become a thought leader instead of just a salesperson. Even if someone isn’t ready to buy right now, they’ll start to see you as the expert when they do need what you offer.

5. Build customer trust

Customers are far more likely to trust a brand or company that makes an effort to share their knowledge about the product or service. They’ll trust you much more if you don’t make it out to be perfect too. Not every product is right for every person. If you address that, but still focus on the positives of what you offer, you can educate your buyer and help them make an informed purchasing decision. Even if that pushes them elsewhere, they might refer a friend to you later when your offering is the right fit.

6. Reduce complaints

When your customer has been more educated about the product, they are more likely to be aware of how to use the product or what to expect. This works to eliminate most of the basic issues that they would complain about. They can see the features and limitations ahead of time so know what to expect. Often, it’s better that a customer doesn’t buy a product from you that’s a bad fit than complain and give you low reviews.

7. Get better website stats

Without going too deep into how a website works, Google loves websites that have engaged visitors who stay as long as possible (bounce rate). By having an educational piece on your product page (rather than just an image price and feature list) the viewer is more likely to stay on that page for a longer period of time. Video is a great way to keep your viewer engaged for longer. This will tell Google that your page is worth looking at, and this will result in Google showing your website to more people.

8. Attract customers who are a better fit

You can attract more customers that suit your business if you educate your buyer. Anyone can create content about how to toast bread. But, if your company is in the business of selling waffle makers then bread toasting content isn’t going to help you attract new customers that want a waffle maker, or even connect with your existing customers that have been making waffles. It’s just going to confuse them about what you actually offer as a service. While you are most certainly creating educational content about making toast, you’re not educating your customers about what they really care about. In reality, you are just educating someone else’s customer. You aren’t the expert in the toaster business, so why would you try to be?

When you’re creating your content with your desired audience in mind, you are cutting out this misdirected approach. If you want to attract more customers like your existing ones then you have to create relevant content that appeals to them. Instead of making content aimed at everyone – including people who will never be customers, why not target people who are a good fit?

9. Simplify the sales process

When you’re selling to a customer who’s already educated on your product, it will save a lot of time explaining the basics, as you’ve already done that with your content. They have made an educated decision to come in to make their purchase, so a good chunk of that sales process is already complete (that’s not to say you can slack off and not give the best service!). The bonus is that if it was the salesperson that has created that educational content, then rapport building has already started before the customer has walked into the store. This simplifies the sales process – they might come in, tell you what they want, and be on their way.

Be the one to give your customers what they want

Remember, we live in a knowledge-based economy. Customers care about value & trust. The key to effective sales content is to educate the customer, not bombard them with things that they don’t care about and don’t want to hear. If you think you might have trouble creating content to educate your buyer, the team at Back9 can help. We have professional content creators who do expert-level content including copywriting, graphic design, and much more. Get in touch today to find out more about how can help you through content creation.

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How Much Should I Spend on Marketing?

Posted on by Phil

How much should I spend on marketing is a pretty common question we get asked. And it’s a fair question. But like anything in the marketing world, it’s like asking: How much does a good logo cost? Or How much does a website cost?

The short answer is… It depends… Not very definitive is it? It depends on what your goals and budget are and whether you see marketing as an investment or a cost. Fortunately, there are some guidelines that can help you decide.

What do the experts say?

While there is no hard and fast answer about how much to spend on marketing, there are some guidelines and general rules of thumb that can help you make the decision about what’s best for you.

Well how about this. According to figures from a recent CMO survey published in February 2021, across all industries the spend averaged 8.9% of revenue on marketing. In theory, this money spent should generate more revenue. When it’s done right, it’s money well-spent.

Finding the sweet spot for spending can be a challenge though. Ultimately it comes down to what you believe the purpose of marketing to be. And if you see it as an expense or an Investment.

Marketing is an Investment

The important thing is to see any marketing spend as an Investment. Not an expense or cost.

Sometimes investments return a lot, sometimes they return a little. Sometimes investments return nothing and sometimes they end up losing you money. However, if you look at any long-term investment, whilst there are always peaks and troughs. In the long run, if you understand what you are trying to achieve, monitor and measure results, and adapt when necessary, most of the time you will see a good ROI.

Marketing is no different. If you define really good SMART objectives, it is much easier to put measures into place to get to the destination.

If you’re throwing money at various activities with no real plan or direction, and not measuring the results, then you are just throwing money away. Marketing without a plan is like driving with your eyes closed. You’re probably going to crash.

Download a FREE SMART Goals Template

What do Graphic Designers do?

Posted on by Phil

When something becomes second nature, it’s almost impossible to describe it in its most simplest form and that’s how we feel about Graphic Design! We’ve been living and breathing design for well over a decade (that makes us feel old!) so to say that we are passionate about it is an understatement. But what do we actually do?

What can you design/create?

The sky’s the limit – all we need is a brief! One of the biggest parts of graphic design is planning. This involves researching, understanding the client’s needs, creating a brief, and then making sure that it is fit for purpose.

Once all of these things have been done then we can move onto the design stage.

Some things that a graphic designer will typically design include:

  • Logos. Logos are the first thing a lot of people think of when they hear “Graphic Designer”. It’s for a good reason. Logos are probably the most important part of your brand identity. It’s how people recognise you, your brand, and what you do.
  • Websites. The design of your website can make the difference between a person choosing your business or competitor. A good graphic designer takes colour, shapes, fonts, usability, and much more into account when creating a custom design.
  • Apps. Apps might seem similar to websites, but they can be quite different. Getting the design of the website (and extra features too) to an app is no easy task. The designer will typically work close with an app/website developer to make sure it looks good and works like it should.
  • Print collateral. Digital may be the biggest part of design these days, but print is still important. Having flyers, booklets, handouts, guides, or something else you can pick up can mean a lot. Having something your customers can take home with them can be an excellent reminder later on too.
  • Business cards. There are several ways to get business cards like Vistaprint if you’re keen on doing them yourself. But a professionally-designed business card can make a huge difference. A lot of our clients found it was worth having us design the business card, then they can reorder it with the same design as needed.
  • Promo products. Branded products still have an impact but the design of those products is crucial. Sometimes that means doing some tweaks to the logo or putting your branding in the perfect spot. A designer can help you get this just right.
  • Adverts. These can be printed for newspapers and magazines, or digital for Facebook or Google. For an advert to be effective, the design needs to be eye-catching but also represent the values and culture of your business.
  • Much more! Graphic designers can work on many more things, even speciality designs like building signage, books, vehicle wraps, and much more.

A day in the life of a graphic designer

A typical day for a graphic designer will be different depending on where you go. Some designers are specialists in one area. Others do a little bit of everything. Let’s break down a typical day for a Graphic Designer at Back9 Creative.

No two days are exactly the same as a designer at Back9. We might be working on a logo concept part of the day. This involves researching imagery, competing businesses and sketching out ideas. Later on, we might move on to designing some business cards. And then it’s over to a digital marketing campaign and we need to design an eye-catching Facebook advertisement. Then to finish the day off, we might design a new website page. Are you getting the feeling that multitasking is key?

Do you have to be qualified to become a graphic designer?

You don’t have to be qualified but it certainly helps when competing in the job market. Employers will typically look for a new graduate that has a Bachelor in Design or has a minimum of three years of experience.

It also helps to have experience with software like Adobe Creative Cloud. Some software has its own certifications you can get by taking a course online (lots of them are free). The more of these you have, the better! Click here to learn more about Graphic Design as a career option.

How can an experienced designer help your business?

Designer Lormindo Mamo said “Every great design begins with an even better story”. An experienced designer can help tell that story. A professional designer in your corner helps to bring your brand to life!

With experience comes wisdom and the ability to make informed decisions quicker which in turn can help to deliver results for your business. Here at Back9, we are brand experts. We understand what can elevate your business and help it be communicated exceptionally to your target audience.

Why should I invest in Graphic Design?

You might enjoy playing around with Photoshop, Canva or Microsoft Publisher and feel fairly confident in your abilities. And if this is the case, we probably aren’t a good fit for your business and that’s ok.

But once you see the value that a design agency can bring to your business you might change your mind. Often all it takes to completely change a brand’s visual identity is a fresh set of eyes from an external party and there are a number of great design companies in Invercargill. Here at Back9, we can audit your existing collateral/messaging and identify ways to improve and better communicate your brand to your audience.

One of the main services our graphic designers do is to create a logo and brand identity. Our logo package starts at just $175 + GST per month for 12 months. Or feel free to get in touch or give us a call to see what we can do for you!