Freelance Graphic & Web Design

Q. What advice do you have for a customer looking to hire a provider like you?

A. Make sure you find someone that really knows how to do what it is you want. Don't settle for second best - always go with the best. Also, you should always negotiate on the pricing structure. If someone won't budge on their price, find someone else.

Q. If you were a customer, what do you wish you knew about your trade? Any inside secrets to share?

A. There are pretty easy things to do to help with SEO on any given page that will help with organic, not paid, search results for google, bing, yahoo, etc.

Q. What do you like most about your job?

A. Everything is designed, some just that some things are not designed as good as they could be. By having the freedom to stay creative and think outside the box, that is best thing about what I do.

Web and print standards change almost daily so being able to adapt and learn new things is always a great thing along with being able to provide my expertise to others and help them on their design challenges.

Q. What questions do customers most commonly ask you? What's your answer?

A. Q: How long does something take to design?
A: It all depends on the project itself. A company logo may be completed in 1 business day, where a catalog may take 2 months. Design time can vary drastically, even on the web. Take for example, www.dmcycleclub.com, this site took about 30 hours of design and development time to complete.

Q. Do you do any sort of continuing education to stay up on the latest developments in your field?

A. The simple answer is YES! Since graduating college in 2001 at Grand View College in Des Moines, I have attended more than 150 hours of continuing education classes focused specifically on web technologies (PHP, CSS, Actionscript/Flash, Javascript and HTML). I attend new classes/lectures on a yearly basis as well as follow several blogs and forums that talk heavily about new standards and guidelines and techniques for web and also print design.