Once you’ve got your new brand and website sorted you might think: “Right, that’s me. I can now do everything myself with the assets I have available.” Whereas that is probably true to some extent, it is worth considering whether staying with your creative agency and using them as a resource for design-related requirements would not only provide you with high-quality consistent design but also with a relationship that would lighten your daily load and grow closely over the years. The reasons to keep a retained design service are various.

Consistency

Consistency within your brand is absolutely vital in your communications to make your organisation recognisable to users and customers. Having brand guidelines written down and ensuring your team follows them will get you half-way there. But most often creating new assets from those guidelines can still be tricky as those guidelines can’t account for every potential design need.

You could say you don’t care, or you could commission a variety of service providers across a variety of creative disciplines to keep your design in check. But by far the best choice to keep things consistent is to have retained design service that does all your creative work. It will ensure that across all your channels and content your brand and voice is coherent and consistent. This agency will grow with you and really get to know your needs and voice when communicating with your ideal client/user.

Value for money

While any retained relationship accounts for peaks and troughs in work, generally, retained clients get more hours than they pay for as latitude is earned through the long-term relationship. That means more value for your money. Additionally, keeping a retained agency has the advantage of not having to induct a new person/agency to your organisation and brand whenever you need a design job to be done. Your retained agency will already know you and will easily be able to convert your requirements into beautiful assets that speak with your voice.

Agility

Last but not least, the relationship that you develop with your retained design agency presents an opportunity to develop trusted partnerships where work can be produced both proactively and reactively. With an established understanding and compiled assets, the agency can respond quickly to creative requirements across a range of platforms.

If you are thinking about getting a retainer with an agency, why not check our post about our values to see if we’re a good fit for you? Or drop us a message directly.