Just a quick post to mention a new Business Forum I’ve recently joined, its called UK Business Labs and its off to a great start, approaching 150 active members and over 1000 posts in just a few weeks. It looks like it may have the foundations to become a really useful community, with a number of forum features that its competition is missing. I particularly like their open approach to allowing members a dedicated area to advertising their products and services, something which has strangely been restricted in other leading business forums I’ve been a member on.

I’m looking forward to seeing the membership grow and hopefully speaking to some of you there - UK Business Labs Forum

Just to let everyone know, I’m off on holiday this Friday (18th July) until next Friday (25th July) so the office will be closed for this time, I’ll be setting up my e-mail auto reply just incase . I’ll reply to any e-mails and messages as soon as I return! Thanks, Greg

Apologies for the lack of updates over the last couple of weeks, its all gone crazy and I’ve been too busy with freelance projects to get any posts made - a good problem to be having!

I have however had chance to start on some early concepts for the DesignForums.co.uk logo and branding style, at the moment I’m just looking at very simple typography to form a clean, modern logo. I’m very cautious about getting too focused on one idea at this stage as its going to be difficult to please a lot of other designers! Not an easy project by any means. Here’s what I have so far… (more…)

I currently have several personal projects in the pipelines which I fit in and around my schedule whenever I get chance to work on them, one of these is Wordpress Army. I’m going to be building a themed Wordpress Gallery site, which will be a similar setup to the various CSS gallery sites that are so popular these days. I’m hoping that the sites unique design will help it to establish itself as a leading inspiration for designers and fans of Wordpress. The site will also feature a blog with various Wordpress tips and advice. I’ll keep the blog posted with the progress of Wordpress Army and my other personal projects over the coming months.

…and they’re always glad you came, you wanna be where you can see, our troubles are all the same, you wanna be where everybody knows your name.

Now I’ve got my blog up and running I would like to dedicate a post to A1 Business Forums, the friendliest business forum around, and they really do know my name!! (more…)

Following my last post, just a few hours ago I received an e-mail asking me about where the best place to buy and sell UK domain names is. So I thought a quick post about my favourite sites for UK domain names might be useful to those interested. (more…)

Back in February I purchased the domain name DesignForums.co.uk from a Sedo auction for just under £300. Probably considered to be a very small amount in the domain name world, that was quite a lot to me as I’ve only ever purchased domain names for under £50/$100. So why did I buy what is essentially just a domain for £300? (more…)

Hopefully this post will be the first of many new posts to my blog, as I hope to develop it further and become a regular freelance design blogger.

By now most people familiar with website design and development will have heard of Wordpress. Chances are that even if you’re not familiar (more…)

Since last updating my blog, the Sleep Centre site was featured in .net magazine (Issue 176, June 08) I was going to post on here as soon as the magazine was released but unfortunately .net got my name wrong! A small mistake their end had meant the published name next to the Sleep Centre screenshot was Geoff Ellis (from the previous .net magazine issue). Fortunately after raising this issue with the guys at .net they said they would print a correction in the next issue.

So after a few weeks of my friends calling me Geoff… the July edition (Issue 177) was printed and not only was the correction noted in the letters section but I got an apology and a full re-print of the column - Thanks .net!!

I received a nice e-mail this morning, with the news that one of my designs for an e-commerce site www.thesleepcentre.co.uk is going to be featured in my favourite magazine!

.net magazine is the leading magazine for web design in the UK and each month features a section for readers’ sites. I decided to e-mail them about the Sleep Centre site I recently completed, not really expecting to hear anything back, but to my surprise they replied to say they would like to feature it!!

I’ve sent in a small pic of myself with 100 words about the site which goes alongside a screenshot of the site, and should be in the June issue (on sale 29th April).

1. Competitive quotes – Freelancer designers are unlikely to have an expensive city or town studio location, as a result we have lower overheads than larger agencies. This means they can pass savings onto the clients with highly competitive quotes.

2. Speak to the designer – As is often the case with larger companies, various levels of staff become involved in your design project, whether that’s a creative director, a studio manager or a project manager. Its common practice that these members of the team will take down your design brief and relay this information to the designer working on the project. This can lead to fragmented information, or mis-interpreted design briefs, as the information needs to go through another level. If you use a freelancer you will be speaking direct to the designer.

3. Know who you’re working with – You know as a client that the freelance designer you have selected will be working on your project. If you were to use a larger agency, there is a chance that your work may be passed down to a junior designer or an office junior.

4. Quicker reaction times – Various levels of staff within an agency could mean that ‘red tape’ could slow down your project. Freelancers are usually able to react to client’s requirements a lot quicker, as they can make decisions and act upon them as soon as possible.

5. Accountability – Working with a freelancer you know who is accountable for your work, you will usually find that a freelancer cares a lot more about the work they do over some employees within large companies.

Please bear with me whilst I complete the development of my new site design. I will be uploading past projects to my portfolio in the next few days, so please check back soon. In the meantime if you need to contact me please e-mail me at greg@gregfindley.com

Thanks, Greg