Career in Graphic Design.

What would be your advice to a new Graphic Design artist for a successful and lucrative career?

• My daughter is a recent graduate of a graphic design program and I would like to help her be succesful, and financially stable in her career. I would like to kow what type of company will offer the best salaries, what type of graphic design specialities are most in demand, and the cities (in the US) where the most successful graphic designers live and work.

• Answer:

  I wish that there was a single answer to your question, but my gut tells me that there isnt.  So I will do my best to shed some insight.  The first thing I need to know is she looking to work for a company or start her own firm.  Either way her portfolio will most likely be the first thing that a company looking to hire her, or a potential client will be looking for.  Secondly she needs to establish efficient processes to get designs completed.  As a graphic designer we dont sell products, we design them i.e. business cards, web graphics, posters, etc.  What we actually sell is TIME, the longer it takes to get a job completed the higher the cost. There are any number of companies/industries  that would require the needs of a graphic designer, she can work her way into a major corp Marketing Dept, a newspaper, magazine,  or the entertainment industry.  She needs to identify her strengths when it comes to design.  For instance, I know that I am not too good at designing "overly urban" projects, so I stay away from those.  I say this to say, she may come across an indie record label who produces Rock & Roll and they need album artwork done, if your daughter has never listened to Rock & Roll then she might not be able to fully embody the Rock and Roll Essence.  I would also like to note that being just a graphic designer, in this day in age is not enough.  She may want to incorporate some web design, as well as MARKETING.  I want to stress the marketing aspect of it because a well designed website, or brand identity is only useful if it is in front of the intended audience and MARKETING is what will do that.  Many of my clients dont even have a marketing plan, yet they want me to design a brand identity. By providing the marketing advice, she will be able to position herself as more than just a graphic designer, but more of a valueable resource that should be well compensated.  I can go on for the next week answering this question, I hope this is a great start.