January 19, 2008

Gaining notoriety in the design world is NOT easy and can take a lot of time and hard work. Some of the most common ways to direct traffic to your business are of course css galleries, blogging, social networks, and the often-overlooked design contest.

Surfing the web about 2 months ago I stumbled upon a snowboard design contest for Artec snowboards. I was really busy with a bunch of big projects but decided to take an hour or two and design a board. Like something my dad would say, “you can’t win if you don’t try”. Well I really wanted to at least try especially since the snowboard industry is a market I would love to do more work for.

Just yesterday I got an email saying I was a top 10 contender out of over 500 entries. My board will be displayed not only on their site but also at the worlds largest trade show in Munich Germany!

The point of this story is design contests often seem like a waste of valuable time and sometimes money but they can be a great marketing tool. The hour or so it took to come up with my board graphic was well worth the time investment. Who knows… maybe Artec or another snowboard company will send some work my way. I hope all of you will try to find your very own design contest! It has Ben Blogged.

No Comments »