Work out whether to design it yourself or hire someone.
Some design work is genuinely fine in Canva and some quietly costs you credibility. askBizly will tell you which is which, what a designer should charge, and who to ask.
Free to use. Ask as much as you like.
Before I suggest anything — what would a good month look like, and what can you pay for a lead?
That’s workable. Here’s how:
- Understand your business, customers and objectivesWhat you sell, who buys, and where you want to get to
- Create your growth strategyWhere the £2.5k goes, and in what order
- Fix what’s holding you backThe changes you can make yourself
- Connect you with a partnerOnly if you need a specialist
AI built on real human expertise
askBizly applies the judgement of people who have grown businesses, led marketing teams and hired agencies — more than twenty years of it. Their criteria shape what it asks and how it answers.
A growth plan built for your business
Not a template. It asks what you sell, where you want to get to and what you have to spend, then sets out what to do, in what order, and what it should cost.
Partners aligned to your objectives
If you want help executing, askBizly briefs partners against the plan you just built — and says why each one fits. It is free to you; partners pay only when an introduction becomes work.
Start here
What’s going wrong with your design?
Pick the design or brand problem that sounds like yours.
When design is worth paying for
Design tools have made the bottom of this market disappear. A business owner with Canva and some patience can produce social graphics and simple documents that are entirely respectable, and paying a designer for that work is now hard to justify.
What has not changed is the top. Design is a form of argument — it decides what somebody notices first, how much effort reading costs them, and whether the whole thing looks like it came from a business that knows what it is doing. That matters exactly when somebody is deciding whether to trust you.
So the sensible rule is about consequence. Work that is seen briefly by people who already know you can be done in-house. Work that is part of somebody deciding to buy, or that gets printed at a size where mistakes are permanent, should be done by someone who does it for a living.
The other thing worth getting right is ownership. Agree before the work starts that you will receive the editable source files and that any typefaces are licensed to you, otherwise small changes later mean going back to the same person forever. askBizly will help you decide what to commission and what to keep in-house.
How it works
Work out whether to design it yourself or hire someone.
Describe the piece and where it has to work. askBizly says Canva, freelancer or agency — and what that should cost.
Understand your business and your graphic design goals
Your goals for graphic design, what you’re doing now and what you’ve got to work with — in your own words, one question at a time.
Work out what’s holding your graphic design back
What you tell it — and any proposal, report or figures you share — is assessed against clear graphic design criteria, with what’s known kept apart from what’s assumed.
Create your graphic design strategy
An action plan, a budget, a review or a brief for graphic design — with its evidence, assumptions and limits shown.
Help you execute
Do it yourself, go back to your supplier with better questions, or look at graphic design partners — you decide.
Fix the problem
Four ways askBizly can help with graphic design
Get a plan for what to make, a realistic design budget, a review of a freelancer or quote, or a brief for the right designer.
Diagnosis
Not every design job is worth a designer.
askBizly works out whether the piece has to persuade a stranger or just look tidy internally — then what to make in Canva and what to pay for.
- DIY versus hire decided against the job
- The few pieces that actually need craft
- What to fix in the brief before anyone starts
Budget
Know what graphic design should cost in the UK.
Day rates, per-piece fees and retainers are different buys. askBizly breaks down freelancer and agency ranges, and what your budget can cover without endless revisions.
- Logo, deck and campaign work kept apart
- What a £300 job versus a £3,000 job buys
- Revision rounds costed before you start
Review
Check a design quote, freelancer or the work you already paid for.
Share the brief, quote or files. askBizly looks at whether the scope is clear, whether usage rights are in the price, and whether you are being charged for strategy you did not ask for.
- Scope and usage rights checked
- Quotes compared on the same deliverables
- Questions to put before you pay
Partners
A clear design brief, then only designers who fit.
If you need a freelancer or studio, askBizly turns the job and budget into a brief and looks for graphic design partners whose records fit. Nobody is contacted until you say so.
- You see the brief before anyone does
- You approve the brief first
- No obligation to hire
Graphic design questions people ask first
Freelance day rates typically run £250 to £500, with specialists and those in London higher. Small agencies charge £500 to £900 a day. Per-project pricing is common for defined work: a pitch deck at £500 to £2,000 depending on length, product packaging at £1,000 to £5,000, a set of marketing collateral at £800 to £3,000. Ongoing retainers for regular small work usually start around £500 a month.
Canva is perfectly adequate for social posts, internal documents, simple flyers and anything short-lived, particularly if you already have brand assets and templates set up. Bring in a designer when the work will be seen by people deciding whether to trust you with money — pitch decks, packaging, exhibition stands, printed brochures — or when it needs to be produced at print quality, where colour and resolution mistakes become expensive. A useful test is whether a slightly amateur result would cost you anything.
A freelancer is usually better value for steady, defined work: you get direct contact with the person doing it and no account management overhead. Agencies are worth their premium when a project needs several disciplines at once — strategy, copy, design, production — or when you need reliable capacity and cover for deadlines. For most small businesses, a good freelancer on a modest monthly retainer covers more ground for the money.
A competent freelance logo with a few variations and a simple guideline is typically £400 to £1,500. A studio identity that includes strategy, a system and templates is £2,000 to £8,000 for a small business, and more if they are also writing the positioning. Logos for £50 exist on marketplaces; they look like £50 and you rarely get the files or the licence you think you bought. The useful spend is the system around the mark, not the mark alone.
What the piece is for, who will see it, where it will live, the size or format, the deadline, and what “done” looks like. Attach examples you like and examples you do not, and say why. Include the copy if you have it, or say who is writing it. Agree how many revision rounds are in the price. A vague brief is why projects run long and quotes look cheap until the third round of changes.
You need something. A full guideline document is overkill for a five-page brochure, but a logo in the right files, the colours as hex values, and the typeface names will stop every job looking like it came from a different company. If you have none of that, budget a small identity pass before a pile of one-off design jobs. It is cheaper than re-briefing the look every time.
Yes. The advice is free for business owners and always will be. askBizly is paid by the partners it introduces, and only when you choose to be introduced. Nothing is sent to anyone and nobody contacts you until you say so.
Stop guessing. Start growing.
Describe the piece. Free, with no designer contacting you unless you ask.