Don’t.

In my experience and opinion an advertising agency will not provide the best return on your investment.

This is based on more than 10 years working on marketing for small to mid-sized companies (1-12 million in annual revenue). Creative houses and advertising agencies charge more for the end product than you can get elsewhere and most importantly they generally do NOT craft your marketing positioning. Advertising agencies can create very visually appealing collateral and can match the image that you define for them, but the typical advertising agency will not take the time to learn your specific business and as such can not adequately recommend the image you should project to the market.

Look for an independent. As someone stated in an earlier response, find them by browsing local company sites and identifying the ones you like the best and feel are the most compelling. Then call those companies, get in touch with the person responsible for their site and be direct with them. Ask them who produced the site, but even more important in my opinion ask them who crafted the message, wrote the copy, and determined the corporate identity. (Important – start by telling them why you are calling them – i.e. that you found their site to be the most impressive and give them specific reasons.) This or these, are the people you want to get in contact with. If it is a single person (and the company is not too large) and that person is employed by the company ask the person you are speaking to point blank if it would create any complication for you to solicit off hours temporary contract work from that person. You will be surprised, especially if the person you are talking to is this individuals direct boss, they generally will be glad to help their people find additional outside work. As director of marketing and communication I LIKED my people doing outside work. It kept them sharp and helped keep them from getting stuck in a creative rut developing the same content over and over again for our company.

I want to make this point very clearly, because I have seen so many companies make this mistake: You MUST define your target image first before engaging in any branding. Your target image must be based on a clear and thoughtful understanding of your target audience and business sector as well as your marketing strategy, product offering and key distinguishing value propositions. It can NOT be emotional or subjectively biased – i.e. “You just like the way this or that looks”.

Does you business sell to other businesses or to consumers? If your company sells services or products to other businesses your marketing message is far more critical than your graphic identity. Even if you are a B2C company Marketing comes before branding. You need to identify the following:

Who is your target audience?
Why do they want your product?
Why would they not buy someone else’s product instead of yours?
What do they value most? (Creativity, stability, customer service, convenience, turn-key solutions, ease of use etc)
What are their pain-points and how does your product overcome them?
What distinguishes your product or service from the rest of the competition?

The answers to these questions should identify the image you want to create. Go out on the web and find companies that are successful in your exact business model or in a similar sector. Review their image and branding strategies. Benchmark them as the beginning foundation for your corporate identity, then modify from there based on your company’s key distinguishers.

If you don’t feel qualified to do this yourself find someone who is and can. Your message and your identity are the source of everything else produced for your company. If you don’t have that definition in place then the best creative design work will not help you.

I have seen organizations with hideous, and I do mean hideous graphic design and corporate branding doing 9 million annually with fortune 500 clients based solely on the strength of their marketing message. (I’m talking about datasheets literally created and printed directly from PowerPoint here.) I have likewise seen companies with incredibly slick designs selling absolutely nothing because the copy on their website and in their marketing collaterals simply does not communicate any value, continuity, or even demonstrate an understanding of their target audiences needs.

I am a very strong proponent of professionally designed branding and image, but without the marketing message as the seed for this branding, and as the legs to carry it to a sale, it is worthless.

Graphic design work: corporate logo (and branding), datasheets and product slicks, websites, business cards and more can be outsourced to independent freelance designers. Specify in detail the image you are trying to convey and they can produce it, at a fraction of the cost if sourced through a creative house.

A logo can be accomplished for $500.00 or less.
A datasheet (if you write the copy) can be accomplished for less than $1,500.00.
Webpage templates (and you need maybe 4 templates for a startup website) can be sourced for as little as $500.00 per template. Then adding pages to the site should be a matter of sourcing a couple new images and dropping in content. If outsourced to an independent new pages from templates could cost in the area of $100 – $200 and less if no new graphics are required.

Compare those costs to what a creative or advertising agency quotes.

The most critical talent for you to find early on is someone who understands your product and its unique value in the industry and can clearly bear that out through product positioning and solid copy. Everything else can be outsourced, but this talent needs a strong and long term relationship with your company.
It takes time to learn your product and more time to craft and hone the message.

Best Regards

your best bet is to have someone local so that you can work with them as they progress.. if that is not possible, then go to my website amservusa.com.. what you are asking for is what I do. I am not soliciting your business, but getting an idea from my website is alright with me.. if you want help..then email me at amservusa@cox.net.. I will caution you to be careful of whom you choose to hire. They should not ask for any upfront money and must be willing to send you some samples of their work..some of these outfits are not fit to carry out the garbage..they have no clue as to what it really takes to create something that is productive. If I were you, I would get references from them and then go see for myself if what they claim is actually true..good luck