BaseCamp - Project Collaboration for Web & Graphic Designers

I was a guest speaker at Westwood College earlier this week, talking to a group of about 50 graphic design students. It is always fun speaking to students that are about to graduate, because they ask the questions about processes that we sometimes take for granted.

Anyways, one of the students asked me after the session was over about how it is I manage my projects. He mentioned that most people in the industry use programs such as Microsoft Project, but the learning curve and price on the software is pretty steep for independent freelancers and small design shops. In return, I also reminded him that MS Project also deals mostly with resource management and in-house project collaboration - but designers and developers have the most problems with communicating with their clients. Therefore, I recommended to him a web based software we started using a couple of months ago called BaseCamp.

What is BaseCamp? In their words, "Basecamp takes a fresh, novel approach to project collaboration. Projects don't fail from a lack of charts, graphs, stats, or reports, they fail from a lack of clear communication. Basecamp solves this problem by providing tools tailored to improve the communication between people working together on a project."

In other words, BaseCamp allows you to provide a method for passing messages, files, group writing, project milestones, to-do lists, and updates and changes to and from members working on the team AND the client - while at the same time automatically keeping an audit trail that is time-stamped and dated. This eliminates problems with documents and communication getting lost in email, takes away the clients and project members deniability for hiccups in the process, and keeps the project lead organized.

BaseCamp doesn't require any kind of software installation or hosting; they store all of the information on their secure servers. The software being web based allows you to be able to use BaseCamp from any computer with internet access, and allows your development team and clients to use it at no additional charge to them. It also allows them to automatically provide updates and new features without you having to manually install them.

The signup process is simple, and they can have you setup with a 30-day free trial account in minutes. Once you finish the trial you have the ability to upgrade to a variety of packages, dependent on how many clients you would like to manage and the features you would like to use. The larger packages are popular because they have a time-tracking module that allows you to track and report the time spent on various aspects of the project.

Clients love it, my developers love it, and as a small business owner it has made my world a whole lot easier. I recommend BaseCamp to graphic designers, web designers, illustrators, programmers, and just about anyone who is looking for a way to streamline communication and manage projects.

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