How to Save Yourself from Heartache Over a TOU

By PChip | Category: Business Management, Designer Tips, Writing Tips |

If you’ve ever had a dishonest customer do you wrong, you know how I felt the day I spent agonizing over the poo-head who decided to change one of my TOU’s without permission.  Take it from me, the best way to distribute a TOU is in a non-changeable, secure file.  The good ol’ fashioned text file format, just doesn’t cut it for me anymore!

Todays Tip: Create all your TOU’s in PDF format to keep from having them them changed by no-gooders.

30-Day Challenge Mini-Tasker:  Read my article about the benefits of creating a secure TOU in pdf format and then give it a try yourself.

Tell Others About What You Read Here!
[del.icio.us] [Digg] [Facebook] [Google] [MySpace] [Reddit] [Squidoo] [StumbleUpon] [Technorati] [Twitter] [Yahoo!] More »

7 comments
Leave a comment »

  1. cindy j September 23rd, 2007 1:10 pm :

    I am not a designer, I am a consumer, but I am considering starting a Scrap4Hire business, which is why I am delighted to see this discussion for designers to get clearer and more specific with their TOUs!

    I do have a suggestion to add however and it has become a big pet peeve of mine…Please for designers, please!, put your name or your business name at the start of the TOU file name! I know a lot of consumers are frustrated with the current situation of designers not labeling their files with appropriate identification. For the consumer end of things, I think most digi scrappers that are active in the community really do want to maintain a high level of integrity with regards to proper crediting to designers with the items they use. However there are so many ‘professional’ designers who don’t bother with this step and it makes it very challenging and time consuming to go back and try to track whose creations one is using…it is much easy to delete and go with another similar item from someone who has taken the time to label their files to make identification easier.

    Sorry about being so wordy about this, but I feel strongly that this topic needs to be addressed in the digital designers professional world. I have debated about starting threads for discussion at several of the ‘hubs’ but am reluctant.

    Thanks for all the great work you are doing here at dsd-professionals to help this industry evolve!
    cindy j

  2. PChip September 23rd, 2007 3:18 pm :

    Absolutely wonderful thoughts here CJ! I couldn’t agree with you more. It’s so frustrating when the files are not named in a way that let’s me know who the designer is! I try to keep my files in a location under the designers name. But on the occassion, I’ve forgotten which folder it came out of - Ugh! What a hassle!

    So I’ll add my vote to this as well and will do up an article on this subject to be added to the http://dsd-professionals.com/stoui website and maybe that will lend more weight to it too.

    Thanks for bringing this up.

  3. loonyhiker September 23rd, 2007 5:38 pm :

    I have also seen the TOU printed out and then a photo was taken and it was saved as a jpg. That was a pretty neat way of making sure no one messes with it also!

  4. David September 24th, 2007 7:03 pm :

    Tip for Day 22: At Aardvark Scrapbooking, we are starting to put a shortened version and web URL in a strip alongside the image, much like a paper sheet from the store.

    Everywhere the image goes, the TOU and your logo / URL go with it. Nothing to lose and no files to dig for.

  5. PChip September 25th, 2007 7:54 am :

    Loonyhiker, I’ve not heard or seen anyone use the printscreen method for their TOU before. But it certainly would do the trick for making it secure! Thanks for sharing the tip!

    David, That’s a great idea for elements packaged as a PNG file. How about papers? Do you make them slightly wider than usual and put the info there too? Or something else for those files?

  6. Di Hickman October 2nd, 2007 11:54 am :

    Wow this had never occurred to me before but you bet your butt that I’m not gonna do txt files for my TOU anymore! Thanks for the heads up!

  7. Jane April 25th, 2008 11:51 am :

    I like designers that include both text and jpg files with their zip files. If I can open the jpeg while I’m creating, I’m more likely to name at least one layer with the kit & designer name and more apt to give proper credit if I’m not searching or having to open a second program just to retrieve the info.

Leave Comment