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Information Seeking Practices of a Freelance Illustrator: A Case Study
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- Author(s) / Creator(s)
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Freelance professionals find jobs for themselves through self-promotion but little study has been done on how they find these jobs or learn how to self-promote. An interview was conducted with a freelance illustrator who is new to the job market and who has limited professional experience. Methods of finding potential employers were serendipitous in nature and relied a great deal on information encountering and information monitoring. Information sources included publications that use illustrations (generally magazines), publication websites, and a network of peers and other illustrators. Some self-promotion was achieved via social media but major social media sites such as Facebook were excluded for privacy reasons. Email was the preferred method of contact for potential employers but the slow processes of finding employers serendipitously has made the interviewee consider more professional options such as subscription to an ad agency. Information barriers include affective barriers (email seen as “safer” than the telephone), lack of time to research potential employers, and information scatter. Information aesthetics is also a factor since personalized emails have a greater chance of eliciting a response than a standard form email. Although currently ‘satisficed’ with this information-seeking behaviour, more professional and faster methods are being considered for the future in order to move into full-time illustration.
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- Date created
- 2015-02-06
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- Type of Item
- Conference/Workshop Presentation