The "AS-IS" Clause: What it Does and How To Use It
You have probably seen an AS IS clause in many of your creative services agreements, typically in bold or ALL CAPS. What are they for and how should you approach them?A typical AS IS clause might read...
View ArticleKey Considerations in Drafting Retainer Agreements
Retainers can be great for the studio or agency but they are prone to disputes. Longer terms lead to forgotten discussions, evolving needs, and unmet expectations. So next time you are drafting a...
View ArticleUse Price Adjustments When Negotiating Contract Risks
Just like a bank charges a higher interest rate for a riskier loan, its not unreasonable for you to charge more if a client’s form of agreement requires you to take on additional risks and...
View ArticleYour Contract is Not Your Contract Process
Lots of clients come to me the same way: "Hey, Josh. We need a new contract." I ask lots of questions and we get a new contract in place, no problem. But more often than not, the businesses I see need...
View ArticleBad Contract Writing Can Be Bad for Business
I see lots of contracts and nearly all suffer from the same problem: bad legal writing. You know what I'm talking about, what people call legalese: writing that is cluttered, bloated, technical,...
View ArticleMatchstick Legal Formed
Leading law firms for creative business merge to become Matchstick. San Anselmo, California and Portland, Oregon – Today CreateLegal and Groundwork Legal formally merged to become Matchstick Legal,...
View ArticleThe Agency Guide to Web Accessibility
Website accessibility is a hot issue right now. What can an agency do to ensure it doesn't get caught up in a claim regarding a website the agency helped build? Kris Rivenburgh recently published a...
View ArticleRecommended Elements for Every SOW
Your SOW is a key part of your contract. In many cases, it’s the first thing your client reads (and maybe the only thing). More than just explaining project details, if used correctly the SOW can be...
View ArticleCovid-19 Agency Survival Guide
Well, here we are! via GIPHY I'm not going to sugarcoat it, things are...not good. I'm comforted in knowing that we will get to the other side, eventually. Until then, it will be a challenge. We are...
View ArticlePlanning for PPP Forgiveness
via GIPHY By now a number of our clients have received PPP Loan funds. Once you have the loan, your focus turns to using it to maximize forgiveness. The forgiveness application and instructions were...
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Introducing Emessay
One challenge we face at Matchstick is how to meet the needs of all creative businesses. While Matchstick represents firms of all sizes, not everyone that contacts us is in a place to commit to a full...
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Don’t Be Intimidated by Agency Indemnification Clauses
Indemnification is a big word, one we don’t often use outside of a legal context. These clauses can be long, confusing, onerous and appear potentially dangerous or costly to your business. What does...
View ArticleWhy Isn’t Your Agency Getting Paid? Make Payment Terms Clear In Your Contracts
It shouldn’t be a struggle to get paid the amount you’re owed for the work you’ve done!You may charge for your services in a variety of ways: flat fee, on retainer, by the hour, or some combination of...
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Guarding Against Trademark Issues in Agency Contracts
If your agency creates logos, naming, or tag lines as part of your branding work, your contracts should clearly state that the client is responsible for conducting trademark clearance. Trademark...
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How to Write Payment Triggers into Digital Agency Contracts
Having clear payment clauses in your contracts ensures two crucial outcomes: You are paid for the work you’ve done, and don’t wind up doing any extra work for free. While that logic is straightforward...
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Employee or Contractor? Mitigating The Risk of Worker Misclassification
Utilizing contract workers is a common practice in the agency space — especially with today’s talented (and affordable) developers and designers being in such short supply. However, some agency owners...
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Listing Agreement Basics When Selling Your Agency
When selling a creative agency or merging with another, owners often engage a broker to help get the deal done. Brokers tap into their networks of potential buyers, gather sales materials, collect...
View ArticleWhat NOT To Do When Hiring Freelancers and Contractors
Creative agencies have long hired freelancers and contractors to handle a variety of projects. But a growing trend among taxing authorities is to collect as much revenue from those workers as...
View ArticleThe Creative Agency’s Guide to Getting Paid
Your agency deserves to collect every dollar it earns. With so many potential areas for missteps, we published this eBook to share our recommendations for best practices, common mistakes and issues...
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Understanding the Letter of Intent When Selling Your Agency
If you’re selling your agency, the letter of intent sets the stage for the entire transaction. The letter of intent (LOI) is a declaration of one party’s aim to do business with another. In an agency...
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Is Your Agency Meeting Remote Worker Requirements?
Nearly three years since the pandemic forced companies to leave their offices, many of us have maintained some version of a remote or hybrid working model. This has in turn afforded employees the...
View ArticleNew Seattle Ordinance Impacts Independent Contractor Work
If your company uses independent contractors who work in Seattle, you will need to comply with a new city ordinance. It doesn’t matter if your company isn’t based in Seattle or doesn’t have an office...
View ArticleKey Criteria for Evaluating Your Agency’s Service Agreements and SOWs
If you’ve begun discussing work and a ballpark price with a new client, the next step is to get specific about various rights and obligations. Both parties need to understand the work to be done, the...
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What’s the Right Fee Structure and Billing Model for Your Agency?
Creative agencies usually aren’t, well, very creative when it comes to charging for their work. Often the billing model is as simple as 50 percent down and 50 percent upon delivery—no matter the...
View ArticleMatchstick Report Card
Without the right language in your service agreement or statement of work, you could be leaving the door open to scope creep, payment disputes, out-of-control clients, or excessive intellectual...
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Should You Include a Non-Compete or Non-Solicit Clause in Your Employee...
Many creative agencies seek to stanch client and talent turnover by putting non-compete or non-solicit clauses in their employment contracts. The problem with this approach is that non-compete...
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Find and Keep Top Talent With More Creative Incentive Programs
Big tech companies and well-funded startups have long used lucrative salary and equity packages to attract and retain top talent. How can agencies like yours hope to compete against companies with...
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How to Leverage Legal to Boost Your Agency’s Profits
Many agencies see legal expense as purely a cost center cutting into job profitability. But when approached correctly, legal can be an important tool in creating value for your agency.The key factor...
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Best Practices When Terminating Employees
It’s no surprise that exercising diligence and care is crucial when it comes time to employee terminations. Whether you’re letting someone go for performance problems, financial issues, or any other...
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Good Writing in Contracts Matters for Agencies
Most agencies have bloated contracts full of legal jargon. They are unnecessarily complicated and hard to read. Bad writing can leave clients confused and frustrated. Conversely, when your writing is...
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Increase Your Fees if Clients Seek Changes in Your Agency’s Contracts
From the very start of discussions around potential scope and fee let your prospective clients know that your proposed fee assumes you will use your standard contract. Make it clear to them that...
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New Year Legal Check Up for Agencies
It’s a new year (at least it was last month). That means it’s time to take stock of all the things you didn’t do last year and mean to do this year. Here’s our list of items that every agency should...
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New Rules for Severance Agreements
Employee terminations are a fact of life for agencies. While terminations are sometimes amicable and the agency can wish the employee well in her next endeavor, some terminations can be bumpy. Maybe...
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What Goes into a Severance Agreement?
In a sign of the times, we’ve been receiving a lot of questions from clients about employee terminations and layoffs. Often, we end up preparing severance agreements for our clients that provide (a)...
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Can't Tell if Your Contract Might Need an Update? Use this Non-Legal...
Lots of agencies come to us looking for a rewrite of their master services agreement. But how do you know when your agreement needs an update? Even if you don’t understand a word of the legal...
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New Pay Transparency Laws Can Impact Your Agency (No Matter Where You Operate)
The landscape of pay transparency is quickly changing across the country. Many states have enacted new laws requiring job postings to include defined salary parameters. The intended goal of the new...
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Stopping Scope Creep in Your Agency to Preserve Project Profitability
Scope creep — the expansion of work being done for a client without additional compensation — is a reality for almost every agency. Scope creep affects resource management, profitability, and overall...
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Legal Considerations When Using AI at Your Creative Agency
As in other industries, creative agencies are increasingly turning to materials generated by artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance their work for clients. While AI presents opportunities to...
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Strategies for Negotiating Contracts in a Weak Economy
When the economy is tight, your agency’s contract negotiation strategies should change to fit the times. You can’t assume the payment terms you use in normal times will work for you when the economy...
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Protect Your Agency During Legal Disputes with the Right Insurance Policies
Legal disputes can be expensive and stressful. While there are several ways for an agency to reduce the risk of ending up in a dispute – good work and good contracts, for example – there is no magic...
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Don’t be Afraid to Use the Pause Clause
As the economy slows down the payments do too. In the last year, many of our agency clients have told us that their clients have been slower, and slower… and slower to pay their invoices. Similarly,...
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Passive Income: How to Get Paid When You Refer Work
Do you refer work out to other agencies when you don’t have the right staff to handle the project, the budget isn’t great, or honestly… the client won’t be the right fit? If so, you can (and should)...
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Use Paid Discovery to Avoid Scope Creep
A paid discovery phase can be a valuable tool to identify problems before they start, communicate value to your client, and properly scope a project. And because the deliverables in a discovery...
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Anatomy of a (Good) Agency Employment Agreement
There is a good amount of confusion amongst non-lawyers (and even many lawyers who do not practice employment law) about employment agreements. And while employment agreements aren’t legally necessary...
View ArticleMatchstick Retained: A Customized Subscription Plan for Your Agency
Fee Models for Matchstick ClientsMatchstick’s services can be customized to fit any type of creative business: whether a small, boutique studio or a large, full-service agency. Our services are...
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The Way to Quicker and More Efficient Contract Negotiations
Sometimes the headache from contract negotiation comes from the process itself. Seemingly endless markups being traded back and forth with progress being painfully slow. With each turn of the draft,...
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How to Collect When Your Agency Hasn’t Been Paid (Short of a Lawsuit)
Unpaid invoices are a fact of life for agencies. While every situation is different, there are lots of things an agency can do to maximize the likelihood of collection. These strategies can help avoid...
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Why to Register Your Brand as a Federal Trademark
One of the hardest decisions some of our clients make is choosing their agency’s name. Once you’ve established your brand, whether it is signified with a single word, a logo, or your agency’s full...
View ArticleUse a Pricing Matrix to Negotiate Key Terms
A new potential client seems cool, organized, and interested in your services. You’ve completed some discovery and are able to put together a proposal. You feel like your proposed fee reflects the...
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What Agencies Need to Know About the Corporate Transparency Act
You have probably heard about the new Corporate Transparency Act that went into effect on January 1, 2024. It may sound like a big confusing federal law, but what does your agency need to do to...
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