Creative Director – Fractional

Animalz

contract

Posted on: 3/26/2026

Location Type: Remote

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💰 $100 - $125 per hour

About the role

Lead creative strategy for customer accounts: Participate in kickoff calls and creative interviews with customers to understand their brand identity, visual goals, and content objectives
Write and shape design briefs: Translate customer needs and content strategies into clear, actionable briefs that production designers can execute against
Review and elevate production work: QA design deliverables before they reach the customer, ensuring visual quality, brand consistency, and creative ambition go beyond "just layout"
Expand and refine customer brand systems: When customers lack the design assets or visual identity needed for production work, lead brand-level design initiatives (color palettes, typography systems, icon sets, illustration styles, brand guidelines)
Manage and mentor production designers: Oversee 2+ freelance designers, providing clear feedback, establishing standards, and building a consistent creative process
Advise on creative direction for data visualization: Help customers think beyond default charts and graphs. Guide the team toward more narrative, visually compelling ways to present data in reports, ebooks, and presentations
Collaborate with content strategists: Work alongside Heads of Content and content marketers to ensure design and content reinforce each other
Shape the design practice: Contribute to how we scope, price, and deliver design services as this part of the business grows

5+ years of design experience, with meaningful time spent in a creative direction or design leadership role—ideally at an agency, studio, or in-house creative team serving B2B/tech customers
Strong visual taste and range: You have a sharp eye and can work across brand identity, editorial/layout design, data visualization, and digital content formats (ebooks, slide decks, social graphics)
Strategic thinking: You don't just make things look good; you understand why design choices matter for the audience, the brand, and the business goal
Brief-writing and communication skills: You can distill a customer conversation into a clear creative brief that a designer can run with, and you can articulate design rationale to non-designers
Experience managing designers: You've given feedback, set standards, and helped other designers grow, whether as a formal manager or a senior creative leading a team
Customer-facing confidence: You're comfortable in customer meetings, can ask the right questions to uncover creative needs, and can present and defend creative direction
Proficiency in Figma (primary tool) and familiarity with Adobe Creative Suite (Illustrator, InDesign, Photoshop)
Reliability and responsiveness: Fractional doesn't mean sporadic. You're reachable, you hit deadlines, and you follow through.

Applicant Tracking System Keywords

Tip: use these terms in your resume and cover letter to boost ATS matches.

Hard Skills & Tools

design experiencecreative directionbrief-writingdata visualizationbrand identity designeditorial designlayout designdigital content design

Soft Skills

strategic thinkingcommunication skillscustomer-facing confidencementoringfeedback provisionteam leadershipreliabilityresponsiveness