Ralf Raaf has been our external all-round freelancer for text, graphics, web and all marketing services for over 10 years.

As an employee of Wunderman in Cologne from 2007, he was responsible for translating all internet texts and catalogues. Since becoming self-employed, he has also taken on the creation of brochures and catalogues (including photo shoots), trade fair graphics, retailer roll-ups, entry documents for competitions and our promotional website for the German market.

The collaboration works very well - Ralf combines a good grasp of the latest trends and methods with his knowledge of the latest trends and methods; the time required for briefing and coordination can thus be reduced to a minimum.

I got to know Ralf Raaf, who was still called Hildebrand at the time, in 2020 and got on very well with him straight away. He had been recommended to me by Axel von Hagen (von Hagen Design, trade fair construction) when I was looking for a capable copywriter to create a new corporate culture for einsnulleins GmbH.

As the coronavirus pandemic had just broken out, all coordination took place online via video call, of course, and it worked perfectly. I brought Ralf together with the marketing team, which was led by Carina Glöckner at the time, and was always informed about the latest developments and involved in the key decisions, as it was my personal "baby" that was being launched.

As a copywriter and idea generator, Ralf contributed a lot to the core of the whole thing - from the claim to the formulation of the corporate philosophy. He also provided the team with fresh, SEO-compliant texts for the new website - as well as for our social media channels.

My main concern was to stand out in the linguistically monotonous and usually difficult to understand environment of IT marketing with a clear, fresh and, above all, understandable presentation for the target group - mostly medium-sized companies and managers without an IT background. Everything should be as clear and simple as possible to break down barriers - even the service contract. Completely without the typical technical jargon and English gobbledygook, and Ralf did an excellent job.

Overall, I was very satisfied with his work and can only recommend him.

We - my husband Reiner and I – got to know Ralf Raaf through our booth builder Axel von Hagen – that was in 2001, when we initially wanted an image brochure that would clearly set us apart from the competition.

Ralf solved this with a coherent concept and realised the entire brochure – photos, text, typesetting, artwork – exactly as we had imagined. (Later there was even a hundred-page book version, which was even better).

What we particularly liked right from the start was Ralf's "writing", which was exactly how we saw ourselves as a company and entrepreneurial couple. He understood us straight away and communicated our philosophy - the feeling - well in all our advertising media, and I think that's basically the core of a good agency relationship. And it has remained that way to this day.

Speaking of agency relationships: with his many skills, Ralf has effectively replaced a complete advertising agency for us, without showing any recognisable weaknesses in any one area. He has mainly created a large number of print media for us, but has also largely taken care of our website, as well as creating, designing and sending emails to our large customer base.

In addition, in the 24 years that Ralf has worked for us – with one long interruption – there has only been one case in which a project has failed due to time pressure, and that was the result of health problems, which fortunately have long since been resolved.

I would definitely recommend Ralf Raaf to anyone who wants a good listener with flair and good ideas – and the ability to realise them to a high standard. We also appreciate his flexibility, the generally short response times and, of course, the uncomplicated co-operation at eye level. All in all, a wonderful overall package for SMEs like us.

Ralf Raaf has been supporting us since we launched our new 3D drag-and-drop design software SmartWOP for carpenters and joiners on the market in 2014, right from the naming process. At the same time, he also developed a new logo for Tibek CNC-Technik GmbH, as well as the complete CI for the new product and a whole series of icons for the software itself. He also designed and managed the websites for SmartWOP and Tibek CNC-Technik GmbH.

Flyers and our "function brochure", which explains the most important functions of SmartWOP, were added at the market launch and have been used regularly at trade fairs ever since - in several updated versions - for which Mr Raaf also provides the graphic design.

In 2022, we commissioned him to develop a new corporate design for SmartWOP, which he completed with flying colours. 2023-2024 he developed our new website, including the support forum, and also skilfully and stringently implemented our new corporate design.

All in all, Mr Raaf is more or less our advertising agency and handles all our communication and design tasks with great care. We appreciate his straightforward manner as well as his professional expertise, his flexibility and the breadth of his skills. As far as I'm concerned, I can only recommend him.

When I met Ralf Raaf in 2007 while working at Pioneer Electronics, he was still working as a copywriter at Wunderman in Cologne and was assigned to us as a translator due to his extensive knowledge of consumer electronics and his good command of English. At the time, he translated the annual car audio catalogue from English into German, as well as the monthly additions to our website, which he also entered into our proprietary CMS system.

A while after he left, we learnt that he was self-employed, and we were delighted to offer him further collaboration on the basis of his positive experience. What's more, it turned out that Ralf also had a lot of experience in design, including artwork, which suited us very well.

I left the company in 2014, whereas Ralf is still working for the car audio division today. As I really liked the uncomplicated collaboration and his extremely flexible way of working, I brought him on board at Wüsthof a few years later. We had just had a new corporate design developed there, which had to be implemented in various media. Ralf took on typesetting work for the annual "Cutlery Guide" in German and English as well as for various print projects. He also created Word templates in the new CD and an invoicing PDF order form for the sales force.

I appreciate Ralf's broad range of skills and experience, which always allows him to find a suitable and practical solution. And of course that he is very pleasant to work with. That's why I can only recommend potential customers to give him a try. You will certainly not be disappointed.

The collaboration with Ralf Raaf began in 2000 with the major task of modernising the somewhat outdated amtra logo and creating a new, fresh corporate design for amtra Aquaristik GmbH's entire communication - especially for the numerous packaging and POS presence. He developed an extremely flexible design that could be seamlessly transferred to a wide variety of packaging types, as well as a consistent colour coding for a better overview at the POS, including the appropriate tools.

This was complemented by a creative and fresh trade advertising campaign and a website, which we updated together on a monthly basis and which offered a whole range of interesting information and additional benefits for the target group.

We also designed a catalogue in DIN A4 format and additional flyers in DIN long format to address user groups. In addition to the appealing design of these media, an aquarium encyclopaedia provided a nice additional benefit.

Overall, I found working with Ralf Raaf very pleasant thanks to his uncomplicated manner and was always able to rely on his flexibility, expertise and wealth of ideas. A real partner who offered solutions instead of discussing them. And all from a single source. That was exactly what I needed. What can I say: I can absolutely recommend him.