6 expert tips to give effective feedback to your brand designer
Being able to give constructive feedback is the key to a smooth design process! Why does it matter? Well, doing it right means you save time, money, and get your final project files faster so you can start using your new brand a lot sooner!
But what is constructive feedback anyway? It's about providing helpful information to ensure the project achieves its best results. To do this, your feedback should be clear, specific, and actionable. This helps your designer make changes easily and avoids any confusion, making the process a lot more efficient and fun.
So let’s dive in…
1. Be Specific
The more detailed your comments, the better! Describe precisely what elements you feel aren’t working and concisely explain your reasons why. Providing comments that are clear and identify the elements that need to be changed makes it easier for your designer to implement your feedback.
Don’t forget to mention the details you feel are working. This information can be just as useful to your designer when making revisions.
2. Provide Actionable Comments
Actionable feedback is information that allows your designer to take action, make changes, and put your feedback into practice. Descriptive words can be very subjective and open to interpretation by your designer. So instead of saying ‘It needs to be more feminine’, for example, explain exactly what that means to you. Does it need to be a different shade of pink? Thinner lines? A script font? The more specific you can be, the easier it is for your designer to implement the changes.
3. Explain why
Back up your feedback with the reasons why you feel elements of the design aren’t working. Having a clear understanding of your rationale helps your designer revise the design and find a solution to the problem. It’s important to understand your reasoning to determine the best course of action forward.
4. Try to remain objective
Always keep your audience in mind when evaluating a design. It can be easy to let your personal preferences influence your feedback. It’s your business and it’s important to feel confident in your new brand identity but sometimes, creative business owners are so used to seeing their business from behind the scenes, that they forget to think about what the audience sees from the outside.
Try and look at the design through the eyes of your ideal client. What would they like? What elements do you think they wouldn’t find appealing?
5. Evaluate against the project goals
Keep your aims and objectives in mind when providing feedback. Remember what you’re trying to achieve with your design project and use the creative brief or brand strategy to stay focused. Ensure any feedback you provide will help move the project closer to that goal.
6. Be kind (but honest)
Sometimes it can be easy to focus too much on communicating what’s wrong and pay less attention to how that message is communicated. Try to keep the feedback focused on the work rather than on the designer. For example, instead of saying ‘I don’t like it, you’ve made the font too big’ try saying “the font is too big here and overwhelms the design.” It’s a subtle difference but it will help your designer feel that the critique is on the work and not a personal criticism.
Remember, the design process is a collaboration and will achieve the best results when both parties approach the project with respect and trust.
A few examples:
Instead of…
“I don’t like it. Please change it.”
Try…
“This font combination isn’t working because it’s difficult to read. Could you please increase the size of the header font.”
Instead of
“Make it pop”
Try
“The colour here doesn’t stand out from the rest of the layout. Please switch it out for the yellow in the palette.”
Instead of
“This looks weird.”
Try
“I love the feel of this but x element isn’t meeting the brief. Let’s remove it.”
Instead of
“You didn’t do what I asked. This looks terrible!”
Try
“It isn’t meeting the brief, but I appreciate what you’re trying to do. Let’s try using a font that is more x and less x.”
To wrap it up, giving good feedback is the key to turning your creative ideas into reality. It's not just about saving time and money; it's about making your project the best it can be. Remember, good feedback is a team effort – it helps you and your designer work together better.
Ready to level up your brand? Let’s schedule a discovery call and get your project started!
