10 things to get the best from your designer
I wrote a book called Clients are Aliens and Designers are Monsters. It got rejected by my publishers (BIS Publishers) because it might be perceived as a bit too negative. In my view, it wasn’t. It was a semi-satirical view of the relationship between designers and their clients, with a view to pointing out what could be done to make both parties’ life a bit easier.
So when Bonnie Seigler released her book in March this year, Dear Client, I kinda thought she had stolen my thunder, and good on her.
So, at the risk of sticking my neck out, I'd like to set out the top ten things a client should consider when working with a graphic designer. This applies to almost any project, a branding exercise, an annual report, a brochure design, you name it. So here we go...
1: I don't know what I want but I'll like it when I see it
This sort of situation sets up a recipe for disaster. I think it is down to the designer to try to tease out what the client has in his or her mind. The best way is to have a face-to-face meeting and ask as many questions as you can. A brief template will be ignored. So get close and personal, take examples of previous work, reference other work, anything to get a hint as to what the client is looking for. And when all is done, write the brief for them, send it to them and ask them, is this what you are looking for?
2: Can you come up with some concepts?
Yes, I can. But I am a professional like you and my work and experience have value. Are you asking me to produce work for free in the hope that I will win the job? Are you working for free? Judge me on my experience, my professionalism. More importantly, for me to do the job properly for you will require me to go through the process. Delivering designs at the tender or estimate stage – from any agency – means that they have not performed their task diligently and merely offered up designs in the hope that you might like them.
3: Providing sketches
We've had clients who mock up what they want in 'Paint' or PowerPoint, usually followed with the phrase ‘I'm not a designer but...’. I use the analogy of a plumber or a mechanic. You employ these professionals to fix an issue. If you were a professional plumber or mechanic, you wouldn’t need these services, you could just do it yourself. I've never known these scenarios to work out well, if you are employing us as professionals, let us do our job for you – it is what you are paying for.
4: Feedback
When giving feedback on creative work avoid instructing the designer. Saying things like moving this image here or making this bigger can produce an unsatisfactory solution for everybody. It is tempting to use phrases like ‘it needs more impact’ or ‘it needs to make you want to play golf’, both are real feedback examples from a client. It is hard to interoperate these kind of comments. Instead, try explaining what you want the piece to achieve. For instance ‘this piece of data is important, we need the readership to grasp this the minute they hit the page’, or ‘the main purpose of this advert is to get people to sign up for this golf programme. It is our job to make all this happen.
5: Extra work
Nobody likes to pay extra for something and we will always do our best to keep within budget. But if the scope changes significantly, then like any industry we need to bill for the additional work. Some things may appear easy to change, like adding one page into a document but using professional software they may not be. Adding one page into a document could cause the entire document to re-paginate, moving text from left to right. The software cannot do this as with most documents the margins differ from left to right-hand pages. We will advise you and we are always happy to accommodate any change, but sometimes these changes can incur a cost.
6: We want to deliver for you
We only want to deliver the most creative, relevant and best value solution for you – always. When we make a recommendation, it is based on professional experience and for your benefit. We ant happy clients who will recommend us to other clients and keep coming back for more. That’s all.
7: Mechanics
If you have a problem with your car you go to a mechanic and they advise you as to what is wrong. They are experts and they take responsibility (most anyway) in resolving the problem. Graphic Design agencies are the same. We get paid to fix the communication problems. In the same vein, you don’t go to your mechanic and say ‘we are looking for a mechanic, if you could look at our car and repair it, will appoint you’. You wouldn’t ask a mechanic to free pitch, please don’t ask us to do the same.
8: Your line manager
Line managers are often hidden behind the front-line troops who have been tasked with delivering a graphic design project. It may be tempting to get a project almost complete before sharing it with them, but if you have an opinionated line manager that could lead to difficulties and re-doing work, which can cause tension and cost. If at all possible, let us communicate with your line manager as well as you, keeping everybody in the loop from day one. Then we will all know what everybody’s aims and aspirations are.
9: Talk
Hands up who does not get enough emails a day. We are a graphic design agency based in central London. We probably have more than 30 projects on the go at any one time. Imagine how many emails we get. We all know that expressing an emotion or intent on email is very difficult, even with an emoji or two 🙄. Nothing builds a relationship better than a chat. A chat raises the likelihood of us ‘getting’ what you mean and is a lot faster than endless emails. You don’t need to ‘book in a call’, just pick up the phone.
10: Relationships
This might sound corny, but relationships are the most important thing to us. Of course, you will get amazing service and brilliant creative solutions, but building a long-term relationship is even more important. Clients do come and go, that is the nature of the business, but we have some clients that we have worked with for 18 years or more. That is better than any testimonial, ever.
Good on Bonnie for biting the bullet. All anybody wants is to deliver the best results for their clients in the most cooperative, long-term relationship. I'll shelve my book, shall I?