Are you and your designer not seeing eye to eye when it comes to the vision of your brand? One of the keys to a successful relationship is communication. This goes for any relationship, including the one you have with your graphic designer.
The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman is a popular book where he explores how to improve communication with your better half. By taking those same concepts and applying them to the creative world, we can put a spin on his concept and have better communication in five easy steps. Read on to become the graphic designer whisperer you were always meant to be.
Love Language #1: Quality Vision
Know the vision of your brand! If you can’t explain it, the designer can’t achieve it. Ask yourself, who is my target audience? Provide specs, the size and dimensions, along with a short creative brief explaining how and where the creative will be used. Is there an existing brand you like? If so, show examples of the brand(s) so the designer gets a feel for the creative you’re are looking to depict for your brand.
Love Language #2: Acts of Examples
Show them. Don’t tell them! Words can have different meanings to different people. Trying to explain your vision by indicating you want something “exciting” can mean one thing to you and something completely different to your designer. Instead, find your brand’s inspiration through visual representation and share examples of creative you like and are inspired by with your designer.
Love Language #3: The Gift of Feedback
Be honest and direct with feedback. Remember, this is a personal relationship. The designer is building your brand and direct communication, which is key to your business. You can easily give positive and direct feedback by following these four steps.
- What part of the design do you like?
- Make sure to point out any errors and omissions. Designers are creative people – they don’t spell check!
- Give an honest and detailed review of their approach. If you don’t like the font used in the headline, then tell them.
- Give different visual inspiration for the next round of edits, especially if what you received from the designer was not what you had envisioned.
Love Language #4: Words of Copy
See point number 2 above. Deliver the copy at the beginning of the design process. This ensures they have taken into account where they need to accommodate for copy. Deliver it to them in either a Word doc and/or Google doc. Trust me, you don’t want to pay the hourly rate it will take them to re-key all copy. See point number 2 above. Make sure to spell check and also have others in your office review for errors. Finally, make sure to indicate where all copy goes. What is the header and is there a sub header? Does anything need to be bolded or italicized? Make it bold and italicized in the copy you provide.
Love Language #5: Trust the Process
Trust the process! It may take time to get there, but if you follow these 5 steps you will become the graphic designer whisperer and will have a long and successful relationship with your designer.
Source: Perry, Russ. “THE FIVE LOVE LANGUAGES OF GRAPHIC DESIGNERS” Design Pickle Web.
