Why feedback is an essential stage of the design process

By Ben Walker on 15 February 2018

Feedback is one of the most valuable stages of the design process. From the initial concept, right through to completion – for us, getting your opinion on a design is absolutely essential.

Design feedback at each stage of the process gives us:

• New insights
• A different perspective – nothing better than a fresh pair of eyes!
• The chance to make sure the design is visually pleasing to a variety of tastes
• Confirmation that what we have created is fulfilling its intention

Being open to feedback – negative or positive – is absolutely essential to the best possible finished product. We want to know what you do like and what you don’t.

Elon Musk, founder of Tesla and SpaceX, is a big fan of negative feedback. Giving a TED Talk he explained he actually seeks negative feedback, because that’s where he learns the most. As any professional creative will tell you, we have learnt to have thick skin and take criticism on the nose, because in the long run fixing your pain points gets the best end result. Although we do also like to hear the positives!

Since feedback is so important, we want to make sure you feel comfortable giving it. The best feedback is given through open, comfortable communication channels, which is why we try to build such good relationships with all our clients.

We’ve built feedback into every stage of the design process. When you work with us, whether it’s on an digital advertising campaign or a brochure design, we’ll use our tried and tested steps to create exactly what you’re looking for.

Here is how our design process tends to unfold: brief, mockups, feedback, revisions, feedback, testing/sample, feedback. Instead of jumping from brief to final product, we like to involve you along the way.

How to give good feedback

We’ll give you plenty of advanced warning to review the work we’ve sent over. It’s important you take time evaluating what we’ve produced, and that we don’t put you on the spot for a quick answer.

We also try to be specific with the areas we’d like you to feedback on. Open-ended questions don’t tend to give us the precise, actionable feedback we need to complete your project, so we’ll ask you about specific elements. We can give you different options on a design to choose from too – sometimes laying them side by side really helps!

Be super specific

If the feedback you give us is too vague or confusing, you may end up with a design you don’t particularly want or like. For example, instead of saying: “the colours don’t work”, try saying “more of a pillarbox red, than a cherry red”. We always try our best to dig deep and clarify exactly what our clients want.

On another note: design lingo can be a bit of a minefield. We try to be as straightforward as possible when discussing your design, but this design jargon explained blog post may come in handy too.

Show us what you like

We’ll get a much better (and faster!) understanding of the type of design you’re looking for if you can show us some examples of similar designs you like. If you are looking for a website design for your business, show us some websites that inspire you and tell us which elements you particularly like about them. We can take cues from designs that are already out there, and then put your own unique stamp on it. If you’d like us to show some previous examples of something similar we’ve already produced, then we’re more than happy to oblige.

Use our expertise

Pick our brains on which colours and shapes work well together. Our team of designers have a vast range of experience working on different projects and we’ve built up a pretty nice portfolio. Sometimes we may push back on certain elements of a design – this is because we live and breathe design and we know what works thanks to years of experience. We want the end product to be both beautiful and easy to use. Feel free to ask as many questions as you want about the design choices we recommend.

While specific feedback is ideal, it’s also important to let us work our magic. Peering over our shoulder as we revise each and every pixel isn’t going to let the creative juices flow. Give your feedback and let us take care of the details.