How To Design For Your Customer, Not Yourself

The Skinny

To be a successful designer you don’t need to be the best artist. The best designers are the ones who make their designs resonate with their target market. A brand or logo doesn’t always need to be outlandish. If your design is perceived as simple design that fits the personality of your audience while communicating something powerful, you have successfully created a look that will build your brand.

The Fat:

Know Your Audience

Designers like me often get caught up in the creative process and meeting client specs when developing designs. As a result, we forget the group of people need to have in mind above all, the target market. Who you are trying to reach with your branding is by far the most important part of the creative process. It is crucial when hiring a graphic designer to create work for your company that you make sure they know your target audience. For a good refresher on how to do this, check out this great Entrepreneur article. Without this information, no matter how good of a designer, it will be nearly impossible for you customers to be truly able to resonate with your brand.

Keep it simple

You may be really creative and develop an intense logo with the first letter of the company name hidden in the logo, or establish a logo with a deep personal meaning to you, but that does not mean it connects to your customer base. As a new company, getting your name out there is important, but making sure your customer understands your brand is even more crucial.

Now, think of some of the most recognizable logos in the world. Nike, Pepsi, Facebook, Twitter… All the boring “letter in a box” logos are also some of the most recognizable. Quite simply, they are all simple and truly effective. When trying to build brand recognition you don’t always need to stand out, you need to cement yourself into the minds of your consumers.

Don’t Reinvent The Wheel

We all run into a creative block at the worst of times. As a designer, any poorly timed creative block can be the difference between a successful roll-out of a logo, and a lost client. In that case, I start scouring my resources for new inspiration and ideas on what I should create. One of my favorite websites in this time of need is Designspiration.net. You can find a wide range of art and designs from different contributors there. It also has the added bonus of allowing you to search for specific topics and find inspiration specifically relating to what you are working on.

Lastly, I wanted to share a valuable secret for designers everywhere. Are you just on a streak of brilliance? Take a second to save some of your favorite inspirations in a folder and set that folder as your screen saver. Whenever you run out of ideas and are staring at your screen for too long, pop open your inspiration folder and let the creative juices flow. If you would like more tips and tricks on this process, feel free to contact us, and we can talk design, marketing strategy, and whatever else comes to mind!

Practice makes perfect, so keep on climbing on, marketers!