Client Feedback and How to Manage it

C Fresh Design

Junior Member
Hello everyone

No matter what we design there will always be client feedback and amendments (unless we get it spot on!) With every design I send I always state why I have done it the way I have...

If the client responds they want to change something which is not the best way you can advise them but they client only likes what they like..... what is the way around this to still get a great design and make the client happy? Sometimes i have just gIven in and done exactly what the client wants but sometimes, it makes a good design bad?

Claire
 
what the client wants, the client gets. Very rarely will you get a client who will give you full creative direction on a design, all clients have their minds set on exactly what they want, each of them thinking they know something about design (clearly not you might find a lot of the time). Really it all comes down to the brief, do what they say and don't keep trying to change it because you think it looks better because like I said, they know what they like and they want it how they like it. The only creative input you can really give is to give a selection of designs against the brief rather than just one design, this way you're giving them what they want but also a few alternatives (still based on their brief mind you) which gives them something to think about. As ever you can only advise on what could be improved on, not what can be different. Improve their ideas, just done change them.
 
It's a simple case of if the client is happy and I get paid it doesn't matter whether the design is to my taste (we all have a style we like) or not.

We're going to get clients that are awkward, they're the ones which you sometimes need to step away from and you're also going to get ones that are great to work with, it's part of the work we're in.

Having said that I prefer my clients to tell me if they don't like something, the earlier the better as it's always harder to change things later on in my line of work. I also tell them this at the start adding in that if things are changed after a certain point additional charges will be applied. Usually works wonders :)
 
Some aspects of a design should be agreed with the client. Some others, however, should be decided by the designer.

Example. When clients choose a colour, a font that they like and similar, that is ok. If they, on the other hand, try to interfere with the way you organize the alignments and the spacing, or, choose poor quality photography, you should tell them that based on your professional ethics, you cannot do that.

Try this magic phrase: "I am willing to give you whatever you like as long as it does not prevent the work from being professional".
 
This happens all the time and naturally the best course of action is to adhere to the clients needs whilst maybe suggesting reasons a different approach might be better, maybe knock up a quick visual of how you would do it wih carte blanche. I was once asked to use a montage of photos for the background of everypage of an online magazine , I knew it would look poor so I used all of my design juices to make it look as poor as possible which brought him around to my way of thinking, the danger of this is the client actually going for the poor design.
 
All I would say is never do a change to a design in front of the client, take a note of the changes they want and send them an updated version. If you start making live changes with a client at your desk they go power crazy, kid in a sweet shop episode.
They will sometimes say "just move that 1mm," it seems like a quick job but resist the urge to do it then and there.
 
The customer is always sh-- no, right!
They're paying for a service, and while you may believe that service may be better delivered in a certain way, at the end of the day they're paying your wages so their satisfaction comes loooong before your own. This is the inescapable mercenary element of design work.
 
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