It is probably one of the worst things that can happen to you as a graphic designer, and that is the client flat-out rejects your graphic design work. But why does that happen and how can we avoid that from happening.
In today’s post learn about seven key ways that your work might get rejected, and how to work around that so it doesn’t happen in the future.
So the first thing that you want to think about in your rejection or why graphic design work gets rejected is something many designers overlook. So when you complete a project and you send the deliverables to the client. Do you just send them the design to look at? Does that sound like you you just send one design concept or just your design on a file or a blank space? If that does sound like you then you’re probably doing it wrong.
You must absolutely explain to the client why your design choices work and why they’re effective so just to illustrate. That let’s say for example you were working on a Nike logo.
You would need to explain to the client why the logo type works in italics and that’s because it suggests movement action and a forward motion direction. That’s simply because angled straight lines do suggest this to people psychologically speaking. You basically want to sell the idea of your design concepts to the client. Make them come around to your point of view and why design choices were made.
Coming up with and creating the designs is only half of the game, the other half of the game is explaining to the client why selling them that idea. Also using language and terms that they can understand.
So the second reason why a client might have rejected your work. Is simply because they cannot visualize your design in real life. Now using mock-ups is a great way to get around this.
Because you can place your design on a mock-up and then the client can see and view your design in real-life use. This is so much more effective than just placing a design on a white background and just sending it to the client. And you want to make sure that you use mockups that are relevant to the client’s brand. So just choose imagery or design setups or situations that the design might come into contact with in a real-life scenario.
But yeah if you do choose to use mock-ups you’re going to be on the way to success and avoiding that dreaded rejection that nobody wants to see or feel in the graphic design industry.
At number three today I have a very clever and a very smart trick to share with you guys. So if part of your design process or part of the design itself uses kind of similar attributes techniques principles or something like that. That relates back to a famous brand then you should mention this in your presentation to the client. Now you don’t want to come across as if you’re copying Nike or Apple or Microsoft and so on.
But explain how something or part of your design really did work for saying Nike or Apple. How it’s not copying but it is similar and it does breed great success. Because it’s tried and tested already. When done tactfully and correctly this technique is highly powerful within a presentation to the client.
So the fourth reason why your design might have been rejected relates to graphic design principles. That is that you’ve probably broken too many graphic design principles. Now it is funny about how many people comment on my school. Saying that graphic design principles are boring, and they should be broken and no good design can ever come from that.
Because it’s not original so to speak. Yes of course you can break grapple design principles and you can add your own twist to them as well. But the backbone of great effective and efficient design is the graphic design principles. They exist for a reason and that’s because they work and they are highly effective and breed successful graphic design. So never underestimate the power of
- Alignment
- Contrast
- Proximity
- Hierarchy and so on.
These are all very useful tools that you can add to your arsenal and just bring them out whenever you need them.
So the next point is a huge one with many designers and that is not fully understanding the brief the client has given them. Likewise pretty much everything in today’s post I myself have also been guilty of this and it’s just part of coming up through the ranks as a professional designer. We all make mistakes and we learn from his mistakes.
And one crucial mistake people make is not fully understanding the brief. By understanding the brief I don’t mean that you’ve read it once and you think yeah okay that’s fine that will work.
I mean that you thoroughly go over it multiple different times you make notes on the brief. You might even rewrite the brief in your own words, also it’s great to follow up and ask the client questions based on the brief just to make sure you are doubly sure on everything that’s in there.
If you can get to a point where you’ve memorized a brief then you’re on a whole other level compared to most designers. And in memorizing the brief you will literally live and breathe their project. Which means you will design effective artwork each and every time.
So the sixth reason why your graphic design work might have been rejected kind of relates back to the previous point and that is the brief. But this point is that you didn’t design for the target market.
Every design is or should be geared towards a very specific group of people. Now sometimes that group of people might be pretty broad and not so specific. But other times it will be very niche and very narrowed down. But whatever the case may be, your graphic designs need to be tailored to a group of people.
Failing to do this will increase the chances that your graphic designs are not chosen by their clients and even worse they don’t resonate with the target market. Understanding the audience of your design is key to success. And then next of course we have the stubborn clients. And I’m sure many of you if not all of you have encountered this kind of client in your graphic design career.
This is the kind of person that no matter what you say to them and what kind of expert advice you give them, they think they know what’s best for their graphic design and their company. Now in this situation, I try to persuade them around to my point of view in the best way possible and to my design logic. After all, I unprofessional and I have experience in this field so I try to make them see my point of view and why it works.
But if that doesn’t work then I just carry on with what they want me to do and I adhere to the contract and I get paid. And if you do use a contract like you should be doing then it will stipulate in there that you are not liable for any kind of losses in the company that you’re working for. So basically that means that no matter how bad the design is you are not a fault for any losses within their revenue. So there are seven reasons why your graphic designs can be rejected by our clients.