Transcripts
1. Welcome to the Class: Welcome to this introduction video, my friend. If you're watching this, it probably means that you are a designer. And illustrator may be a copywriter or at the generalists who works with client projects. Now the thing about client projects, another client typically comes to us with design request or a client's requests. We tend to take it at face value. And that fatal mistake is one of the major factors why some of the design projects fail in some of the clients relationships go sour. So you've probably heard the saying of the the only tool you have is a hammer, then every problem looks like a nail. So our task as a designer or as a creative is actually to let go of that mindset. The most critical step and skill that we have to actually learn is how we can see the real challenge that the clients are facing at subsequently, what the proposal and recommended solutions should be. The other major problem that we have to deal with as a designer is that clients tend to self-diagnose the challenges. And then they bring you in on the desired outcome or a desired deliverable. And this creates two major problems for us as well. First of all, they will treat the whole entire process and you as a result, as a transaction. And second is that if the project fails, they will still blame you, even if they self-diagnose that the challenge incorrectly in the first place. So what is the answer? Getting really good at learning how to deal with those client projects coming in and client briefs coming in and then interpreting them. And either validating the self-diagnostic challenges that the clients are facing or interpreting them into some new and better optimal recommendations and solutions for them. Hey, my name is Ilya long enough and I run a creative agency called Studio, will help business owners and entrepreneurs build better brands. I've been doing this for more than 20 years. So the stuff that I will show you in this class is not something that I've read in a blog or social media some way. It's actually been applied to real life projects, probably thousands of real-life projects in different scenarios. So you know that apply this successfully and implemented it. Now, I'm also really passionate about empowering designers and creatives like yourself to help you level up and go from someone who's seen as an order taker to someone who's seen more as a creative partner for your clients. So in this particular class, I will empower you to build or fine tune your process for all new projects coming in. Helping to learn about the downfalls of getting the initial brief wrong and what to do about it by transforming those client briefs into something called a reverse brief. And then we will diagnose some example projects and provide recommendations for putting together your proposals. So as part of the class project, I would love for you to download the example brief that's sitting within the Resources section and then submit back, I simply reverse brief based on how you interpret and understand the challenge. And I look forward to seeing you in class. Click enroll now.
2. Process for New Projects: So knowing what your program looks like and sticking to it can create major benefits for both you as a designer and to your client. And this is true not just for your specific processes, like for a logo design project or for a website design project, but also your overall flow of when particular new project comes in or client request comes in to then delivering on that project and nurturing that client relationship as the project goes on and as it completes. And the thing is, when you share your process clearly and communicate transparency to your client regarding your process that can create what I call the clarity waterfall effect. Now, I'm still working on a better name for this, but it was inspired by the champagne waterfall. And essentially in both cases, you should be celebrating success at the end of it. It provides more certainty to the client as to what will happen, how and when. That in turn means that they will trust him more as an expert. That in turn means that there will be more accepting of your higher rates. And in turn, that will mean that there will be more collaborative and less trigger happy with those revisions. So that doesn't mean that sometimes, occasionally you can't bend the rules of the process. And in some cases you want to build some goodwill of your client so you can kind of step back and look at your process and adjust some things, both specific and unique situations. But overall, my process looks something like this. So feel free to apply it within your own process and your own flow. So the first step is usually a client will reach out to me unless of course I've reached out to them in the first place. And typically they will ask me for a potential project, whether that might be over email or a website, maybe social media. And the thing about this is that not everyone who reaches out to me will be a great fit. And we want to be in alignment on certain things. So I first of all need to make sure that they will align with me on on a budget, the type of budget expectations that have the top of deliverables that they're requesting than the work style and the kind of design style that they are after. So I need to know some of these things before I will schedule a meeting with them and spend maybe 10, 15 minutes talking to them about the project. Maybe when we're really not a great fit for. So I need to qualify them and to make sure that we align. So often they will request some kind of indicative pricing on the email or on that message. So instead of spending that 1015 minutes to put together kind of a rough ballpark costs for project may not actually go ahead anyway. Next step is sending across what I call the services guide. The services guide is essentially just the general PDF document that I sent across to any new prospects. It talks a little bit about me. It looks a little bit about my approach and my process. And then it has some generic preset kind of main services that I provide, such as the brand strategy workshop, the brand identity design, website design and development and so on. So it has some ballpark cause things in there to give them an idea of what that might look like. I find this to be a much better strategy than just sharing your prices on a website somewhere. Because at least if they have reached up to you and you've sent across this PDF document to them. You can first of all, a track the win or lose for new projects whenever you send that proposal. And you can actually also have a chance to demonstrate and talk to them about your process and show why you are combining those types of prices. Whereas if you're sharing your prices openly on your website, you might have hundreds of prospects and potential clients looking at prices, but you won't actually ever hear about them. If they don't like your pricing or something is off, it doesn't work for them. So normally what happens as the next step is a discovery call. This is what happens when they are happy with what they've seen within the services guide document. And I make it really easy within that document as well as in that e-mail that I share with them with all new prospects to schedule time of me to hop on a call, whether that's a Zoom video call or a local, um, I it might be an in-person conversation. This is where we will discuss the specific challenges and expectations, specific deliverables that they think that they need and desired outcomes and goals of the project. Essentially, this is their brief. I can use this opportunity to either reiterate the steps of my process and the approach, or I can talk loosely about how I envisage may be to come up with a particular solution for their project and how the project might look like without, of course, going into specifics, was a general ballpark kind of an understanding based on what they've told me so far. Then the next step after that is usually I will send a proposal to them. This is after they've essentially handed me the brief on that particular discovery call in in a previous step. So the brief is essentially all of the requirements. And I put all of those together into a proposal which includes the summary of those requirements and also the steps that I proposed to take them there. It may also include costs and potential timeframes. And depending on the size of the project, I make a call on whether I present these types of proposals on a call with them or I send it in an e-mail. So generally speaking, sending it or presenting a face-to-face or on a video call is much more effective. But sometimes if I have a project where I kind of feel like I basically, it's as good as one. I've basically as good as have received this project from the client for whether that's because I've already shared some pricing and they indicated that they're happy to go ahead or maybe I've worked with him previously, whatever the case might be, if I'm confident that they accept the price or if it's a smaller type of project and less complex and may just share it over e-mail. But generally speaking, face-to-face presentations works best, just like when you are presenting any kind of creative work. That also works best when you're presenting face-to-face. But also the proposal document will include a contract with the terms. They can sign it right away and kind of get the project started if they're happy with what they see. The next step, well, the next set of sub-steps will be unique to the top of deliverable that you're presenting. So this is the kind of deliverable process steps. So for example, for, let's say a brand identity project, the steps might look like a brand strategy workshop and additional research phase, brand strategy presentation to the client's brand identity concept presentation to the client. Logo files preparation may be Style got creational design, and final delivery of all of those files. Now the next phase is the delivery. So delivering all of those files, but also what I have is I'm checking with the client shortly afterwards to make sure that they have received everything is expected and also that they know how to correctly action them and how to implement all of these things supplied. Sometimes what we'll also do is have a handover meeting with my client. So actually go over with them that's face-to-face or in a video recording or a Zoom call or something like that. I will go over any particular nuances of usage of those files that I supplied and take them through any of the kind of needs and nitty-gritty of the implementation of those files. So at this point, most designers and creatives will consider that project complete and that whole phase complete. But the two more very critical steps that you should take after that project is complete. So one of the main things is you need to reach out for a testimonial and off for a referral request. This is something that can be done. I find one to two weeks after the project is complete. That can be a good time period, but also make sure that the testimonial is not a chore for them, something that's easy for them to do. So that might mean sending them almost like a template where they fill out some bits and pieces where you have pre-filled some of the other information. Or it might be some kind of a web form where they fill out particular prompts. Jelly for me, what that looks like is I shed them a shared template with them for a testimonial there. I helped them create and then they fill in the rest of the details and ask them to upload that as a Google review for my business page. The other step that I also do at the end of the completion date of the project, especially for any new clients or any new projects. I will always add a calendar reminder for myself to follow up if the client in two to three months time. So you can use this opportunity just to remind them of you may be talking about any new capabilities or services that you've added. Maybe share a link to an article that you think they might find useful. Basically get in touch with them and again, potentially ask for a referral if you haven't done so already. Generally just build that relationship further and turn it into more of a connection. People who have already worked with you in the past and they've enjoyed the process and have enjoyed the results and success that you've delivered. They will be more than likely to wanting to share and refer you on to others. But usually they do need a prompt to do so. So, so this is a good opportunity. So this is a set of steps that generally works for me. But as I mentioned, I do bend the rules sometimes like maybe send over the proposal in an email. Basically make a cold do so. Don't treat this set of steps or voi your process as this fixed thing that you have to defend to your death. Truth, more like a guide. So if you do need to paint some rules, go ahead and do so for four unique situations. Just remember that having clarity and sharing that type of clarity and transparency about the process with the clients is something that will make your project and outcomes of successful project more likely. So let's talk about how a client brief and the design brief and creative brief and all of those tabs or breaks fit into this whole project process. And how getting that initial client brief or design brief wrong can actually mess up the entire process altogether.
3. Getting Brief Right (or Wrong): So one of the key factors of working for a client brief or design brief, is making sure that the key challenges and the key objectives all captured within that particular brief. And getting the brief Wright is perhaps the most critical factor in ensuring that your project can be successful. A brief is essentially a summary of all the critical elements of a project, which may include things like clients details and companies background. Project challenges to be solved. Client's target audience. And in particular, constraints of mandatories or must-haves, deliverables that I requested, budget and timeframes, and general desired project objectives, outcomes and goals. So all of this information will essentially help you to Festival assess the request, then interpreted and have a think about what proposed solutions you might come up with and put that together into those recommendations and put together the proposal document. Now what usually happens in a creative agency environment unless you're working as a freelancer, as a solo freelancer in a creative agency, what happens is, and account manager is someone will generally have that relationship with the client. And there will also be the person who deals with the client and receives that initial brief. So in other words, they will collect all of that information that we just mentioned above. Then the second step would normally happens is the account manager may discuss that client's brief with the creative director. And together they will formulate it into a creative brief or a design brief, or a vision brief, or any other number of briefs that we normally have within a creative agency environment. So then the design or creative brief is then distributed to that design or creative theme to action. So why the creative agency go for this extra step when they could have just handed that client read directly to the designer. Well, that's because they know that a lot of the information within that client brief will not always be relevant to your particular deliverable. So if you are designing a website or some wireframes or maybe a simpler brochure. You don't really need to know all of the information about the client, just the very specific things. The other thing that they know is that sometimes the client's requests aren't necessarily what will best solve their challenges. So it's up to the account manager and the creative director to try and interpret the client's requests into something that can actually solve the challenge. So the thing is, as a young designer, I really disliked this practice because I always felt like some information was being, he being kept secret from me and being hidden from me. And I felt like I needed all of that information to be able to make my best recommendations and design decisions. But as I'm kinda moved up, almost doubling my career and got into the creative director role. I realized that not everyone actually was like me. I've realized that after working different types of creative people, that many people just wanted to have just the right amount of information, but not more. And I've realized that some designers and some creatives need to be equally directed and inspired. So that can mean that you can't just dump all of the information that you have on them. It means that you have to give them all of the necessary information, but no more. Of course, if you are working as a freelancer, then you really have no choice because you are the account manager, you are the creative director, the Senior Design at the junior designer and accounts theme, all rolled into one. So you kinda have to be really good at interpreting the client's requests and into a particular solution or recommended proposed solution that you think would best solve the challenge. And that can take lot of practice and experience. But what can help you a little bit is sometimes we've really complex projects, is creating something called the reverse brief. So I want to talk a little bit about that in the next video.
4. What's a Reverse Brief?: So once a reverse brief, exactly. Reverse brief is essentially an interpretation of the client's brief in the way that you understand the challenge and in putting together a proposed solution based on what you think will solve the challenge best and getting the client's approval on that. So that helps you to avoid that issue of getting the brief wrong in the first place or taking that brief at face value. But before I go on and talk more about the reverse brief, let me share quick story with you as to what can happen if you do get the brief wrong in the first place. So I was working as a direct at a time and this branding agency and essential declined came to us. And they spoke into the account management team and the brief them on a new project. So the new project was essentially an e-mail signature, some stationary and a small booklet design. So what happened is, of course the account management team put together that design brief for the design department. And I briefed it into my senior designer. And the senior designer has come up with a really elegant set of stationary designs and a booklet. And also the junior design team, they've helped out with putting together some more options for the stationary as well. And both myself and the creative director at the time approved it. Everything looks great. But guess what? The client absolutely hated it. And the thing is, they've had it five or six subsequent attempts. Some somehow we've gone through five or six additional revisions. Sometimes there were minor design revisions and in some cases full redesigns for the booklet and the stationary for them to keep saying, just show us something else. Do we want to see something different? Of course, by this point, our managing director, the owner of the company where I work that was getting really annoyed and vivid, just wanted to get the project out of the head and out of the studio no matter the cost. So the essence of what we were working with the design department is a brief that said design collateral and stationery that looked professional. Hence, the thing is they only had a, just a logo in two main colors, but not much else. So no wonder that we struggled. So the actual challenge that we were trying to solve, and this is something I can talk about in hindsight, is that what we're trying to establish a new brand identity for them. Although the client came to us with a request for stationery design in the booklet. That's because in their eyes, they thought that those kind of deliverables would help them compete with those $1 million companies that we're in a market with and make them look like those $1 million companies that they were competing with. But they couldn't kind of verbalized that in a way that we understood. And unfortunately, for all of us involved, needed the account manager, nor the creative director, nor the design department. So this is a challenge. And that's because often the least complex projects or projects that seem like the least complex and actually be the kind of a giveaway that the project might be misinterpreted. So the way that we could have handled this particular instance of that particular project differently is we could have put together a verse brief and put that into our original proposal where we would seek approval from a client before moving on. In the reverse brief would be a document that outlines our recommendations and propose solutions, objectives that we will move and work towards, as well as deliverables and budget and time frames that we see based on their regular client brief that we received. I see the reverse brief as an opportunity to challenge some of the requests and make sure that we are working towards something that's objective and not subjective. So in that particular example, collateral that looks professional is not really an objective goal to move towards. And the thing is that stationery design and a booklet is not something that actually would get the outcome that the client wanted. Hence, why we all went around in circles. So what we all fail to recognize is that even though they were requesting those individual items, what we fail to recognize that we wanted they wanted a brand identity that would kind of put them on par with those $1 million companies that there were competing against. And those companies have invested in branding. But of course, our client thought that those simple deliverables would get them there. But we, as experts and someone, people that work in that industry, in the design industry should have spotted that opportunity and that request and interpreted in the best possible scenario. So what we would've done is instead of designing those individual items, like stationary in Brooklyn, we would have probably started with designing a brand identity and maybe some patents and something that's. Really ownable, some distinctive visual assets that really ownable by that client. And potentially even started with some kind of strategic work to try and understand more about the client needs small their strengths of the businesses and so on, so that we have a real strong foundation. And there would not be designing individual items, but designing the whole overarching identity, which is really what the client was requesting without being able to communicate it really clearly to us. So of course, this is where the reverse brief does come in, is that if they came to you asking for any more significant booklet, and then you come back to them with a proposed solution for doing strategic workshop and brand identity. Obviously, the cost and time frames, there are some implications that are going to happen there. So this is where the reverse brief does come in. It gives the client than the opportunity to see what you are proposing, a new opportunity to explain your recommendation and why you're basing why you're creating that proposal for them based on their requests of deliverables. So I reverse brief is not an ultimate into decline, is simply an opportunity for you to explain your point of view and explain them why you feel that that particular proposed solution will best help them solve their challenges. And the reverse brief can help you challenge any kinds of elements of the brief or the client brief and the first place that the requested client comes to, things like the timeframe. So the budget as well, as well as the deliverables. So for example, if the client's requesting a website for $500 built in two weeks, but your website developers telling you that is going to be several, $1000 and a month or two months, then you need to outline that clearly in the reverse brief and indicate clearly why this is the case. So showing the specific process and that the particular timeframes and costs that are associated with each step in my example might seem trivial to many of you, because nowadays, branding is something that's talked about on social media left, right, and center. And you might say, well, yeah, of course you, they needed to start with a brand identity first. But the thing is, every client's requests and project will be unique. And so sometimes it's the things that the seemingly simple Mei, Mei actually trick you in our case before. Well, that's a very simple project. Will smash it out really quickly and be done with it. But the thing is everything will change and everything is contextual. So, so the, the thing that I will want to empower you within this particular video is to help you have that mindset that don't take the project brief, the client brief at face value, the obvious need to think about what is it the client is saying and is it something that actually will solve the challenge? So I reverse brief is equally a, an opportunity for you to challenge that brief. And also just to think about what is requested. And it's going to the deliverables that are requests that are going to be the best tool for the job.
5. Example Project One: So for this next set of videos without thought would be fun, is to go through some practical examples and look at some client brief examples so that we can try and dissect them and try and understand what the challenges are and seeing how we can potentially tackle them. We can start with this particular first brief, but first, let me say that I haven't deliberately mentioned anything about time-frame and budget within this example. Just because I think every creative agency and the free answer will have different kind of resources. And so there's a lot of variation. But this is something that definitely needs to be included normally in the reverse brief. But for this particular set of videos, we're just going to focus on some of the other critical information. So let's have a look at a brief number one. So we start with the company and the crucial element description about what the company is about. So at unique ingredients, we sell hard to find food ingredients to health conscious consumers. New clients mostly come from referrals and word of mouth or repeat customers. What makes us unique is that we also prepare custom meals, meal plans using those ingredients for each person that orders. The project description is as follows. Her website doesn't sell products. We want to redesign our website and make it convert more of our visitors into paying customers. The target audience is health-conscious. Mostly women stay at home malice. They goal for this project is 10 x our monthly sales on the website. And that the deliverable that the request is a newly redesigned website that will help them achieve that goal. So if we are taking this particular client brief at face value, we will be quoting and putting together a proposal for redesign of a new website and then build up a new website. But why? Well, that necessarily help them solve that challenge of the website not selling enough products? Well, it might, but it may also have a multitude of other reasons why they're not selling their products, and also a multitude of other solutions that might help them. So a potential possible way how you can try and kind of dig deeper and uncovered the real issue that they're having is to use the five whys technique, which is essentially a probing question, questionnaire. Where you ask probing questions to try and get to the root of the problem. While I don't necessarily believe that every root problem lies exactly five levels deep is the technique may suggest, but I do think that this can be a good start to help you start probing into into the right direction. So on our call, we might have a discovery call with a client who might start asking questions like this. So what specifically do you think is wrong with your website design? Well, we're not sure. We were hoping that through tell us, okay. They have some analytics data to show where the users abandon and when we haven't installed any analytics or tracking and virtually how much traffic a drawing to your website in the first place to have some data? Well, mostly we rely on social media where customers leave us, thank us for the orders. But since we're not tracking, it's really hard to tell how much traffic or actual traffic there is. So would you say that uses are not buying a just a particular type of product or in general, the product sales are poor across the entire range. Now, have you maybe done some tests for functionality that may not work, for instance, the contact forms or anything like that? Yes, we did test the existing contact forms and buttons on key landing pages and they seemed to work fine. Got it. Okay. So I using any social proof on your website that may persuade your results, got some great Google reviews and testimonials from socials grant that our postcard side is your website copy strong enough. They think there's persuasive enough in enough call to actions and things of that nature. Not sure about this, but happy to take your recommendations. Of course, this questions might be different for different types of clients and different types of projects. You may have. Some of these questions repeat. However, you will, of course, have unique questions that you may want to ask your particular client. But what we're trying to establish, whether US as a designer, as an expert, as a creative, and also the client might be making some assumptions about the challenge. And so we may continue to dig deeper and to try and find the root cause of a real challenge that they're facing. But just, let's have a look at the questions that have we have an ask and how we can start putting that together in some kind of recommendation or a reverse brief, if you like. So the recommendation that we might put forward for the reverse brief might be as follows. We might suggest that we actually start by installing some analytics data and then track that for 30 to 90 days to get some understanding of the users that are coming through to the website where they're dropping off and so on. Then from there we might also, or in conjunction with that, we might start to put together three to five lending pages which have paid traffic going to them. And we will also then test those conversion rates, optimize each of those pages that work best. And that will give us a better understanding of where the business might be dropping off, what might be beneficial for them to kinda make purchasing decisions and so on. And then using that kind of insight and understanding, potentially redesign the website or some of the other pages, or maybe just apply some of the learnings to the existing website. Which may also include things like speed improvement, reduction of clutter on the website, maybe simplification of content and messaging and so on. So naturally this might be an obvious simplification of this particular brief. And of course, not every website design request from a client will have the exact same set of recommendations and steps. I hope that this video just shows you kind of an example of how you can apply some critical thinking to try and challenge the brief and actually challenge the assumptions behind the requested deliverables. Because as you see from the recommendations that I'm proposing here, is that the client may not necessarily need to do a full website redesign. Maybe there's just some small tweaks that they can do in which we can understand by optimizing and testing some of those landing pages and tracking that analytics data. So there's multiple ways to solve different problems. And obviously the more experienced that you get with specific types of projects, especially you'll get better and better at providing those recommendations and sporting assumptions most importantly. So let's take another example. And in fact, they actually wanted to take you back to the previous anecdote about the client with the e-mail signature in that booklet, that design fiasco that we've had that I've talked about briefly. I kinda want to use that as an example in kinda dive deeper into that to see how we could have handled it and how we might have approached it in terms of room adverse, brief, and proposed recommendations so that we can learn some actionable takeaways from that. The block.
6. Example Project Two: So let's dissect another example which is based on that client design fiasco that I've talked to you about previously with the ma signature in the booklet and see how we could have tackled it and handled it a bit better for better outcome. Just keep in mind, I've changed some of the details here just for privacy sake. So we start with the company's description. At Bolt construction. We built and developed new houses and renovate existing homes. New clients come from our industry partners and also other referrals from our network. What makes us unique is that we focus on using only sustainable materials and design our projects. With that in mind, the project description is we need some stationary designs, including some business cards for our two directors. And let the head an e-mail signature and a service is booklet so that we can give up that to our potential customers. The target audience is mostly commercial property developers, as well as some residential home owners. The goal of the project is to make sure will look like an established and reputable business. The deliverable of the project is professionally designed, stationary and booklet. So let's look at the client's challenge goal to make our business look professional and reputable. So again, if we're taking that requests at face value and that client brief at face value, then we will be putting together a proposal and a quote for some nicely designed stationary. But what have we learned from my previous fiasco in an example that I've shared in retrospect, is that potentially professional and reputable. Those words can mean two different things fall to the designer, enter the client, and of course then we can spend so much time going around in circles without having any outcome. So let's take a look at how we might handle the discovery call and how that might go, and then how we might put that together into a reverse brief or proposal for the client. Hey, let's kick this off. So they have an existing collateral that we can refer to when designing and stationery. Actually now we only have this logger done by a friend and the two main colors, the green and gray. All right. Understood. Could you maybe show us then some websites or collateral examples that kind of portrayed the card professionalism that you'd like to convey and communicate with your stationary and booklet? Well, to be honest, we haven't really thought about that. We just need something that looks professional and it looks the quality and up to the standards that are main. Two to three competitors have. All right, Understood. Well, let me just have a look at the competitors here that you've named. I'm looking at those two free competitors and what is the main things you would say you like about them? Would you say that all have a kind of recognizable visual element or maybe an asset of some kind that you liked. Yeah, for competitive the x sum, we do really like the photos that they use on the website. I would say on the brochures for competitive, Why would like that patent graphic that they have? And probably the way that competitors that talks about the clients on their websites. Something that we really like as well. Great. Okay. Understood. Well, just looking at those free. I didn't notice that they use the word professional quite a bit, is something that pretty much all use in their copy. And somehow they all look slightly different. Have you maybe thought about some other brand attributes that you might like to communicate with your station, may be that we are trustworthy. We are kind of forward thinkers. All right. Would you think that it would be important to clearly communicate your unique quality of working with sustainable materials and know that that's a big part of what you do. Actually, this is something really important to us actually. So if we can somehow show that in the design and great, what you might mention is that part of what made your decision for that particular recommendation of going with strategic brand workshop first is that you've gone through some preliminary research and you found that the main top three competitors, they all use those words professional and reputable. However, they all look different. And therefore, as a result, you are suggesting that the word professional reputable can actually be interpreted in different ways. So you know, you want know you as a designer and your client, you want actually have alignment on what those things mean. And a recommendation you suggest that perhaps you can find some more ownable things that you can kind of be objectively moving towards if your client prove that strategic brand workshop or through some strategy, work together to make sure that your are both aware when you are hitting those targets and those goals. And thus saving potentially rounds and rounds of revisions. So this is what your proposal might end up looking like. Your recommendation might start with undergo an initial strategic brand workshop first established a more concrete definition of what we are trying to communicate with our designs and help us set up the definitive checklists. Essentially. I said, we all know that we've successfully created the right design. Then as a next step, we will create two to free visual moodboards to help us with picking the most relevant visual direction based on that strategic insight that we've gained. Then we will design a visual identity system based on the selected Moodboard with any additional colors, typography style, imagery, photo direction, a potentially sub graphics and components which will also include indicative mockups of stationary and Booklet, the cover page, as well as a spread to give us an idea of what all that, how it might all come together. And then finally, based on approved indicative mock-ups, we will tweak the finer details of this stationary and finalize the booklet design and supply the final deliverables. So again, there might be multiple ways to tackle this particular brief example again. But this is my recommendation and how I propose that in retrospect, how it might've handle that particular scenario in that project. And of course, in our real life scenario with that project, we did eventually after maybe 10 to 12 different design options that would present it to the clients that did eventually pick something that they kinda liked or at least that they accepted. But as you can imagine, they're no longer really felt confident. Continents and asked to deliver any future projects lead relationship was kind of growing altogether. And that was all down with getting the initial design brief wrong. So this is why I say that defining the initial challenge clearly and correctly is the most crucial first step. As it can actually become impossible to recover from an issued and kinda call-back any trusted midway through the project.
7. Final Thoughts & Class Project: Great work, my friends. You've made it till the end of the glass. I trust that with this knowledge and this information, you will feel more empowered to position yourself as a great partner for your clients unless there's an order taker and actually give you the opportunity to become that partner That looks at the challenges that the client spring you and they requested declines bringing and help them to validate their self-diagnose challenges and actually helped them propose solutions that will actually help them solve those challenges. Now, for your class project, what I would love for you to do is download the creative brief example that I've included and also the example of reverse brief template. And submit back the reverse brief and with the information field up based on how you interpret the charge, I suggest that you have a look at other submissions of reverse briefs submitted by other designers and creatives. Because that will help you also see are the perspectives and show you how we can all interpret the same information differently. Because of course, we won't have the luxury to ask our fake client in this particular client. Brief example, any additional questions to clarify anything and there's no right or wrong answer with this view will be making quite a few assumptions about the project and the client brief based on that document that you'll download. Just as a side note, I did deliberately keep the reverse brief template, kind of shorten them without some of the sections. So I haven't put in things like timeframes and budget on purpose because I want to keep this more specific to our class project, which was just interpreting the challenge in first place. But of course, in a real life scenario, when you are sharing a reverse brief and a proposal, if your client, you will need to also include things like timeframes and budget if you are kind of challenging those things based on the client's request. So I look forward to seeing your submissions for your reverse briefs and your interpretation of that creative brief challenge. And if you have enjoyed this class, I will ask for your kind review. And if you have a designer friend who think might benefit from this class, please send them my way as well. My name is Robin off and I'll see you in the next class. And don't forget that the world needs your creativity and you have the power to contain it.
Ilya Lobanov, Creating brands that make impact
