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Most clients have never received a proper UX audit before.
So the first thing I do is set expectations, not about design, but about what they're going to read.
Here's the structure I used for a recent legal software audit:
The one core observation (structural, not cosmetic)
Why first impressions are high-stakes for this specific audience
*A before/after comparison, current state vs refined experience
*Business impact, tied to real B2B SaaS benchmarks
*A proposed engagement path phased, low-risk
Notice what's not in there: no jargon, no design theory, no "per gestalt principles."
The client is a founder or product lead. They care about conversions, trust, and time. So everything in the deck speaks their language.
A deliverable that communicates clearly is part of the design work. If they can't read it, they can't act on it.
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What do you think of when you say, “this design doesn't feel premium”?
I've heard this kind of feedback from clients countless times. You know that “premium” can mean different things depending on the person, the product, and what they are comparing it against.
Recently, though, I found myself on the other side of a very similar conversation.
We've been developing a brand identity for one of our own projects, and I caught myself giving exactly the kind of feedback I've spent years receiving from clients.
“This doesn't feel right.”
“This isn't quite what I had in mind.”
There was a very specific image in my head. I just didn't have a neat explanation for it.
I was comparing what I was seeing against a pre-existing perception of what the brand should be. The gap was obvious to me because I could see both things at once: the design in front of me and the image in my head.
And that made me think back to all those conversations about making something feel more like “premium”, or trustworthy, sophisticated, playful, serious, whatever the brief happens to call for.
A client may have a very specific perception in mind that doesn't necessarily match what a designer would know to associate with that quality. They may be comparing the design against something the designer can't see yet.
The designer is checking against something too: years of seeing how visual choices, combinations and conventions tend to communicate, plus the context of the product, audience and brand.
The client is checking against the idea in their head. They may not always be able to articulate it, but they can still tell when what they're seeing doesn't match it.
So what are you actually checking against when you decide a design feels premium?
To me this would mean one thing - there was no strategic work done before touching visuals. Hence it's shooting in the dark and trying to magically match the client taste.
Strategy makes decisions informed, and put both parties on the same page way before the design work starts.
This project was slightly out of my comfort zone.
Most of my work tends to be warmer, more elegant and feminine. So when this client asked for something very rigid, minimal and clean, I knew I was going to have to approach the project differently.
They are architects, and they wanted their structural, precise and highly organised way of thinking to come through in the website.
I have to admit, I was a little scared at the beginning.
It’s always interesting when a project doesn’t immediately feel like “you”. There’s a temptation to bring your own aesthetic into everything you create — but sometimes the real challenge is knowing when not to.
Looking at the final website now, I actually love how consistent it feels with their identity.
And perhaps that’s the real goal of design: not to make everything look like your work, but to create something that feels unmistakably like your client.
Have you ever worked on a project that was completely outside your usual aesthetic? Did you embrace it, or did you find yourself trying to bring it back into your own visual language?
AeroNova is a UI/UX and landing page design project for a next-generation drone brand built around power, precision, and intelligent flight. This case study covers product strategy, user journey design, a dark futuristic visual identity, and UI/UX design for both the AeroNova website and its drone remote controller — resulting in a +28% improvement in product clarity and a +35% lift in user experience metrics
