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Client said "can we make it look more modern" on a call yesterday and I just sat there for a second because I never know what to do with that one.
It's not a bad note but not a design note either.. Nobody who says "modern" can tell you what modern actually looks like. I've asked. They point at someone else's site and say "like that" but what they're really saying is "that company looks like they have their stuff together and I want to feel that way too."
I used to just go tweak stuff in Figma when I got this note. Make things cleaner. Whatever I thought modern meant that week. Didn't work. They'd come back and say it still felt off, obviously, because the design wasn't the problem.
Anyway I don't have a clean takeaway here. I think the move is to just stop and ask "what feels off" instead of trying to fix it.
Yeah it definitely can be hard to get the specifics out of clients who don’t really understand the process behind designing their site.
Totally agree. Part of our job is translating feedback into visual decisions. And like you mentioned, asking what’s not working can be more valuable than asking what they want.
Thanks for sharing Daniel! Yes, I agree, before going down a rabbit hole, it's best to chat with the client and find out what exactly they mean. Sometimes we find that clients can struggle to see the bigger picture, especially at the beginning of a project. They'll over analyse...
modern or not - i really like it
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I'm working on a MUCH needed rebrand for my own studio at the moment and the amount of second-guessing involved is genuinely shocking for someone who does this for a living. You're just so close to it! My studio is my baby, and I suppose it’s quite hard to assign a single five-colour palette to a baby…
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Its so true, ahah!
BTW, just wanted to ask how to post like this, like a courousal style on contra, where you can swipe up the slides??
looks cool to me 🔥
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