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Most brand identities fail before the first pixel is even drawn. 🎨
Why? Because they start with "make it look cool" instead of "what problem are we solving?" I just wrapped up a project where we spent 80% of the time on strategy and 20% on execution. The result? A visual system that actually speaks to the target audience rather than just following a trend.
Question: To my fellow designers, how much of your "design time" is actually spent in discovery/strategy?
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Most websites fail before a single pixel gets designed.
They fail in the brief. "Make it modern. Make it clean. Make it feel like... name any competitor"
That's not a brief, it's a mood board pretending to be a strategy.. We just shipped a Framer site for an AI company.
And we didn't open Framer for 3 weeks, just locked positioning, who's the buyer, what makes them stop scrolling, what objection hits first and what proof kills it.
Then we wrote the site before we designed it, because every section needs a job.
Built the whole thing in Framer in 10 days because the strategy was already done and there were no debates around copy, structure or style. just implementitaion.
Then 2 more days on the final layer with scroll animations, micro interactions, page transitions. That's what turns a good site into one people actually remember.
Fastest way to build a website is to not start with the website.
• Apr 3
Love the colors 🎨
I need honest feedback: what would make you stay longer on a case study? 🤔
I recently saw a recommendation in Contra’s dashboard about going deeper on projects to improve portfolio quality, and it made me question how I am presenting my own work.
I tend to write a lot. I like explaining the thinking, the systems, the decisions. But I honestly do not know if people are actually reading it, or just scrolling through the visuals.
I have been revisiting projects like BASYX and asking myself. Is this a portfolio for designers, or for the person hiring me?
Would really appreciate honest feedback. Is this too much copy?
Do you read case studies fully, or just scan?
What actually makes you stop and pay attention?
Honestly the visuals do the scanning, the copy does the convincing — you need both, just don't front-load the text
Every brand strategy project starts with a discovery questionnaire —
and inside it, there’s already a lot of the strategy.
The real work is knowing how to read it.
Part of my process is decoding those responses, identifying patterns, connecting signals, and understanding what the client is really communicating beyond their words.
So I built Brand Discovery Decoder.
The instructions are based on how I personally process client questionnaires:
– mapping responses into values and personality
– identifying positioning signals
– surfacing patterns and underlying themes
– highlighting gaps, tensions, and opportunities
Instead of starting from a blank page,
I start with a structured strategic base I can build from.
From there, I develop the brand direction.
Great work!
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