Most disappointing design projects were lost before any design happened — in a vague brief. "Make it modern, I will know it when I see it" forces the designer to guess, and every wrong guess costs a revision round, time and goodwill. The good news: a strong brief is short. It just answers the right questions.
The six questions every brief should answer
- Context: what does the business do, and what makes it different?
- Goal: what should this design achieve — more enquiries, a launch, a repositioning?
- Audience: who exactly should this appeal to? "Everyone" is not an audience.
- Scope: what exactly is being delivered, and where will it be used?
- Taste: two or three examples you like — and, just as useful, one you hate and why.
- Constraints: deadline, budget, existing brand elements that must stay.
Give feedback on the problem, not the solution
"Make the logo bigger" is a solution. "I am worried the brand is not visible enough at a glance" is the problem — and it gives the designer room to solve it better than you might have. Collect feedback from all stakeholders into one voice before sending it; contradictory notes from three people cost more revision rounds than anything else.
Trust the process you are paying for
A brief sets direction; it should not prescribe every pixel. If you have hired well, the designer will take your six answers somewhere you could not have described in advance. That gap between what you asked for and what you receive — that is what you are actually paying for.
A designer can only be as good as the problem they are given.
