When you talk to startups, CEOs, and others, it seems like everyone wants to be the “next Apple,” “just like Nike,” or to do things “the way Starbucks does.” Admittedly, these companies are icons and have surpassed the competition to become larger-than-life brands, symbols that stand for things both larger and more sweeping than the commerce they generate. But it’s not like any of them pushed a magic icon button to make it all happen. There’s no road map to guaranteed iconic status, or our world would be vastly different, to say the least. But if we dissect these kinds of rockstar brands, and remove the lucky breaks, the passion, sweat equity, and visionary leaders, what is left? We believe there are some fundamental activities remaining that help illuminate the roads a brand must take to becoming an icon.

Here are a few of them:

Ubiquity
You need to be everywhere your audience is. That doesn’t necessarily mean event-driven Super Bowl commercials or plastering your brand messages on every free inch of real estate. But it does require an intimate knowledge and understanding of the people you’re trying to reach, and then unobtrusively inserting your brand into their lives in useful and meaningful ways. This is less the persistent stalker syndrome and more the reliable, friendly presence. And it requires more than holding a sign that says “Remember, we’re here!” Today’s audiences want more from your brand than just a pathetic “Call me…?” Give them the means and a reason to follow you and follow up when their need arrives.

Repetition
To remain in that elusive “top-of-mind” position, it requires some sort of regular and consistent presence in the lives of your target audience. It’s up to you to determine the how and who, and which messages and means are crucial elements in your brand strategy. Repeat these in a way that doesn’t feel monotonous or self-absorbed (no one likes the people who only talk about themselves!), but slowly unfolds what you’re doing, what you’re about, and why it matters. This means that your brand’s messaging, look, feel, style, voice — all need to be consistent, working in concert to provide synergy that makes it sound like your organization speaks with one voice.

Emotional Connection
This might seem silly to a company that sells toilet brushes or distributes freight containers, but the honest truth is that nearly every purchase or product decision carries some sort of emotional weight to it, however slight. The hard part is finding out what that bit of caring is, and when it’s liable to happen to your audience. Someone might care very much about getting their morning coffee quickly, so the brand touchpoint of a fast line is crucial to evoking satisfaction. Simple, bold nutritional graphics might make a harried parent’s shopping a bit easier at the point of purchase. Audience empathy will lead to the discovery of these moments of emotional connection, allowing you to use your service, product, or offering to make a positive difference to them.

Spark
This is one of the least quantifiable aspects, but no less important in stepping up the ladder to brand stardom. What is a spark? It’s that “new and different” aspect that sets your brand apart from others. It could mean providing something that’s never been seen before (a Segway?), revamping an existing category (the iPad), or just offering a completely fresh point of view on familiar products (like Method did with cleaning supplies). The commonality in all of these is some type of “unique selling proposition” in marketing parlance, but we prefer to think of it as a brand’s soul, it’s spark, or reason for being. (And making money doesn’t count as a “reason for being.”)

Something Worth Sharing
Finally, you know you’ll have an iconic brand in-the-making when you have something people want to share with others. Sharing is a highly-overused term in our sphere of retweets, Likes, and thumbs up , but this principle has been around a lot longer than social media. In fact, it’s centuries old and very simple. Your brand needs to contain something that people want to tell others about. Other than the occasional brand train wreck, what brands are truly worth discussing? You need fans and people who want to selflessly evangelize about what you do, because they love it and want to tell others. The motivation might come from wanting to be the first kid on the block with the new toy, a desire to be the resident expert on something, or just an overflow of genuine delight.

These five aspects are no magic recipe, but instead, we hope that they’re a handful of crucial steps on the painstaking road towards brand greatness. Now get going.

Like a plot twist gone astray, the streaming film company, Netflix, has once again befuddled customers by reversing course with a recent brand announcement. Weeks ago, Netflix announced its intention to divide its streaming and physical mail business units into two separate entities, while simultaneously apologizing for recent price hikes. This effort was intended to kick off the renamed DVD mail service, christening it Qwikster. Apparently, public outcry and common sense won the day, as Netflix backtracked and rejiggered its plans.

This on-again, off-again game of brand Twister has damaged the Netflix name and its brand cache. While we can only guess at the business reasons that motivated these decisions, it’s plain to see how Netflix shot itself in the foot from a brand perspective.

In some ways, the rationale behind Netflix’s merry-go-round of christening, defending, and retreating from its plans doesn’t matter. Brand identities are tightly bound up in what people think and feel about a particular brand, and most everyday customers won’t ever get to know a company’s reasoning for an initiative. They shouldn’t have to — brand decisions are made in the present, where they affect, challenge, and reflect on an organization — for better or for worse.

We think it’s a useful and instructive exercise to rewind the film, so to speak, and walk through some of the reasons why Netflix’s actions are the equivalent of a disaster movie, or maybe just brand mistakes, seen in high definition.

Brand Equity Squandered
Netflix painstakingly built and earned its reputation as a forward-thinking, powerful content provider, employing a Long Tail strategy to re-envision the movie rental industry. The future-forward vision of delivering films and television to users initially focused on using direct mail as the vehicle for providing films quickly. Fast delivery, responsive customer service, and a super-optimized supply system were all strong brand attributes, and crucial to its growth. Coupled with the company’s commitment to developing better and better recommendation algorithms, all of these factors drove Netflix’s popularity and to a place as the leader in its sector. Cute little red envelopes became synonymous with fast service and the delight and surprise of receiving your next film in the mail. The website experience of Netflix was helpful, friendly, and user focused.

But changes have taken hold in the industry, with corporations moving towards streaming models of delivery, and while Netflix did it first (and arguably, best), it mis-managed the evolution of its brand. This Qwikster debacle grew out of this shift away from Netflix’s original model, and that, coupled with an earlier price hike, started pushing away many of the company’s loyal customers and fans. In surprisingly short order, Netflix began squandering many of the good feelings and past positive experiences previously associated with its brand, as users began to feel excluded and alienated from the formerly warm embrace of Netflix.

Business-friendly, User Hostile
The move to focus more on streaming users makes sense, and that change is a wise one for the company. But the initial concept of the Qwikster rollout was primarily built around the needs of the business, and not users. From a user experience perspective, it seems foolish and nonsensical for a single company to force current users to navigate two distinct websites, handle user accounts separately, and degrade the user experience by providing no integration between the related sites. These are not the actions of a company focused on its customer base, and it made many of the Netflix DVD/Blu-Ray subscribers feel like second-class citizens.

Better to Retreat Than Stand Your Ground
But we have to cut Netflix a little slack. Every brand has missteps. Remember the Apple Newton? No one is immune from screw ups, and the best and most popular brands get to make their mistakes right in the spotlight. So, a brand has to make a decision — to retrench, and fix the problems, or stand their ground and defend the decision. But we know what happened to other brands who’ve gone down this path. New Coke? Tropicana rebranding? The Gap logo? You can circle the wagons, but eventually consumer-facing brands need to kneel before their customers and offer the mea culpa. The above brands survived after all the hoopla, and the name of the game is moving forward after a mistake.

But Who Drives This Train?
Of course, this seems to suggest a dangerous precedent. How willing are companies and organizations to hold the line when a seemingly unpopular decision promises to lead to better places tomorrow? Good PR can’t always serve as the indicator for whether a decision is correct or not. Often, the issue is not the actual decision itself, but how it is communicated to the target audiences and public at large. But even if communication is pitch-perfect and completely on-brand, bad things still happen to good brands. Sometimes a temporary black eye is the cost of visionary leadership.

Still Wondering
All that being said, Netflix’s handling of the scenario was odd — with strange communications, then an out-of-the-blue reversal. The company’s delivery was odd, which caused many to speculate that this rebranding was setting up its mail delivery component to be spun off completely, in anticipating of selling it off to another entity. Perhaps Netflix wanted to distance itself from soon-to-be-obsolete technology, maintaining its technology-forward brand image. Or possibly, the company wanted to jettison the extra baggage of hard costs and labor of mail service, as it seeks to become the premier content partner for streaming devices and online.

In the end, we don’t know. But we do know that Netflix could have done a few things to avoid these pitfalls. Here are a few brief thoughts that might serve as a good reminder:

Keep users first. There is always a fine line between decisions that make good business sense, and those that are good for users. Sometimes sacrifices have to be made. But when in doubt, the more profitable decisions (in the long term) will always be for the good of customers.

It’s all about tone. How an organization communicates hard truths (like a price hike) is almost as important as the content of the actual message. Honesty, sincerity, and a clear message about why a decision will eventually benefit an audience will go much further than a strange, pseudo-apology. Directness, transparency, and consistency are the keys.

Don’t underestimate the value of a good name. Netflix almost threw away millions of dollars of brand equity by renaming part of their service. Forget the fact that the name was poorly-conceived (I still can’t spell it correctly!). Any change was a poor one, if it wasn’t going to utilize the goodwill, recognition, and singular awareness of a little red DVD envelope. When your organization spends years, millions of dollars in advertising, and the hard work of building a brand people can trust, renaming must be done with the most sober of mind, if it needs to be done at all.

Logos and brand identity are an oft-misunderstood part of design. A logo is not a brand. A logo is not a brand identity. A logo is a crucial part of an overall brand identity, but it’s just one part of a larger toolbox that contains things like color palettes, brand platforms, photo styles, graphic patterns, positioning statements, and much, much more. This is well-traveled territory. But one thing that’s rarely discussed in logo and identity circles is timing. For clients, when is it a good time to rebrand your organization?

It depends on who you ask, but there are a lot of avenues where it makes sense to initiate a logo redesign. Many prospects and clients see identity design only as a first-stage project — to be initiated early in an organization’s life cycle — for startups and newly-minted organizations. But truly, a new identity is valuable for all seasons. If executed thoughtfully and properly, a redesign is a powerful weapon that can have maximum impact across a variety of moments during the life of your brand.

Sidestepping the issue of how to rebrand your company (conversation for another time), we’ve laid out some of the critical moments when an identity redesign can make a major difference:

In The Beginning

It’s crucial to inaugurate your company correctly at launch, and have a cohesive and strategically-designed logo in place from the beginning, so you have a consistent and appropriate story to tell. Some startups believe that well-reasoned brand strategy and design are for “later,” after rounds of funding or IPOs. But the reality is that audiences don’t care about those things — they need a consistent look and message that ties into their experience with your brand. It’s far simpler (and less expensive) to get your brand personality in order at the outset than have to retool or make course corrections soon after launch.

When Things Go South

The economy continues provide a challenging environment for many organizations, so slowing sales might be your chief concern. When faced with a loss of revenue, smart organizations see the opportunity embedded within the situation. Rather than seeing marketing and design budgets as a place to cut costs in tough times, it might be better to hit pause and reconsider — by reworking your brand’s visibility with updated design and positioning.

While your competitors are hunkering down, it’s even easier (and often cheaper) to gain the mindshare of your markets, with a lot less competitive noise. While that’s happening, it’s important to ask some honest questions: Are you still communicating to the right audiences? Have your audience’s perceptions and needs evolved? Has their awareness of your organization changed? A research-based redesign of your logo and identity can help slow the decline and reposition you for a quick rebound.

All In The Family

Sometimes brands and organizations grow in an organic way, and you find yourself introducing products or services in response to market demands and internal changes. An identity redesign can help reorganize product lines, whether it’s for an overarching organization, or for specific product suites and services. In an age where many companies have diverse interests and audiences, sometimes radically different approaches are needed under one roof. Redesigning a brand’s identity and its presence in the world can often help clarify the goals for departments or groups within your company, or on the opposite end, provide much-needed consistency that prunes back wild applications of your previous identity.

The Times They Are A-Changing

The products, services, and initiatives of your organization don’t exist in a vacuum, so it’s crucial to ensure that your messages, overall look, and an identity application can flex over time when necessary. It’s important for your brand to adapt to new competitive forces, shifting markets, or other parts of a changing landscape. With the speed of business and commerce increasing, it’s crucial that an identity is able to bend, flex, and sometimes morph. If you’re saddled with an intractable, immovable brand identity, then it’s even more important to consider a redesign or “refresh,” to gain the ability of adaptation — whether it’s to new market realities or changing trends. What is fresh today might be stale tomorrow, and yesterday’s relevancy is tomorrow’s history. The best designed identities take this into account, and provide room to grow and change.

Back to the Fusion

Companies get absorbed. Buyouts yield new products and challenges. Mergers and acquisitions are ripe with opportunities for logo and brand redesigns, but it’s important to redevelop new properties in a way that’s appropriate and authentic — true to the story your organization is already telling. Sometimes these absorbed entities are so large that their presence shifts the brand gravity of a whole company, and a redesign is vital to rethink and redistribute the visual universe you now live in.

A Shift in Focus

Whether it’s caused by a new CEO or any of the above changes, sometimes organizations just need to change. A shift in organizational thinking can have a domino effect on all the ways a company sees itself, communicates, and relates to the world. This includes a visual identity, and this very public shift can be an important, outward sign of the positive and tectonic changes within.

UPDATE: We received a Twitter reply from @CDOTNews. See the end of the post for details.

To:
Gabe Klein, Commissioner of CDOT
Chicago Department of Transportation
30 N. LaSalle Street
Suite 1100
Chicago, IL 60602
cc: Rahm Emmanuel

Dear Commissioner Klein and Mayor Emmanuel,

It’s no secret that the city of Chicago currently finds itself in a challenging financial state. The economy and the previous administration’s decisions and poor budget planning have left our city with the desperate need to do more with less. Many organizations and businesses face similar challenges — and there are a lot of ways to cut costs, trim expenditures, and stretch the city’s money. But crowdsourcing the new CDOT logo is a terrible idea.

On the surface, it might appear that holding an “open call” for logos would yield many more options, and thus, a better chance to get what the Chicago Department of Transportation (CDOT) needs out of a new identity. And of course, in these challenging economic times, “free” might seem like the obvious choice, but as part of a graphic design firm that focuses on identity design, I have to tell you that this is a dangerous path to tread. I can almost guarantee that this logo project will go off the rails if kept on its current course, because fundamentally, a disconnected logo design process is a lose-lose situation for both the clients, the audience of CDOT, and any graphic designers involved. Here are some alternative strategies that we’d suggest, rather than resorting to crowdsourcing. Building some or all of these thoughts into a revamped logo design process will help ensure that CDOT gets a logo that accurately and powerfully communicates its essence, without breaking budgets or wasting the precious time of our city government employees. So, here they are:

Hire someone with a track record.
Instead of giving everyone a shot at this large-scale project, it seems much wiser to find some experts. Just as you wouldn’t want to have a “dentist-in-training” or a “dental hobbyist” work on your teeth, it makes sense to work alongside a team who has been down these paths before. Hiring a proven and experienced design team will help you to get the project right the first time. They will save you time and money, since they are aware of regular pitfalls, important requirements, and next steps that your internal CDOT team might not be aware of. Even though each logo or identity project is unique, there are underlying principles and overarching methodologies that come with experience, and an experienced identity design firm will employ those to make sure the project will run smoothly from initial brief, to concepting, through execution and production.

Realize that more is not always better.
It might seem like common sense to say that the strengths of crowdsourcing design are that you get more bang for your buck. Lots more designs and design options should automatically lead to more quality logo options to choose from, right? Well, not really. The money you might have initially saved by not paying a strategic design firm will be wasted in countless hours spent sifting through a deluge of weak, poor, unprofessional and inappropriate design submissions. It takes a lot of time to curate the logo entries that have no filter of quality, thought, or craft.

By disconnecting from the process, you sacrifice rapport and strategy.
One of the foundational, essential elements of any good design project involve building relationships and understanding the needs of each client — whether they be budgetary, political (not in Chicago, of course…), or strategic. What have the previous CDOT marketing and design efforts been? How were they received internally and by the general public? What internal efficiency issues need to be kept in mind? Who will be evaluating the success and quality of the designs? What specific criterion do these decision-makers bring to the table that are separate from (or at odds with) the actual project goals? These kinds of points sometimes are less tangible and difficult to communicate, but they often mean the difference between success and failure in a design project. To ignore this aspect of the process is tantamount to asking hundreds of strangers to submit their “best guesses” as logos.

In brief, create a brief.
It’s rather difficult to reach your destination successfully if you don’t know where you’re supposed to wind up. The posted “project description” consisted of the following: “CDOT’s looking for a new logo. Help us! Send your designs/ideas to cdotnews@cityofchicago.org.” The page that this tweet pointed to is no longer available, but regardless, good graphic design requires a stated set of goals and needs. This project will not achieve its potential without a solid design brief. Creating one would be one step that can’t be skipped.

Show Chicago voters that you’re repairing the economy by hiring a local design firm.
Mayor Emmanuel, you’ve talked in public about how strongly you support business development in Chicago, and medium and small business are part of the beating heart of this city. Well, this is a great opportunity to show that you meant it, by hiring one of the many great design firms in the city. Of course, feel free to contact us first, if you like.

This course of action won’t win you any friends within design.
Undoubtedly, the concept of crowdsourcing the CDOT logo was meant innocently, as a way to drum up excitement and press for the CDOT, to get people involved in city government, and to stretch the shrinking budgets you have. But working design firms and professional design associations will see this in a completely different light. Unpaid contests and spec efforts actually belittle the work of solid, practicing designers by suggesting that their work can and should be given away for free. Despite your good intentions, contests such as this “open call” aren’t helpful or respectful towards trained professionals who feed their families by doing this kind of work, and doing it well.

There’s a sweet spot in the relationship between clients and designers that yields a final product everyone can be proud of, and we offer all of the above thoughts in the hope that CDOT can get to that place with this logo redesign — without the pitfalls and challenges of crowdsourcing.

Sincerely,
Tim Lapetino and Jason Adam
Partners at Hexanine

UPDATE:
We received the following response from CDOT via Twitter: “We addressed this 6/23 in Tweet to @aigachicago, others. We respect and appreciate the design community’s feeedback.”

That response linked to a page on the CDOT website which stated:

“Our intent with this process was to get feedback from our customers—the residents of Chicago. CDOT does a lot of things—from paving streets and building transit stations to installing bike lanes and neighborhood streetscapes—and we are looking for ideas that reflect that. We were hoping for feedback from all Chicagoans, not just designers.”

However, this seems very much at odds with their original concept, which read this way:

“CDOT would love to see your ideas for a new logo. Send us your ideas—as a .jpeg, a .tiff, a .gif, a .pdf, even a sketch on paper. We’re certain that your creativity will result in a new look that will represent CDOT as we move into a new era.”

Seems like a little bit of backpedalling, because of the uproar created by the design community. And as we said on Twitter, this still seems like a poor choice. After all, if CDOT were building a new L line, they wouldn’t be soliciting engineering feedback from customers. They’d hire professionals. Which brings us back to our original thought: Logo designs are at their best when created by designers with a foundation that’s firmly rooted in a strategic client brief and experience, not the suggestions of random Chicagoans.

Whether you call it crowdsourcing, spec work, community-based design, or participatory creation, it’s fundamentally the same animal. Crowdsourcing is the act of oursourcing tasks (in our case, design) to a large group of people as part of an open call for solutions or deliverables. This might take the form of a contests, RFPs, or clients who want a “test drive” before committing to a creative firm.

In the design world, some examples are crowdsourced logos, tshirts, and a variety of other marketing and design initiatives. While the crowdsourcing concept has worked its way into the business practices of some organizations, the execution is still controversial. AIGA, the professional association for design, has taken a stand against it specifically and also contributes to the ongoing dialogue against its use. Heated comments and criticism always fly in this debate, but most of the questions boil down to one for practicing designers: Is this practice “the way of the future” or is it a deeply-flawed model of working in design and branding?

At the risk of oversimplification, we think it’s the latter. In a nutshell, crowdsourcing strategic design work hurts both designers and their prospective clients. While crowdsourcing as a technique takes many forms, design firms and their clients are usually attached to the process in work like logo design, print, tshirts, name generation, etc. But the road to crowdsourced design success looks to be a mirage. We’re approaching this discussion specifically from a design industry perspective, so most of our thoughts are focused along those lines. However, it’s definitely worth noting some honest and practical ideas about business scenarios where the strengths of crowdsourcing are better utilized.

Briefly, Where Is The Design Brief?
Nothing will shipwreck your efforts more quickly than setting off on a journey without the destination firmly in mind. This happens all the time when design projects begin while still lacking a set of strategic objectives. Sometimes a project’s goals are varied and multi-faceted. While we do what’s needed to help clients focus their efforts, the process of landing on a set of objectives is like dance. It requires back and forth, initiation and response. Good designers play interviewer and really dig into the needs of the client, and this part of the discovery process is time-intensive, requiring a level of trust. It can’t be communicated easily in a single sentence or a quick website writeup. In general, the broad crowdsourced call to a large group of designers isn’t going to be specific or concrete enough for the process to work well. Not all clients know which questions to ask for a project to head in the right direction, even if they know the eventual answers. That’s some of what experienced designers bring to the table, an important part of the relationship-building process that’s the foundation of solid end results. Crowdsourcing doesn’t lend itself well to this important first step in the process.

The Client “Leap of Faith”
Another client rationale for requesting spec work or crowdsourced design is a form of the “first date” butterflies. We sometimes hear from new and potential clients (especially those who haven’t hired design firms before) about the trepidation they feel in beginning a project. What should they expect? How do they know if they will like the results? How do they be sure the design firm will do a good job without seeing the final work? These are hurdles first-time clients have to overcome, and it may go beyond their normal comfort zones. But it’s helpful to lay out how this process works best. A design firm’s portfolio is a good indicator of the scope and quality of their work. Obviously, we all put our best foot (work) forward, but the projects a firm shows should be the level of quality you can expect if you end up hiring them. There are a few things prospective clients should look for but the specific needs are up to the project itself. At some point, after the necessary conversations, reference checking, and scrutiny of a firm’s work, clients need to take a leap and make the decision. But it’s the same kind of choice we all make when choosing which dentist or mechanic to hire – there’s no such thing as a “trial root canal” or “practice break repair.” Just like the designer-client relationship, those decisions are built on reputation, trust, and perception of quality. The sticking point is that in those instances, most of us ignore process itself, just focusing on the end result, whether it’s clean teeth or a new muffler. A good design relationship requires a little bit more involvement.

But all that said, once you’ve worked through a project with a new client, that initial nervousness can evolve into a strong relationship that rewards mutual trust and communication, making subsequent projects simpler, easier, and even better.

Why It Hurts Designers
As crass as it might sound, money is at the core of this debate. It’s all about the Benjamins. We like to think that all great designers do the work “for the love of the game,” but few of us are able to survive on that passion alone. Design love doesn’t pay the office rent or keep the lights on. This is a problem, because most crowdsourcing arrangements are weighted to heavily favor the “client,” and designers absorb most or all of the risk. A designer creates a finished deliverable, spending time, energy, and resources (all of which have value) without any guarantee of compensation. Unlike a conventional client-firm agreement, in this scenario, the client isn’t bound to pay for the work. That crowdsourcing client has no incentive to build a working relationship or to utilize the designer’s time as they would when making a financial commitment – and the designer has no leverage in drafting a fair agreement.

This arrangement might work for hobbyist designers, but for those of us who make a living charging for design expertise and services, it’s a very poor business model. The fine print in some crowdsourcing agreements is also frightening – the devil’s in the details when companies gain unlimited rights to the “winning” crowdsourced artwork, allowing them to profit from it ad infinitum, without due licensing compensation stipulated at the outset.

Now, it’s been reasonably stated that participation is voluntary and no one is forcing designers to enter into these agreements. Rightly so. But the overall effect and perception built by crowdsourcing degrades and devalues design as a valuable business asset, which hurts all designers in the long run.

Even putting aside those concerns, crowdsourcing just isn’t built to solve strategic design problems well. Sure, clients might occasionally be able to get a nice-looking logo or a solid tagline from these efforts, but crowdsourcing falls flat in instances where strategy, partnership, and other crucial intangible elements are needed. Here are some of the scenarios where crowdsourcing doesn’t work:

Crowdsourcing doesn’t work…

When a one-on-one partnership is crucial

A good design relationship requires trust, time, commitment (and the safety net that paid contracts create) to dig deeply with a client. A prospective client who invests no time or money into a design solution (like in a typical crowdsourced scenario) will value it in the same way: zero. It’s low on the priority list, little time will be invested, and the end product will suffer. But clients who are willing to pay four, five and six figures for commissioned work quickly learn that having a trusted design ally to partner with leads to the best, valuable solutions. In those situations, both parties are invested heavily (time, money and reputation for each), capturing the focus of everyone involved.

If quantity is the driving factor

Some companies jump onto the crowdsourcing bandwagon because they see it as a way to get huge pools of concepts to choose from at minimal cost (that in-house teams can later implement). After all, aren’t more options always better? Not in these scenarios. Too many weak options can confuse the project’s main objectives, and a variety of opposing voices can muddy the decision-making process. There is much to be said for seasoned professionals helping to curate and filter concepts in concert with a client. This fast-food menu scenario of crowdsourcing doesn’t typically offer that.

When the problem is open-ended or nebulous

Designers are trained to expand on challenges like the client who asks that a new brand identity “makes our company seem trustworthy.” That statement is not a creative brief, but just the tip of the iceberg. It’s the beginning of the process that will eventually tease out what that exactly means. Are there relevant historical issues in the client organization’s past? What does “trustworthy” mean to this particular group of decision-makers? Usually, the crowdsourcing apparatus functions like a radio broadcast – a one-way street  – and further clarification is rare. Open-ended briefs or vague opening agendas can be a gold-mine filled with excellent nuggets for the right design team. But 5,000 independent designers working from the same fuzzy notions will never be able to dig as deeply as a team who has priority access to narrow the focus alongside the client.

Crowdsourcing Is Useful…

When you’re trying to solve a discrete problem

In times where there is seemingly one way to do something, the crowd can be extremely efficient in solving binary problems. Advice sites sites make use of this strategy, drawing on the expertise of qualified people who are already filtered or self-selected for competence. The ideal situation is to find or build a qualified community, and leverage their knowledge to solve a specific problem or issue. If you want to know the best way to install a hard drive or the correct ingredients for a Chicago-style hot dog, crowdsourced wisdom might be the way to go.

When you want simple actions or opinions from a larger sample size

Mountain Dew’s Dewmocracy initiative that allows fans to select their favorite flavors are a great use of crowd opinion. In a scenario like this, vast numbers do really matter. Quantity is going to be the most helpful feedback for marketers and food scientists, and the Internet has a strong, built-in filter of interest for people to find a product or service like soda. But clients still need to filter these results, unless the voting criteria are very clear and specific.

When you need financing or other non-creative assets

Kickstarter has built a loyal following and practical business model around the use of like-minded crowds to rally around a singular purpose. The interest and excitement of helping a product come to life (and deriving a benefit of discounts, preorder status or creative credits) is a potent combination. It works well because the benefits are stated clearly, and both parties are guaranteed to get something in return. It’s also a venue for entrepreneurs and designers to fund their own production outside of the typical corporate structure. This set of operating principles are scalable because the “client” is still financing design, production or some other creative activity, albeit in much smaller amounts.

The idea of tapping creative communities for overall group efforts (like MakerBot and Behance) open up some exciting possibilities, but crowdsourcing will have to evolve in order for it to be fair, powerful, and equitable for all parties.

We’re sure this has never happened to you, but sometimes brands misstep and the results aren’t pretty. Whether it’s because of bizarre weather patterns, changing stylistic trends, the rise of American Idol style voting, or slow news cycles, some logos just aren’t well-received. And to be fair, some logos are crappy, objectively. But assuming the work you and your team have launched isn’t a horror show, chances are that it’s decent, solid and professional. But that doesn’t mean everyone will like it. Sometimes the Internet brings the hate.

Take the recent GAP logo debacle, or an even fresher example, the Big10 identity created by Pentagram. Both launches set off firestorms on Twitter and Facebook, with hoards of supposedly-livid commentators going off about how terrible each design was. In a situation like that, what is a brand to do? It’s easy for commentators (who didn’t design the project or pay for it) to say that “public opinion” is king, and encourage a brand to quickly retreat, scrapping months of work and tens of thousands of dollars. But is that the correct response?

In this era of instant Internet feedback, it’s easier than it’s ever been to voice an opinion. We are rapidly becoming a society of people who comment on anything and everything online, from what we ate for lunch, to the people we see picking their noses on the train. There’s also a certain kind of mob mentality and overzealous hatred unique to the bowels of the Internet, message boards and blog comment fields, and when it’s your brand caught in the crossfire, it can be difficult to decide how to respond. It takes a savvy team to sift through the feedback and determine if it’s legitimate, important, and weighty enough to shift the direction of your brand efforts.

So, if you find your organization (or yourself) in front of the Internet firing squad, it’s not advisable to automatically head for the hills. Instead of acting on the instinct, it’s probably worth it to expend the time and effort to figure out what’s truly going on. That time can lead to crucial insights, helping your team determine if a remedy is indeed necessary, and what the possible repercussions might be. Here are some important issues to consider:

Determine Your Audience
Before digging into the feedback you’ve received, it’s helpful to revisit the project goals and creative brief. Who it is your brand/campaign/effort trying to reach? Has your target audience changed, or does it need to change? What are the end results – better word-of-mouth? More website traffic? Increased sales? Bringing your brand back into the spotlight? Without setting a specific benchmark for success in reaching a target audience, it’s nearly impossible to differentiate success from failure. You’ll never know if the logo redesign was successful, much less whether the feedback you’re getting is significant in the life of your brand. Keeping these goalposts in mind as you parse the public feedback will help direct your course of action in beneficial ways.

Look Who’s Talking
Once you’ve firmly established your target audience and goals, it’s time to dig into the feedback itself. What is the quality of the commentary? Who are the people trash talking your new logo? What vehicles are they using to communicate their displeasure? Are there pockets of negativity being riled up by certain outlets? Do certain opinions stem from a few specific tastemakers, or are they more grass-roots driven? Do these people (or representatives of certain demographics) fit into your target audience? Not to put too fine a point on it, but do these people truly matter to your brand? If you’ve redesigned the on-air identity for Lifetime Television (aimed at middle-aged women), then it’s largely inconsequential whether Xbox playing, Mountain Dew chugging 14 year-olds respond negatively or not. This seems obvious, but it’s a major call – not a call based on gut instinct, but a qualitative decision focused on the pre-determined needs of your brand.

How Is The Criticism Affecting Your Brand?
Whether your target audience if part of the firestorm or not, in this connected era, it’s important to consider how quickly negativity can spread. You might be concerned about your brand receiving a media black eye, but it’s best to set true numbers to those negative impressions. The business bottom line is this: Do you believe that the negative feedback is affecting your business goals? Is working to preserve your brand’s reputation worth the price of scrapping your shiny, new logo? Or does your particular situation support the adage that “there’s no such thing as bad publicity?” Is it enough that people are talking about your brand again? Has your redesign led to a drop in sales? Do your front-line sales associates hear from customers about the logo? Are your other brand touchpoints being affected by the logo’s negative reception? It would be self-serving for us to say that a graphic identity is the end-all, be-all of a company’s brand, but it just isn’t true. There are organizations with amazing products and mediocre visual identities, while some brands hide crappy services behind beautiful design. Design is just part of the equation, and you need to ascertain how large a part it plays in what you do.

What Actions Do You Take?
Even if you decide to stay your present course and weather the storm of criticism, this negative experience can be a fruitful one. What can you learn for future efforts? Are there any nuggets of wisdom you can pull from all the chatter? Are the criticisms specific and concrete, or just generally harsh? Do your dissenters offer up any constructive thoughts or ways to improve? Is the criticism true or valid? Or are people just generally displaying our innate resistance to change? Maybe you can determine if it really was a content issue, or a problem with the way the design was released instead. (Yes, we’re looking at you, GAP.) Perhaps there was a better way to announce your intentions and plans for the future.

In deciding to respond, it’s important to note that there’s a lot of territory between appearing defensive and offended on one end, and seeming aloof and unresponsive on the other. Your answers to the above questions can help you figure out a next-step response. If you do rush to defend your position, what you say (and possibly as important – HOW you say it) is crucial. Possibly there’s a strategic and understanding way to affirm the voices of dissent while still forging ahead with your brand plans. You might engage people on Facebook, or email specific audience influencers and ask for some deeper discussion. Or you might decide to remain silent and let the storms of criticism die down while normal business continues. (Sometimes, engaging in the argument just legitimizes the “opponent’s” arguments, so it might be better to remain above the fray.) You might need to provide additional context – like supporting your new logo with more imagery that shows it in use. Or adapt your positioning accordingly – a more thoughtfully-crafted statement could help clarify your brand position.

Finally, it’s important to remember that even if you’re the client (and it’s your brand), you’re not the only involved party. Your design partners have a huge stake in how their designs are received, and they will be motivated to make sure things go well. If any of the above negativity is visited upon your brand, how will you work with your design firm (in partnership) to right the ship, allowing both parties to save face? Among all the options, surely there’s a scenario where everyone – your brand, your audience, and your design team – can come out positively.

“In order to cement your status in the cultural elite, you want to be already sick of everything no one else has even heard of.”
—David Brooks, NY Times Op Ed columnist

This has, in my ten years of experience, been the prevailing attitude and general temperment in business, amidst a set of people who are constantly standing on the forefront of culture and gleaning bits for their work. I might be bold enough to say that attitude will soon be falling out of fashion. In a post-Obama victory, in an empathy-filled set of hard luck headlines, it’s time for optimism and promise to make a comeback. What can we offer in hope? Are our uncertain times a clarion call for a newer, more hopeful way of thinking and presenting real problem-solving solutions?

Now, I’m not talking about an unrealistic cheeriness that merely sugar coats the struggles ahead, but a bright-eyed, soul-driven willingness to seek and find solutions to problems—both for our world, and for the business that drives it. In these times, this kind of buoyancy is a breath of fresh air, a much-needed emotive undertone communicated to a weary audience. Are these the kinds of concepts and solutions that will resonate with clients and their markets in the coming months and years? I’m convinced that working within this mental framework will change us for the better.

One great example is Banyan Tree Hotels and Resorts. They’ve achieved success on the two fronts of corporate responsibility and corporate growth of a high-end luxury brand. In its latest CSR initiative, the Banyan Tree Al Wadi in the United Arab Emirates released a first set of animals, consisting of 18 Arabian gazelles, eight Reem gazelles and four Arabian oryx into the resort’s 60-hectare nature reserve. Other ongoing CSR projects include Seedlings, a group-wide initiative to support communities by building capacities of young people; Greening Communities, to tackle climate change; Resource Conservation, to reduce energy and water consumption by each resort; and a marine lab at the Banyan Tree Vabbinfaru in the Maldives to look into environmental conservation. And, the Banyan Tree group has been supporting Earth Day for five consecutive years.

Founder Ho Kwon Ping attributes the company’s success to excellence in brand building and says idealism and business are not incompatible. “To me, the proudest thing I’ve done (with) Banyan Tree has nothing to do with hotels; it’s the fact that we’ve been able to build, from a relatively small platform, a globally sustainable brand that would have come from Asia, but be able to compete globally.”

There doesn’t have to be a difference between a good businessperson and someone who wants to improve the world. We must act on what matters. Making a difference is what intrigues and moves us forward. There is this rising expectation that business must address our most pressing concerns. Businesses will succeed based on their innovation of purpose, not on selling more products or creating better models for how they handle their business.

Photograph of the small jetty of Banyan Tree, Vabbinfaru by Daniel Laskowski, used with permission.

Previously, we discussed some tips for clients on selecting a design firm, and important considerations before entering into a working relationship. Once you’ve taken that step, it seems like the hard part is over—the design firm is going to do the work after all. Right? Well, it’s not really that simple. The challenge of working with your chosen team to create the best possible project is the responsibility of both design firm and client. On this journey there are some recognizable roadblocks you should avoid, allowing you to get the most out of your working design partnership and the money, time and energy you’ll be investing.

Below are our key points to help you work together successfully:

Have A Destination In Mind
Expectations are the underlying (if invisible) foundation of any good design relationship, and it’s crucial to bring those to the surface right at the start. If you’re going to engage your design firm as partners, you’ll want to communicate your expectations, even if some of them are less-than-obvious. Defining the business goals might be as easy as asking a few questions: What are your goals for the project(s)? What’s the timeline? What is it that you hope this project will do? Drive sales? Build mindshare? Increase web traffic? Get as specific as you can, and in each of these, think about how you (and your firm) will best measure and analyze the results at the end. Will success be defined by internal feedback? (Does the rest of the company embrace it?) Or external reactions? Many companies enter a project with unrealistic expectations of what design can do—a beautifully designed and executed effort still won’t turn a typical product into the iPhone. Great marketing won’t save a poorly-conceived plan. Be realistic and specific, and make sure you designate a target everyone can aim for. It seems obvious to decide on a measure of success before the project begins, but many projects proceed without one, to everyone’s detriment.

There is also another set of expectations specific to you and your organization. Your chosen design firm will want to know: What similar efforts have you undertaken in the past? Which have succeeded, and what would you rather forget? What sort of history do you bring to this project? Is this the 5th time the department has attempted a similar effort? And then, there are the more personal, idiosyncratic factors to keep in mind. Does the CEO’s husband hate the color orange? Whether they’re goofy or financial, from your perspective, what crucial tidbits does your design partner need to know?

Show Them The Money
When a design firm asks “What’s your budget for this project?” it isn’t an effort to squeeze every last cent from your company. It’s a question that will frame the entire effort—what realm of solutions are possible? What set of tools will work effectively within the budgetary constraints? Different services and deliverables have various prices—a set of lookbooks might be a smaller investment than a deep, socially-networked web campaign. There are many ways to attack a design problem and meet the project goals, so it’s important to help your design firm know which tools you (and they!) can afford to use. This will save everyone from building up concepts that you can’t afford to execute, and instead, spending time on affordable solutions to your actual design challenges.

Talk When They Listen—More Info Is Better Info
Give your design team as much ammunition as possible, and as much data, information and perspective as you can. A firm that asks a lot of questions isn’t stupid or ignorant—quite the contrary. The more information you can provide at the outset of a project, the smoother the road to success will be. Customer profiles, anecdotal evidence, sales trends, previous marketing—all of this knowledge your company lives with on a daily basis can be like gold to your partner firm. So, don’t underestimate the power of what you already know. There might be hidden treasure amongst it.

Decide Who Will Be Involved
Give the final decision-making power to one or two people, rather than a conference room full of divergent (and equally weighted) opinions. Committees can (and will) kill great ideas with a thousand little changes—until the end product is as bland as yesterday’s oatmeal. So it’s important to hand pick those few who have the need, the skill, and the authority to make the final call. This is the place where you, as the client, have significant power to keep projects finishing well, allowing them to play out in powerful, unadulterated ways.

Far too many design efforts go awry when the real stakeholders are not present or involved. So, these people need to be identified and swept into the process at the outset. You’ve probably seen it before: A high-ranking executive suddenly appears out of nowhere with uninformed, 11th hour project opinions, killing months of strategic work, sending the design firm and internal team scrambling for a new direction. So make sure that your top people can (and will) make the time to be involved. The alternative tends to leave firms discouraged, money wasted, and clients disillusioned about the process.

Beware of Process Diagrams
Some design agencies employ various patented Process Diagrams to describe discrete “phases” of their working procedure. In our experience, most of these charts are mostly smoke and mirrors. They’re often beautiful flowcharts designed to make concrete, right brain-thinking clients feel better about spending their money. We understand that hiring a design firm for nebulous “creative services” might feel as tangible as tossing money into a black hole. That firm with the Standardized Process might present itself as a safer bet, with the illusion of always-consistent, measurable steps. But in trying to systematize the design process, these diagrams give the false impression that creative output is always linear and straightforward, with predictable results. But what client wants its marketing and design to emerge as predictable and safe? In our experience, clinging to a rigid, one-size-fits-all process ignores the fact that each client (and project) is unique. To shoehorn the design process (which, at its best, is a fusion of strategy, intuition, creativity, and execution) into a standardized chart is insulting to the client and disparaging the work of design.

Every great client understands that design is a non-linear, messy, and sometimes meandering process. There are no quality “design factories” that churn out identical, beautiful, functional pieces of design. Creative problem solving and execution isn’t something that can be automated by punching variables into the Bat-Computer. It’s less akin to hiring an accountant, and more like a sojourn that leads to where business goals and inspired results meet.

Every great client understands that design is a non-linear, messy, and sometimes meandering process.

Don’t Hire A Clone Army
You’re not looking for clones of yourself, so be prepared for some solutions you didn’t expect. Sometimes an in-house team can be too close to the situation, and a complementary outsider perspective is welcome. If you receive exactly what you were imagining, you’re either a creative genius (who should probably be designing yourself) or you’ve put restraints on the creative team you’ve invested time and money into. Either way, you probably didn’t get your money’s worth. Micromanaging your firm doesn’t make much financial sense. You’ve hired them for their expertise, so let it come through without suffocating the process—and all of this will eventually lead you (and your chosen design team) to the promised land of many successful projects.

We are a design firm, and we’re always looking for clients to partner with—organizations who will engage us to work together on projects that bolster and improve their brands. Sounds simple enough.

But clients have told us that hiring a design firm isn’t as simple as it might seem from our side of things. It’s not like hiring a plumber to come unclog your toilet. Enlisting the services of a design firm can be an intimidating process. So, in our first For Clients post, here are some things to consider when you’re on the lookout for someone to work with.

What Kind of Designer Do You Want?
In general, design firms are looking to help you by being part of the process. They bring a wealth of ideas, experience and strategic intuition to bear on your design challenges–and for what you will pay, it’s important that you take advantage of every iota of that expertise. There are many reasons clients head into the wilderness and search for the perfectly fitting Design Firm. To narrow it down, it might help to ask yourself, ‘What kind of help do I want?’ If you want someone to execute your already-baked ideas, you might be better served conserving some of your funds, and hiring a younger designer, design intern or freelance design member to put some polish on your Million Dollar Ideas. If you’re convinced you already know what you want, it could be a waste of your time, money and energy to go through the process of hiring a design firm.

On the other hand, if you have an overall sense of your organizational or marketing goals, but see the need for a partner to help you achieve those things, strategic design firms make a lot of sense. If you want someone to come alongside you and improve your company’s visual presence, the brand’s voice, and to think deeply with you about the company’s true message, then you could use the expertise of a design firm.

What You’re Getting When You “Buy Design”
Occasionally we’ll run into a prospective client who equates purchasing design services with ordering off a fast food menu. In our world, the client isn’t merely getting a deliverable, like a widget or a coffeemaker. You don’t just order a comprehensive brochure set or four package designs and say “Super Size It!”.

In the best-case scenario as a client, when you approve a proposal for a website, a logo, or a marketing campaign, you’re also entering into relationship: You’re getting the experience, the skillsets, and specific viewpoint of your design firm. Good design firms are less like Burger King and more like romances. A good design firm will want to sit down and get to know you (compatibility check), your goals and thoughts about the direction of your organization (dreams and aspirations), your history (past relationships) and all those other nuances, to help craft something that meets each specific, individual need.

“You don’t just order a comprehensive brochure set or four package designs and say “Super Size It!”

How To Look At A Portfolio or Past Work
Sometimes prospective clients have a hard time looking at the work of design firms, because after a while it can all start to seem alike—an endless array of logos, case studies, artfully cropped photos of printed pieces, website links—it can be overwhelming. To help cut through the clutter,simply ask yourself a few questions: What are you looking for? A specific style? Someone with experience in your industry? A fresh approach to your type of organization? The answers to these questions will give you a filter of sort with which to sort out which firms might fit you best in the pool of prospective suitors.

After you’ve decided what you want, there are some additional criterion to use in your evaluations. How do each of the design firms measure up in: Flexibility—do they have a variety of work? Is their expertise transferable to many different types of clients (a diverse set of projects) or are they only strong in one area? Craft—does the quality of their work seem professional? This may feel somewhat subjective, but do their designs strike you as finished and airtight? Is the presentation of their work detailed and thorough? Can they write and think intelligently about the work they’ve done? On a more elemental level, do you connect emotionally with the work they’ve done? Put yourself in the shoes of that target audience—does the work communicate what it should? (And this is much different than asking yourself, “Do I like the work?” The biggest question is, “Would I like it if I were the audience?”)

Is What’s Important To Them Important To You?
In the design firm’s case studies and project descriptions, do you see how they’ve solved the challenges of past clients? Is there evidence that the firm puts client business needs at the top of the list, strategically meeting (or exceeding) business goals? Or are they more focused on just making beautiful “art”, droning on about other less relevant things? Creative execution is a must, but great design firms always harness creativity in the service of something larger—and that something should be your business.

Do People Say Good Things About Them?
This is just part of due diligence. Ask for references. Can they hand those over without blinking? Are they easy to work with? Personable and friendly? Or do they bristle and push back at every chance? How quickly do they call you back? If you’re part of their roster of clients, how important do they make you feel?

Finally, Are You Committed To The Process?
At the end of the day, when you’ve finally settled on your firm, it’s easy to bring a design firm in, toss them a project brief, and say “Have at it!” It’s a totally different experience to sit down, roll up your sleeves, and begin the immersive discussion about your project, goals, likes, dislikes and overarching strategy. By really engaging in the process of design with your chosen firm, you’ll show that you’re committed to great results and thoughtful execution. It will take more work than just handing off the design work and moving on to something else—but the final results will be much more exciting, effective and rewarding when you, the client, occupy that all-important co-pilot’s chair.

In our next installment of this series, we’ll explore Working With A Design Firm.

The above image is used with permission as part of a Creative Commons license.