How to review design work if you're not a creative

Reviewing creative work can be a challenge, especially if you aren't a designer. The desire for perfection can lead to endless rounds of minor 'tweaks' that waste time, inflate costs, and fail to improve the final result.

Worse still, this kind of unfocused feedback can dilute the effectiveness of a great design, turning a brilliant concept into something bland and ineffective.

This guide outlines our approach to collaborating on design work, ensuring the process is efficient, effective, and results in creative you can be proud of.

It all starts with the brief

The single most important factor in a successful design project is a high-quality brief. Your goal should be to give your designer a clear picture of what you need to achieve.

Before any creative work begins, make sure your designer understands:

• The core objective: What is the primary goal of this design? Is it to drive sales, generate leads, increase engagement, or build brand awareness?

• The key message: What is the single most important thing you want to communicate?

• The call to action (CTA): What do you want the audience to do after seeing this design?

• The context: Where will this design be used? Is it for a paid social media campaign, an email newsletter, a website banner, or a printed brochure? The format and environment will heavily influence the creative direction.

If you have brand guidelines, share them. They are an essential tool for ensuring consistency. If not, your designer will need a clear understanding of your brand, from your logo, colour palette, and fonts to the specific audience you are trying to reach.

Reviewing the first draft

When you receive the first draft, it’s easy to get excited and start sending feedback immediately. Before you do, take a moment to pause and consider the design against the original brief.

• Does it achieve the objectives you set out?

• Is the key message clear and compelling?

• Is the call to action prominent and easy to understand?

• Does it feel 'on-brand' and appropriate for your target audience?

It can be tempting to ask for multiple opinions from colleagues, but this often leads to 'design by committee'—a process that rarely produces great work. Aim to have no more than one other key stakeholder review the design, and ensure they are fully aware of the project's original goals.

Providing clear, consolidated feedback

When planning design work, we typically include two rounds of amends in our proposals. The first round is for any significant changes to the concept or layout. The second is for final, minor adjustments. While more changes are sometimes necessary, sticking to this structure helps keep the project on track.

If you find yourself in a cycle of endless amends—we’ve heard of clients enduring over 20 rounds—it’s a clear sign that the process has gone wrong. It’s time to pause and have a frank conversation with your agency to get things back on track.

When giving feedback, gather all your comments and provide them in one go. Drip-feeding feedback is inefficient and can lead to rework if a later comment contradicts an earlier one.

Using the right tools for feedback

Providing feedback via email or a Word document can be problematic. It’s often difficult to explain precisely which part of the design you are referring to, and written comments can easily be misinterpreted.

At Brew Digital, we use tools like InVision to manage the feedback process. This allows you to click on a specific point in the design and leave a comment, ensuring your feedback is clear, contextual, and easy for the designer to action. It creates a clear record of every requested change and its resolution.

The importance of an honest partnership

You might feel hesitant to tell a designer you don't like something they've created. This is a natural concern—giving critical feedback can be uncomfortable.

However, a professional designer understands that the goal is to create work that is right for the client and their audience. Honest, constructive feedback is a vital part of the creative process. You are paying for their expertise, but also for a final product that meets your objectives.

When done right, the design process is a hugely rewarding partnership. By providing a clear brief and structured feedback, you can help turn good ideas into truly great work.