Bad Design Sells
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- harlequino0
It really depends on your products/services, and it's related market. I spent a good chunk of time in direct response marketing. They have mounds of research showing that the worse and more gawdy something is, the better it often does. I frequently got hte following feedback: "Too nice. Call to action must be big. And red. In a burst."
Naturally, that's just one exmaple but you see the point.
I know we don't have a direct line t your situation, but you have to accept that when it comes to marketers (**NOTE: Marketers are their own breed and animal), here is the thing-
they don't give a flying fuck about your design aesthetic. Not one bit.You can fight that fight as much as you want, but there is no winning. Hopefully it will play out that you vut your teeth there, suffer, do some stuff, and quickly move on to a place where you actually can exercies your real vision and contribute in a meaningful way.
Just remember - all the horrible packaging, ads, etc you see around the world. SOMEONE has to do those. It's where they come from. Good luck!!
- direct marketing is considered successful if you get less than a 5% response rate. i don't get how is that is good use of marketing money.mcLeod
- ...marketing moneymcLeod
- There is oceans of $$ in it, make no mistake.harlequino
- mantra0
i guess its just frustrating... from being able to create design that clients enjoy while freelancing and in a University setting that isnt mediocre , to landing a job at an agency that does mediocre design... which ultimately frustrates the shit out of me.
i know this happens alot, it just fucking sucks.
you cant always get what you want.
- Nairn0
ha ha ha
- stem0
We are confusing aesthetics with successful design. The design can only be considered a success if it meets it's objective (in this case selling ice cream). It doesn't matter if you think it's aesthetically pleasing. Do the graphics communicate the values of the brand to the perceived target audience?
As far back as I can remember in my design education (college/uni) was;
Who, What, Where, When, and Why
The magic 5 w's
Ask yourself these, then you might have a better idea of what shape the graphics should take, rather than just doing 'what you think is cool and current'
- SigDesign0
People who don't know anything about design often try to explain things in their own terms, and often this doesn't translate well to the designer.
It's just like the "make the logo bigger" comment, or "it's too dark." That may be true to a certain extent, but the real issue is that the design you created isn't meeting their objectives. If you can create something that's designed well, within his framework, you'll succeed.
But, I do believe that good design will always sell better than bad design. There are always other factors and rules involved with each product and market, but it's up to the designer to come up with a solution under the restrictions to break the trend and take the product to a new level.
- mantra0
it funny that you recommend to "quickly move on to a place where you actually can exercies your real vision and contribute in a meaningful way."
i just sent work samples to a smaller studio in my area that does great stuff.
hopefully thats like an omen or whatever.
- Point50
this is right along the lines of my boss's attitude as well...
“I don't care, just get it done!” *storms out of room
you know what? I don't care either. I'll save my creative time for freelance work.
- stem0
Both are effectively about gambling...
One is aimed at sports fans, the other professional traders. Can you guess which is which?
http://tbn0.google.com/images?q=…
- stem0
- mantra0
i should have been a garbage man or janitor.
- I've said the same thing many times. The "real" design world kinda sucksGlitterati_Duane
- Probably a good time to go into real estate! But, you'd need capital for that...SigDesign
- Why don't you ever hear designers say I should have been a lawyer or doctor? It's always some shitty jobvoiceof
- ********0
This sounds like a case of 2 problems:
1) The boss isn't clearly stating your parameters.
2) Your idea of "good" design is relative, and isn't matching up with "proper" design.
- DaveO0
Design is a response to a brief. Right response to the right brief.
If they want big pictures, do big pictures but make it look good. If you can't find a way to do this you failed at your job. Simple.
Don't slash your wrists about design either - it's probably not design you're upset about, just someone's negative response to your work. Easy mistake to make.
- olli1010
It's an interesting question - just look at the products featured on lovelypackage.com - most are niche or non-mass market.
What are some of the biggest sites on the Internet?
Ebay, Craigslist, MySpace, Facebook, Amazon, MSN, etc... - none of those (possibly excepting for IA) are going to win any design awards.It's up to us to change that paradigm.
- stem0
Agree cannonball, sounds like the boss isn't making himself very clear, or he's not explaining his point in enough detail. Telling a member of staff to "just make money for the client" is bang out of order. Ask him to expand on it a little, ask him about the ice cream companies clients, who are they, where will this stuff be on sale, how would it be eaten?
Also, I think you may have done the classic designer thing of take a bit of criticism to heart and are now thinking of quitting!
Talk to your boss and the client (if possible) to get to the bottom of what the aim of project is... and don't accept "It's to make more money for the client"
- Bluejam0
"Often the best design, the most important design, takes place outside the profession,where this is still a true vernacular. A non-corporate, non-designed vernacular. Vernacular is slang, a language invented rather than taught. Vernacular design is visual slang. More than that, it’s design that’s so familiar that we don’t really see it. Seeing the vernacular is seeing the invisible. It is looking at something commonplace— a yellow pencil, a metal folding chair— and falling in love. Vernacular design is so clear and simple that it seems to be from another time. Often it is. Vernacular design happens when a small business hires the local sign painter, print shop, or commercial artist to take care of its design needs. Vernacular design happens when a business takes care of its own design needs. Appreciation of this sort of design shouldn’t be confused with nostalgia, because the vernacular isn’t a bygone era or a style that can be celebrated or revived. Rather it’s a process, a straightforward one, that creates work which has an unfiltered, emotional quality. These designs are some person’s, some regular human being’s, idea of how to communicate— how to say,
“This is a company that sells shipping supples.”
“This is a store that sells sausages.”It is the unscientific but clear way to say,
“This is a beauty salon,” or
“This is a bottle of soda.”The vernacular is designed as if design were a regular thing to do, and not the sacred mission of an elite professional class. It’s design that hasn’t been ordered and purified by the methods of trained practitioners. It’s communication without the strategy, marketing, or the proprietary quantitative research. And that’s what’s good about it."
Tibor Kalman
January 1990(sometimes it's good to be bad)
- BaskerviIle0
Bad design doesn't sell. Products that people want to buy sell, in spite of their bad design. Don't confuse the two. The design is not the product. I buy albums for the music not the cover, I buy food for the taste and nutritional content not the packaging.
Good design can only sway you to choose one thing over another, it is not the product.Even Apple computers, though people do buy them for their aesthetic, are above all functional objects. They work well and are useful that's why people buy them. Their aesthetic only sways consumers to buy them over comparable products.
The argument that bad design sells is a bit like the argument that says "hendrix took lots of drugs. He was an amazing guitarist. Therefore taking drugs will make me an amazing guitarist"
Hendrix was a great musician in spite of his drug use not because of it.hmm, hope that makes sense.
- stem0
You have to realise that as designers, the majority of our clients are not design educated and quite often this can lead to us missing the point.
Most of our end users are normal everyday people who couldn't give a stuff about the latest ps filter or how their text is kerned.
I'm always fascinated by designers who want to do the nice stuff 'cos they think it's cool. You have the ability to communicate to the masses, what's so wrong in that?
Designers with egos... Hate 'em
- mantra0
for the record, this conversation didn't take place of a design crit.
he likes to hear himself talk.
this is what came out.
- jimzyk0
tell him to get his head out of his ass...
every cunt in the world qoutes rand to make themselves fell important — here i go.
"The public is more familiar with bad design than good design. It is, in effect, conditioned to prefer bad design, because that is what it lives with. The new becomes threatening, the old reassuring."
there is that thing about stuff ......
- oh very true about people being used to bad designSigDesign
- mcLeod0
"Considering graphic design’s ubiquity in modern life, I’m not sure that many people (non-designers that is) understand much about it. It’s something that people encounter every day — perhaps every minute of their waking lives — yet they hardly bother to consider the impact, either for good or bad, that it has on their lives. It’s a subject that means a great deal to the people who do it for a living, but rarely means much to the people it’s aimed at.
Graphic design has been likened to a wine glass. When we drink wine we barely notice the glass it’s served in. It wouldn’t be true to say that we don’t care what glass we drink out of — we wouldn’t choose to drink a rare vintage out of a Tupperware mug, for example — but it’s the wine that matters, not the vessel it comes in.
It’s the same with graphic design: people absorb the messages that graphic designers use their skill, training and ingenuity to make, yet rarely stop to think how the message is constructed or how it affects the viewer. This seems odd considering graphic design’s ubiquity in the modern world."
A Layperson's Guide to Graphic Design
http://www.designobserver.com/ar…