Conditions for Good Design
What are the conditions for good design?
The correct way
to order something from a designer
Do you mistakenly believe that beautiful designs with good sense are "good designs?"
What exactly is good design? By knowing what to base your judgment on, you can more accurately bring out the effectiveness of a design.
What are "good designs" and "bad designs?"
All designs are made for a certain purpose.
No matter how tasteful or beautiful a design is, if it doesn’t make your target audience take action, then it is not a good design.
A good design is not something you can only talk about with your senses and preferences. A good design moves the target audience’s emotions and leads to the awareness and action that you planned for.
What do you need to do to order a good design?
When ordering a design, it is important to clearly define and share with the designer the objectives and goals of the design, and to provide concrete instructions.
1
Clearly define and share your objectives and goals
Before ordering a design, clients should think of who the design is aimed at, what they want to convey, and what action they want users to take. Clients should also put their design objectives and goals concretely into words, and share them with the designer.
2
Avoid abstract expressions
When ordering from a designer, you should be careful to avoid abstract expressions like “cool” and “interesting.” You should share designs you want the designer to reference, and materials that have the image you want to give to your target audience, as well as give clear instructions.
Conditions for Good Design
What specific conditions should you meet when creating designs that move people’s hearts and make them take action?
If you’re not sure how to judge a design, use the following criteria as a reference.
1
It is a guideline that is in accordance with the viewer's feelings
Sale advertisements that do not clearly convey what products are on sale, or how big a discount is being offered, cannot expect to draw in many customers. To make your target audience take the desired action (=goal), you should create guideline designs that do not cause stress and that let users get the necessary information in the order they want.
2
Suitable color schemes and fonts are chosen
Seeing if the chosen color schemes and fonts suit the target audience, objective and medium is one judgement criterion for good design.
Generally, product advertisements aimed at seniors should have color schemes with high legibility and calm fonts.
3
It considers the characteristics of the times
In the modern day, our values regarding gender and lifestyles are greatly changing. So target audience approaches that are aimed at women, mothers, and seniors are nothing like they were 10 to 20 years ago. If you do not sense the changes in the times, and do not accurately understand the needs your audience has now, you cannot create designs that move the emotions of your target audience.
7 Books that Help You Improve the Way You Think About Design and your Language Expression Ability
To order good designs, you need both logical thinking ability and language ability for being able to plan out design objectives, goals, and methods.
Here, we introduce some recommended books for non-designers to improve their basic thinking and language abilities for design.
1
77 simple rules that can improve your designs Design skill basics (2019)
This books simply explains the designer’s thinking process, as well as examples of designs that have been improved using BEFORE and AFTER illustrations.
2
I understand now! 22 rules for making designs that move people (2020)
Using many illustrations, this book unravels ideas for communication design examples that are easy for non-designers to understand.
3
What should you do? Better understand how to communicate with design clients! How to design on and convey designs (2021)
A design book that gives an overview of the design production process from the interactions between designers and clients.
4
Basic Design Notebook
Learn all the sense and techniques you need to use design at work (2018)
This book teaches readers how designers think as well as work skills. The content teaches about the design process, presentation methods, and the attitude of a designer.
5
Learn design that communicates well 8 skills that can be used for the rest of your life (2020)
This book lets you refine your ability to communicate with designs through 8 steps. It expertly puts into words the design thought process and logic.
6
Design and layout examples learned through quizzes (2015)
By putting design into words through a quiz format, this book lets you refine your ability to make designs logically.
7
-Lessons in learning, thinking, and creating- (2015)
-Lessons in learning, thinking, and creating- (2015)
You can learn both design basics that are useful for material and planning document creation, as well as design thought.
