A Guide On Effective Design For Non-Design People
There’s a common misconception that a designer’s job is easy to do. You might have come across several articles or memes about the daily struggles of designers and honestly, it’s a funny thing for us.
Design. The world sure knows it exists, but the majority don’t know the design’s nature and technicalities, of course. Too often, our team of experts here at Grafik has encountered several clients who have questioned why the design appears what they seem. But to be honest, we can’t blame people when they question a specific design. It’s costly to undergo design education and not many people have the luxury of time, money, or even talent to study design.
But today, where increasing numbers of businesses are surging to meet consumer needs, design is becoming more in-demand among small business owners too. Even large companies are investing in design to improve a user’s online and offline experience with their brand. Every business is focusing on creating design strategy, which by definition, is the process of the interplay between design and business strategy and as for designers, is a framework that will serve as a basis for the project.
Why teach design to people who have little knowledge of design?
Because design plays an important role in creating an impact on people’s lives. Today, having knowledge of design gives you a competitive edge for your business and it’s a great way to learn something new too!
Grafik shares a comprehensive guide to effective graphic design for non-design people.
The Dictionary of Design
Design is the most prominent component of our everyday living. What comes to mind for people who don’t do design is that design is a universal term where you need to produce visuals, regardless of medium.
But, there are appropriate terms for what type of design you’re going for. Design, which encompasses across various disciplines, includes but not limits itself to the following areas:
Print Design
Print design is perhaps one of the oldest forms of visual communication, dating back for as long as 500 years ago. Print is a visual communication method to convey information to its audience with a specific aesthetic printed on a surface, usually on paper.
Two examples of print design are traditional marketing collateral design (tickets, brochures, invitations, etc.) and publishing design (magazine, book covers).
Information Design
Are you familiar with display information for a painting at a museum exhibition or the street name signage you come across the road? That is called information design.
Information design is a form of visual communication that presents a piece of information in order for a viewer to have a full understanding of what they’re seeing. In better terms, it’s also known as explanation design.
Multimedia Design
The most common form of visual communication is multimedia design, which includes different forms of media, usually a combination of audio, animation, and text is used to convey a creative delivery of information depending on the target audience.
Multimedia design requires not just creative skills but also the ability to transform data into creative visualisation. It’s the most prominently used form of visual communication in the marketing, advertising, and animation industry.
Under multimedia design are the following disciplines: graphic design, animation, digital illustration, packaging design, logo design, and visual branding, advertising posters (billboards, posters), and screen-based design (television, film).
Experiential/Interactive Design
Experiential or interactive design, also known as user experience design, is a form of futuristic visual communication that seeks to improve the satisfaction of a user by improving the design’s usability and accessibility once they interact with the product. The key to creating a good interactive design is simplicity and its ability to figure out what the customer wants.
The most prominent examples of experiential/interactive design are UI and UX design for websites and mobile apps, augmented reality (AR), and virtual reality (VR).
How To Create Effective Design For Non-Design People
Don Norman, an experiential engineering and famous design author, would quote, “A lot of people in our industry haven’t had very diverse experiences. So they don’t have enough dots to connect, and they end up with very linear solutions without a broad perspective on the problem. The broader one’s understanding of the human experience, the better design we will have.”
Every business has to understand that you can’t just sell your product or service by only highlighting its features. The design speaks louder than it seems, and great companies have attested to that with the success of their campaigns.
Rather than focusing on how the design will work, they design because they want to solve the problem. Their ultimate secret to effective design? Constant real-life human interaction. Why? Because they’re the ones you’ll be talking to, they’re the ones who will use and decide whether your product or service is worthy of attention or not.
With that mentioned, here are 15 short, proven ways to start cultivating creativity in yourself and creating an effective design that matters to consumers even if you’re not a design person by nature:
- Only limit the font you use in two typefaces.
- Master the art of space in design.
- Use colors wisely, look up for color psychology for marketing.
- Make the design look clean and simple.
- Your fonts will evoke what your message’s tone is. Choose your fonts carefully.
- Utilise white space.
- Think original when creating the website: it’s a make-or-break thing.
- Research thrice as much before designing.
- Create a visual mood board to have a better grasp of the design you want to achieve.
- Always be updated about the latest trends and events.
- Do not think inside or outside of the box. Think like no box exists and create on a blank space instead.
- Contrast is important in design. Use it well.
- Keep a notebook with you in case of sudden ideas or insights.
- Observe everything around you. Create a good conversation with different kinds of people.
- Always make room for trial and error.