Effective Creative Feedback| Spencer Brenneman

Great! You’ve partnered with a brand agency whether that’s us or any of the many other talented firms out there. But are you ready to give effective creative feedback?

Before we talk about why that’s important, let’s remember why you engaged them. It’s not just to create a new logo. And it’s not just to write some pithy web copy. The one job your branding agency has is helping you show up in the world in the most authentic, differentiated, and compelling ways possible.

That’s it.

From getting someone’s attention to making them stay forever in love with your organization, your brand agency or consultant is there to craft messaging that resonates with those most important to your success.

We can’t do it alone, however. After all, we’re not you! But how do you ensure that the creative work provided actually accomplishes this critical task? The feedback process is where the rubber meets the road, and managing it poorly can derail even the most promising creative partnership.

Who Should Be in the Room Where It Happens

Cue Lin-Manuel Miranda! Letting the wrong stakeholders review creative work can take your brand off course faster than a dog spotting food dropped on the floor. Here’s how to identify who should be involved:

The core team. These are the must-haves—people who need to be involved in every major review:

The ultimate decision-maker. Who this is differs by the size, type, and culture of your organization but most often it’s a CMO, Marketing Director, CEO, or Executive Director.
Project lead. The day-to-day project lead who manages the agency relationship. Having a (singular) project lead is critical but more on that later.
Subject matter experts. Technical accuracy is always critical so it’s important to have those experts at hand. However, set the expectation that they’re welcome to comment on anything, but their input on accuracy will carry the most weight.

The informed observers. These are the nice-to-haves in most situations and include people who should be kept informed but not necessarily involved in feedback:

Strategic advisors. If someone is working on your organization’s acquisition strategy or service expansions, for example, they might just have some relevant insight to share.
Legal counsel. Often compliance issues dictate some legal oversight. Better safe than sorry!
Influencers. They’re not just relegated to Tik Tok. Influencers exist everywhere. That’s why it’s important to bring them into the process as a courtesy, an FYI. Doing so helps ensure the rollout’s success.

One caveat for anyone you ask to review creative: Make certain they understand the long-term strategy, the brief, and the context. Getting someone’s reaction in a vacuum is dangerous. This caution is particularly true if the reviewer is outside your organization.

According to the Harvard Business Review, “When people who shouldn’t be involved in decisions are, they create costs for the organization by slowing down decision-making, imposing coordination burdens, and distracting people from activities to which they could add more value.” Your feedback process is no exception.

What Requires Your Input (And What Doesn’t)

Not all feedback is created equal. Understanding where your expertise is crucial and where you should defer to your agency’s judgment is vital to a successful partnership.

Where your input is critical:

Technical accuracy about your products, services, or industry. It’s also critical to share how your customers or constituents work with you.
Legal and regulatory compliance specific to your field. Every industry has its quirks after all.
Internal politics and stakeholder sensitivities. I think you know exactly what I mean here. If not, you’ve probably led a charmed professional life!

Where you should trust your agency:

Visual design principles and execution. Most of us have trained and spent years honing our skills.
Writing style and tone (assuming you’ve approved the general approach). This can be tricky, which is why agreeing on your messaging framework and its brand personality attributes in advance is critical.
Industry best practices for user experience. One of the great assets we bring to the table is purview into similar, but different use cases.

Think of it this way: you hired your agency because they’re experts in their craft. As I wrote in Do They Care?, “If you’re hiring experts, let them be the experts. No one wants a client who hires them for their expertise and then ignores it.” (Apologies for the shameless plug.)

Establishing Final Authority

Perhaps nothing derails creative projects faster than unclear decision-making authority. The “decision by committee” approach often produces watered-down work that pleases everyone slightly but excites no one, let alone actually works.

Why a single decision-maker matters:

Creates accountability for outcomes, which runs both ways, of course!
Prevents deadlocks and endless revisions, which slows approval processes to a crawl.
Maintains consistency across project elements. After all, as I’ve said at least 500 times, inconsistency is enemy #1 of a strong brand.

Selecting the right final approver:

Choose someone with both strategic vision and practical authority. Having to redo something because it gets a veto from on high is expensive.
Ensure they understand both business objectives and creative principles. That means you’ll probably have to find something else for that nepo intern to do.
Verify they have enough bandwidth to be consistently available. That kind of scarcity costs money and time too.

Streamlining the Feedback Process

Now that you know who should be involved and what they should focus on, let’s address how to make the entire process more efficient.

Set clear expectations upfront:

Establish a feedback timeline and concrete deadlines with your agency. Hold them accountable and let them hold you accountable too.
Define what “good” looks like to you through examples.
Day one, provide a list of things you need or really want, from industry-specific or regulatory language to must-have creative deliverables.
On the flip side, provide a list of “no-gos” from the start, such as terms that might have negative connotations or creative approaches that have been tried in the past.

Consolidate contradictory internal feedback:

Gather all input before sending to the agency and resolve internal disagreements before sharing feedback.
Not all changes are critical. (Sorry to break that to you.) Prioritize changes based on strategic importance.
Avoid “feedback on feedback” loops, which are akin to having a meeting to schedule a meeting.

Make feedback actionable:

Be specific about what isn’t working (“This feels too corporate because…”). If creatives push back on feedback, it’s probably not because they have a thin skin and can’t take criticism. It’s more likely because they don’t understand it.
Suggest alternatives rather than just identifying problems. Granted, you might think that’s why you’re paying the agency, which isn’t wrong.
However, here’s where that partnership term comes into play. Help them, help you and then trust the process.
Focus on objectives rather than subjective preferences. For example, saying that you want to come across as bright and optimistic is better than saying you want them to use yellow.

The Bigger Picture

When you think strategically about the approval process, you’re not just being efficient; you’re ensuring that the creative work maintains its integrity and purpose. You’re making certain that your brand strategy successfully does the one job it has.

Does this approach to creative feedback sound like what you need? Let’s talk!