A client's blunt feedback made me ditch my whole design process

I had this client last spring who told me my mockups looked like they were stuck in 2019. She said it straight to my face during a video call. At first I was pissed because I spent like 40 hours on that first round of concepts. But then I looked at my work again and she was right. I was still using the same template layouts and color combos I learned back in design school. So I forced myself to learn Figma properly and started studying current trends on Dribbble. It took me about 3 weeks to retrain my eye and now my work actually feels fresh. Has anyone else had a client call them out on something that ended up helping?

2 comments

2 Comments

pat_harris4h ago

You know what's wild, that "stuck in 2019" comment actually made me realize I was designing for other designers instead of solving real problems for clients. I started asking my clients to show me three websites they actually liked (not ones they thought they should like) and it totally shifted how I approached every project after that.

miaprice3h ago

Did you ever get a client who was super into a website that was like, totally broken?