so you walk into the client call and...
Tuesday, February 2, 2010 at 9:42PM 
Admit it, you spoiled creative ass. You hate feedback. You dread it. You loathe it. You know that even the least talented hack in the saggiest creative department in the city thinks that feedback is beneath him, and you don't think he's wrong.
Maybe that's why most of you overreact to it. Even for relatively minor changes, creatives whip themselves into incensed states during the meeting. They vibrate with outrage. They become unable to speak coherently. They find their disgust smothered by account people before it squirts out like an exploding zit. They get back to their desks and throw paper in disgust, or staplers in anger. And when major revisions are required – well, if you remember the Old Testament story about the chained Samson bringing down the temple on his tormetors, you have some sense of the vibe.
All of which is stupid because it makes your work worse.
The impulse you feel (trust me, I've lived all of this) is spite. You'll give them exactly what they say they want. You'll take your brilliant concept and amazing writing down to the level they demand, and they deserve all the crap you're about to do for them... Except you really shouldn't. It's not good for your work, or your client, or your agency, or you.
I had... well, let's call him an opinionated client a couple of years ago. He started his job halfway through a major project we were doing, and he was rumoured to be a bear. Just before one of the first calls we had with him, which was to approve music tracks for the job, his underlings warned us that he considered himself to be something of a music expert. He knew everything about it. Gulp. And as he remained silent through all our reco'd tracks, our panic grew. Somehow, in spite of all our lurking despair, the subject of the '80s band Juluka came up. (I honestly couldn't tell you if it was mentioned by him or me.) It was slightly obscure, as no one else in the room was old enough to remember them, and it allowed us to start talking. We arrived at some common ground and we were able to rationally discuss what he wanted. Without (too much) rage.
As the weeks and projects went along, I found that talking directly to this key client was the only way to: a) get him to understand what I was after, and save much more of the spirit of our concepts; b) discuss things with the real decision maker, not minions; and c) feel much less rage. Email was useless, and calls with only the minions didn't help either.
You've got to engage, creatives. You can't be sulky or defensive. You can't fight. And you can't expect to keep absolutely everything intact. But you can simply talk about things and maybe keep the spirit of what you created alive. You'll have a better relationship with your clients. You might even stop thinking of them as being beneath you.
clients, communication, creative
Reader Comments (2)
While nothing reeks of rank amateurishness like a petulant creative who isn't getting his or her way, you do make it sound – perhaps inadvertently – as though at the heart of every brand manager is a thoughtful, informed, reasonable person who understands how intangibles like taste and aesthetics can reflect well on their brand in unquantifiable ways. I know from empirical evidence that this is not always the case.
You're right, it's not always the case. But we have to act as though it is. And I think the only possible way of changing that non-thoughtful, non-informed, non-reasonable client is to engage them. Again, it doesn't always work – hell, I wouldn't even claim that it usually works – but when the alternative is a heavy-duty course of medication for the ulcers you'll develop, or finding a new job, engagement strikes me as the first and best course of action.