Why design is so much more important than a lick of paint

After nearly 30 years working in design, I’ve lost count of the number of times a client has come to me with what sounds like a fairly simple request: “We just need it to look a bit better.” A new brochure, a website, a presentation, a brand refresh or perhaps a campaign. Sometimes the brief is essentially, “Here’s what we’ve got. Can you give it a lick of paint?”

And I completely understand why. From the outside, design can look like a fairly straightforward process. Pick some colours, choose a nice typeface, find some decent images, move things around a bit and, hey presto, something looks better. But after three decades of doing this, I’ve learned that making something look nice and making something work are two very different things. Good design should do considerably more than make a business look polished. It should help it communicate, differentiate, connect with the right people and ultimately achieve whatever it is the business is trying to achieve.

Design isn't decoration

I’ve always thought of design as a bit like an iceberg. The bit you see, the colours, typography, imagery, layout, animation or website is only the visible part. Underneath should be a whole load of thinking about who you’re trying to reach, what you’re trying to say, what you want people to think, feel or do, what makes you different and, perhaps most importantly, why anyone should care.

Without that thinking, design can very easily become decoration. It might look polished, professional and perfectly pleasant, but still fail to make much of an impression. I’ve worked on plenty of projects over the years where the temptation was to jump straight into the visuals, but the most successful work usually starts somewhere else entirely, with a conversation, a bit of digging and a willingness to ask questions that perhaps weren’t even included in the original brief.

Because sometimes the brief isn't actually the problem. Sometimes the problem is that nobody has properly understood the problem in the first place.

The danger of the 'paint job'

A client asking for a paint job isn't doing anything wrong. In fact, it makes perfect sense. You know something isn't quite working, you know it needs to look better, you’ve probably noticed that your competitors seem to have sharper-looking brands and you don't have the time, inclination or expertise to work out exactly what's wrong. So you ask a designer to fix it.

Over the years, though, I’ve found that a few fairly simple questions can often turn a straightforward design job into something much more valuable. What's changed since this was created? Who are you trying to attract now? What do your customers actually think about you? What are your competitors doing? What do you want to be known for? What makes you different? And where are you trying to get to as a business?

Those questions might sound obvious, but they can completely change the direction of a project. The answer isn't always a new colour palette or a prettier website. Sometimes the brand positioning is wrong. Sometimes the messaging is unclear. Sometimes the business has evolved considerably but its identity hasn't kept pace. Sometimes everything looks different across different touchpoints because nobody has taken ownership of the bigger picture. And sometimes, of course, the design really does just need improving. The trick is knowing which one you're dealing with before you start moving things around on a page.

Canva isn't the enemy

I’m not going to bash Canva. Tools like Canva have made design much more accessible, and that’s a good thing. If you need to create a quick social post, internal presentation, event notice or other piece of everyday communication, being able to do it yourself can be incredibly useful. AI is doing something similar, only on an even bigger scale, making it possible for people to create images, layouts, copy and ideas that would previously have required specialist skills.

The problem isn't the tools themselves. The problem is the assumption that having access to a tool automatically gives you the expertise to use it strategically. Having Canva doesn't make someone a brand strategist, just as having Photoshop doesn't make someone a designer. And being able to generate a convincing image or layout with AI doesn't necessarily mean you've solved the communication problem.

The temptation, particularly for smaller businesses, is obvious. Why spend money getting a designer involved when you can create something yourself in ten minutes? Sometimes that’s absolutely the right decision. But the danger is that these tools make it very easy to produce something, and something can be deceptively convincing. You can create a beautifully designed LinkedIn post in ten minutes, but if it doesn't sound like your brand, doesn't communicate anything meaningful and looks completely different from everything else you put out, what have you actually achieved?

The question isn't whether a business can make its own design. It’s whether it should make all of its design decisions in isolation.

Consistency is doing a lot of heavy lifting

One piece of communication rarely builds a reputation. It’s the accumulation of hundreds of small interactions over time that gradually shapes how people perceive a business. Your website, proposals, presentations, social media, signage, brochures, emails, packaging and campaigns all contribute to that perception, whether you realise it or not. Every time someone encounters your business, they’re forming an impression.

Good design helps make those impressions consistent, recognisable and memorable. That’s why a strong brand is much more than a nice logo and a colour palette. It’s a visual and verbal system that gives a business a distinctive character and makes everything it communicates feel like it belongs to the same organisation.

And consistency doesn't mean making everything identical. In fact, that can be just as dull. It means creating a recognisable thread that runs through everything you do, while still allowing the design to flex and respond to different audiences, messages and situations. Think about the brands you know and trust. You probably recognise many of them before you’ve even read their name. That recognition isn't an accident; it’s the result of years of consistent, considered decisions.

You simply don't build that kind of reputation with a collection of nice-looking templates.

Insight makes the difference

For me, the most important part of the design process has always been understanding. I've spent nearly three decades learning that the best creative ideas rarely appear out of thin air. They come from getting under the skin of a business, understanding its audience and finding the interesting bit that other people might have missed.

That might be an uncomfortable truth, a contradiction, an overlooked opportunity, something that makes the business genuinely different or simply a better way of explaining something complicated. The insight becomes the foundation for the creative work, giving the design a reason to exist rather than simply providing a visual treatment for information that already exists.

When you have that foundation, design becomes much more powerful. You’re no longer asking “How can we make this look better?” You’re asking how you can make someone stop scrolling, make a complicated proposition instantly understandable, make a business look credible without making it look corporate, make a brand feel distinctive in a sea of sameness, give an organisation some personality or make people remember it. That’s where creativity starts earning its keep.

EXAMPLE OF AN NHS CAMPAIGN I CREATED (Future)

Design is an investment, not an expense

I think this is particularly important for smaller businesses, where budgets are understandably tight and design can sometimes feel like something that can be dealt with later. A new website is an expense. A brand identity is an expense. A campaign is an expense. But poor communication can be expensive too.

If your website isn't convincing, you can lose enquiries. If your proposition isn't clear, people won't understand what you do. If your brand looks amateurish, people may assume your business is too. If every communication looks different, you make it harder for people to remember you. And if your marketing looks exactly like everyone else's, you’re making it very difficult for anyone to choose you.

Good design doesn't magically fix a bad business, of course. But good design can help a good business communicate its value, differentiate itself and compete much more effectively. It can take something complicated and make it simple, take something ordinary and make it distinctive, and take something that feels difficult to explain and give it a clear and compelling story.

That’s why I don’t see my role as simply making things look good. My job is to understand what needs to be achieved and then use creativity, design and experience to help make that happen.

So, should you give it a lick of paint?

Sometimes you should. But before reaching for the paintbrush, I’d suggest taking a step back and asking yourself what actually isn't working. Look at what your customers see, look at what your competitors are doing, think about what you want to be known for and ask whether your current brand and communications are genuinely helping you get there.

If the answer is yes, perhaps all you need is a fresh coat of paint. But if the answer is “I'm not really sure”, that’s probably a sign that there’s a bigger opportunity hiding underneath.

After nearly 30 years in the industry, I’ve learned that the best design projects aren't the ones where I simply make something look better. They’re the ones where I understand why it needs to exist in the first place, what it needs to achieve and who it needs to work for.

That’s where design stops being decoration and starts making a difference.

And that’s what I mean by creativity with character.