I have a question!

What does a designer do, the first thing, after accepting a new project?

"Accepting" meaning you have had an initial conversation with the person(s) with whom you will be working and you have all agreed upon the project's deliverables and timelines (as set out in a signed contract).

First and foremost - define the market. Who is the ideal customer, the audience to whom you are marketing, the ultimate user(s).

Create a profile of the different groups. Choose a single sample person or PERSONA and characterize that individual. What do they like? what do they not like, what kind of music do they listen to? where do they live? what kind of shops do they enjoy visiting? which restaurants do they frequent? You can continue to do a more involved analytic by asking more data-driven questions such as age and their salary range as well as more emotionally driven characteristics through inquiries including what are their ‘feelings’ towards: certain political issues, social issues, etc.

After going threw this exercise you might find yourself in a conundrum by identifying multiple groups. This is problematic because no matter what you think, you can only focus on one group at a time. The solution: define a primary group, the one you believe tips the balance between your options and separates the secondary and tertiary groups.

If you are lucky your primary audience may ‘rub off’ on your secondary and voila, you gottem’ both! For example - if you decide that your primary audience are teenagers between the ages of 14-19 years old and live in urban settings within their parental homes and your secondary audience are adults between the ages of 35 - 65 years old and are also urbanites, then it is likely that what those teenagers do and talk about will be heard and viewed by at least the adults who have teenagers under their roofs.

This question is always the first and most important one I ask when working with a client but also when teaching a class. I am constantly coming back to the question - who is your primary audience! From this clarity all else follows - where to market the new product or service, why to market it there, how it should be packaged, who should promote it, etc.