10 Pre-Design Questions

Posted by Miles Evans

When I am fleshing out a project, idea, design, marketing concept or even a logo I keep coming back to the same terrible memory.

I find myself thinking back to when I was 5 years old in kindergarten working on a typical coloring handout. I remember being completely obsessed with coloring inside the lines. I would look in disgust at other kids with their silly Picasso’esque nonsense and remark that I was a true coloring master and always stayed within the lines.

The problem now is that as an adult I often continue to do things in the same way.

If you are scared to explore the edges you will never come up with anything that gets attention. This much is guaranteed. Every invention, revolution, innovation, or solution was born by its very nature at the fringe. This is why it was noticed in the first place. Right?

When you set out to design something answer these questions:

1. In what ways has this been done?
2. What is my competition not capitalizing on?
3. How could we do it completely different?
4. How can I guarantee to make something unique?
5. What is the most bizarre idea I can come up with related to my project?
6. If I was watching a video about my idea what might it look like?
7. What might people expect to get out of my service or idea?
8. What types of objects, themes or ideas does my project conjure up?
9. What is the most important feature of my product? The one people might talk about.
10. If I could do anything at all with my project, without even thinking about the engineering problems, what would I try?

It will be exponentially more expensive to add killer features and should haves down the road. In fact the overwhelming majority of projects that stall out did so because one of these questions was not answered. So remember - only if you are not afraid to color outside the lines can you design something truly worth talking about.

Posted Oct 08, 2006 at 01:30 AM | Permalink | Trackback URL | Del.icio.us | DIGG!