What to Prepare Before Hiring a Brand Designer
You wouldn’t go to a tailor without knowing your sizes. You wouldn’t meet a contractor without a basic plan for your kitchen renovation. And you definitely shouldn’t sit down with a brand designer about your logo without doing some thinking first.
If you want a logo that feels intentional, strategic, and unmistakably you, it’s not about creative inspiration alone, it’s about clear direction. Good designers don’t just make things pretty. They solve visual problems. And to solve your problem, they need context. You don’t need to have everything figured out. But it helps to think through a few key things before the first conversation, so the process starts with clarity instead of guesswork.
Here’s what to prepare before your first conversation.
Start with the basics: what are we building?
Before you talk about style, a designer will want to understand what your business actually does. Not in corporate language, not in buzzwords, but in one or two clear sentences. If you can explain your work simply, your designer can translate it visually. If the business feels fuzzy even in words, the logo will struggle to feel focused too. Branding always starts with meaning before it becomes aesthetics. Begin with thinking about questions like:
What does your business do?
Who is it for?
Why does it exist (what problem will it solve)?
How do you want to be perceived?
This is one of the most important questions in logo design, and it’s often the one clients skip.
Before you think about colors or symbols, think about impression. Do you want your business to feel clean and minimal, like Apple? Or playful and friendly, like poppi? Should it come across as premium, witty, outdoorsy, bold, understated, modern, traditional?
A helpful way to approach this is to think about brands you already love. Not because you want to copy them, but because you’re responding to something. That same idea can translate into your own business. It’s less “Should I look like Nike?” and more “Do I want to give off that kind of confident, sporty energy — or something completely different?” If you can’t picture a brand that inspires you, no problem. Most people can’t immediately pull references out of thin air. Here are a few simple ways to find your direction:
Think in adjectives instead of visuals. If your brand were a person walking into a room, would they feel calm and trustworthy? Energetic and modern? Quietly luxurious? Approachable and warm?
Look at your industry and ask what you want to signal. Do you want to blend in as a familiar option, or stand out as something different? A logo can do either — but the intention matters.
Think about what you don’t want. Sometimes it’s easier to know you don’t want to feel corporate, childish, overly trendy, or generic. Those boundaries are just as helpful as preferences.
And if you’re totally blank, that’s cool as well. That’s more common than you think. A good designer will pick up on your vibe through conversation. Personally, I always present three initial design directions anyway, especially when a client isn’t sure what works yet. That’s part of the process: exploring different moods, testing what feels right, and narrowing down from there.
Designers don’t need you to arrive with the answer. They just need a starting point. The rest is collaboration.
Bring direction, not a finished plan
You don’t need to show up with a perfectly polished brand vision or a Pinterest board with 200 pins. A good designer will ask the right questions — that’s part of the job.
But it helps to know what you’re drawn to. If there are logos or brands you admire, share them and explain why. Maybe you like simplicity, strong typography, timeless design, or something more handcrafted and expressive.
It’s equally useful to know what you dislike. If you want to avoid generic symbols or overly trendy looks, saying that upfront saves time and revision cycles later. A designer isn’t looking for you to art-direct the work. They’re looking for signals about your taste, your boundaries, and your business reality. At the end of the day, you don’t need to have all the answers.
Thinking through these points before you reach out makes the whole process a lot smoother. You’ll know who you’re actually looking for, you’ll be able to explain your business faster, and you’ll get results that feel like they belong to you and represent your business. It also saves time on both sides, because you’re not spending weeks trying to force a brand direction with someone who doesn’t design in your vibe at all.
Your Pre-Designer Mini-Cheat-Sheet
What does my business do (in one clear sentence)?
Who am I trying to attract (and who am I not for)?
How do I want people to feel when they see my brand for the first time?
What three adjectives describe the vibe I want to give off?
Are there any brands or logos I’m naturally drawn to — and why?
What makes my business different from others in my space?
What would I want someone to remember about me after one interaction?