Tips and Tricks for Giving Good Feedback
It all starts with your mindset
Feedback is an important part of any creative process—but it doesn’t always have to communicate that the team you’re working with has done a bad job. It can be both positive and negative. What did you like? What didn’t quite resonate? Setting aside time to give feedback gives you the perfect opportunity to suggest more effective ways of explaining a concept, ensure visual style and the overall tone are best for your brand, and so much more. If you start viewing it as helpful advice, it goes from being avoided to encouraged—and sometimes it’s precisely what a project needs to get to the next level.
Got some baggage attached to feedback? Here are some tips to find a fresh mindset and help your creative projects thrive.
Tips for Creating an Open Dialogue
If you love it, say it
Don’t forget that feedback can look like praise! It’s helpful to communicate what you liked, what works, and what drew you in. That way, we have more context for your preferences and vision, which helps us paint a fuller picture of what you’re looking for.
Throughout every step of the video production process, you want to have an open lane of communication with the team you’re working with. This can look like scheduling regular touchpoints to give intentional feedback and talk about how it’s going. The road to creating a fantastic video strategy isn’t without speed bumps, and there are a lot of decisions to make along the way. We don’t want anyone wasting their time stuck in a constant loop of revisions and edits. That’s why your candor is a vital component of creating great work. Open and honest dialogue lets us workshop solutions and confirms that we’re addressing the issue at hand, which goes a long way toward healthy, speedy, and accurate edits.
Make it specific
Projects that don’t have a clear CTA tend to be less successful than those with a clear purpose and directive. The same is true with feedback. Try to avoid saying things like, “I just don’t like it” or “make it pop!”, since this doesn’t provide clear direction. Instead, call out exactly what it is you think can improve and give some suggestions. The more specific you are, the more effective edits your video production team can make.
Curious as to what sort of directives work and what don’t? Here are some examples of ways you can be more specific:
“I don’t like this section” - This type of feedback is vague and doesn’t help us understand what specifically needs to change.
“The way she talks about the product in this section feels off.” - Now we’re headed in a good direction! This helps us understand what it is you’re unhappy with and leads us toward action.
“In this section, she missed a key feature of our product. Could we overlay a graphic from our website to make all the product features crystal clear to the viewers?” - Now that’s what we’re talking about! This is clear and direct.
While we might not use the first idea we workshop, it sets us in the right direction and takes the pressure off of speaking up and trying to find the perfect fix.
It’s totally okay if there’s something about a project that doesn’t quite feel right and needs to be changed. If something feels “off”, try to put a name to that feeling. Getting to the why behind certain changes and explaining your reasoning helps avoid further edits down the road.
Define your team - who gets the invite?
You’ve probably heard someone talk about having “too many cooks in the kitchen”, and the same can be true of giving feedback—but a well-formed team eliminates this worry and makes sure the best ideas are coming to the table.
When you’re deciding who on your team gets the invite to give feedback, consider the key stakeholders and departments that will be most affected by what we’re creating. For example, if your marketing team wants to create a set of videos to further sales, it’s important to have someone from that department give input at the beginning of the process to ensure everyone is headed in the right direction.
Once a project is underway and we’ve hit a good stride, it can be deflating and stall our momentum to find out someone else is coming to the table with edits. That’s why we encourage our clients to identify at the beginning of a project who will be giving feedback. Every member of the core feedback team will be well-versed in the purpose of each video and the problem it aims to solve, so feedback can be filtered through a targeted approach.
You know your brand and messaging best, so working through your feedback is incredibly valuable. That’s why our team places such a high value on it. Now, when you’re partnering with a production company on your next project, you don’t have to be scared to give feedback, but learn to enjoy the process.
Have an upcoming video project and are curious to learn more about how we can help? Let's talk!
