A few years back I used to spend endless hours on the small details of design projects, getting my icons just right or the line heights of my fonts pixel perfect but what did that help me to achieve, the sites got delayed in being realised or the sexy new brochure or sales letter was a week late in getting sent out.
My other work mounted up and deadline projects were rushed, meaning I would have to stay late to get things done costing the company more money in overtime pay and me feeling over worked and overwhelmed. And why? Because I was trying to satisfy my design ego.
One day I said to myself ‘that will do’… those three little words transformed my working life, projects got launched quicker, leads came in quicker, I worked less hours and after 3 months later I got a healthy little payrise while some of my collegues were laid off in budget cuts. Why, because they didn’t share my opinion that THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS PERFECTION.
Searching for perfection is a trait I continue to see in 90% of the people I work with and the new designers we bring into the team here at Melt Design.
And the same is true for a lot of business owners. They want the site copy to be perfect or the link colour on their email campaign to look the right colour… the list goes on but none of this matters. This quest for perfection then turns a 2 week project into a 4, 5, 6, 7 week project. Can you believe I’ve still got websites sat at 99.9% complete that we started over a year ago because we’re still waiting on the client to sign it off because they’re not sure it’s ready?
The reality is that what you feel is perfect, isn’t perfect to the people you’re trying to sell to.
Have you ever read a website homepage and thought I still have no clue what they do (IT Companies are the worst for this)! You have to speak to your audience on their level even if that means dumbing it down a bit so they understand what you do and why it can help them.
All this wasted time could be killing you and your business income. It’s as simple as that. You can always come back and tweak the copy, tweak the style a little but don’t let these things delay you getting stuff done and off your desk.
It just need to have the right things in the right places to be out there mingling and competing with your competitors.
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So please give those 3 little words a go when you next write an email campaign or you’re having your site designed. I promise it will make your life better.
Leave a comment below and tell us your story of when you learnt that perfection doesn’t matter and how it transformed your life.
Matt
