The Reality of Perception: Why design is a necessary part of your business strategy

As in any occupational field, graphic design has a history besmirched with an overabundance of self-importance. For example, in 1956, Paul Rand, the designer of the famous IBM striped logo, declared that “If it looks terrific, then that’s all I care about. After the looks, and of strictly secondary importance, comes client approval.”1 Many designers have also tried to justify their subjective styles with haughty sounding claims based on artistic pride that elevated the designer’s esoteric expertise over the client’s more pragmatic concerns. But, as always, what curtails such abuses is the real-world necessities of the marketplace. It will not tolerate prima donnas and art snobs. Yet here we also find two principles that make design indispensable. They are not based upon overinflated egos but upon nature—human nature to be exact.

The first principle is psychological. It is human perception, the way people make value judgements based upon visual clues or indicators. This phenomenon has been described as arising from our survival mechanism of distinguishing dangers in our environment or distinguishing good foods from bad. Our environment is no longer the wilds of the hunter-gatherer but the ever changing chaos and clutter of the marketplace. The visual clues that identify products and places in our urban environs are now mostly man-made. Yet we still rely upon the dominant function of our brains which is pattern-recognition. Uwe Stoklossa, writing in the book Advertising, states the following:
“The human brain is predominantly devoted to sight. About fifty per cent of the cerebral cortex is used to analyze visual information.…Psychologist Professor Philip Zimbardo of Stanford University described perception as follows: ‘Perception is the ordering principle that gives coherence to kaleidoscopic sensory input and meaningful unity to separated elements, making possible an organized direction of our behavior. without organizing processes of perception, we would not see objects, space, events, movement, people, or relationships, but would drift through a world of meaningless, random sensations.’ (Psychology and life, Glenview, IL, 1988)”2
Recognizing man’s natural talent and tendency to identify needs using visual information is fundamental to a business’s marketing strategy.

The second principle that makes design a vital consideration is cultural. We call it the visual language. In all cultures the visual clues mentioned in the first principle are codified as a sort of shorthand which can be understood by all people only as it is learned. There are numerous statistics on the growing amount of information, but what these often do not consider is the nature of people to adapt through the use of mental shortcuts. And the primary shortcut is using visual clues to make quick decisions. Thus the other commonly repeated observation: we are becoming a people that read less and seek information more through purely visual media. With this tendency our visual language is increasingly important and companies that recognize this are quick to develop a visual reference for themselves.
“The central social function of graphic design is to embody identity through visual forms. Design creates a visual personality for institutions, products, audiences, and for designers themselves. Organizations of every size—from multinational conglomerations to corner stores—use design to convey a sense of purpose and a set of values.”3

The primary concern of design here is not beauty, style, or artistry—as was supposed by Paul Rand four decades ago—but more objective business goals of distinctiveness, consistency, and repetition (see sidebar for definitions). These are not phrases that relate to art but to business. The chief goal for any company should be to be recognized and remembered, to have its branding convey meaning about the company to the audience in such a way that sticks despite all the visual clutter competing for attention.

Both of these fundamental realities, of human’s visual orientation and of society’s visual language, show that businesses need to have a fundamental concern with being visibly recognizable in their culture. The effectiveness of design in these environments to distinguish a company arises not from sophisticated art theory but from basic facts about human psychology and society. Make it your goal to develop a communication strategy that recognizes these realities.

1. Paul Rand, cited by James Woodhuysen in “Paul Rand Hates Logos”, Blueprint, (September 1989): 37.
2. Uwe Stoklossa, Advertising, (Thames & Hudson Ltd, New York, 2007), pp.204-205
3. Ellen Lupton, Mixing Messages, (Princeton Architectural Press, New York, 1996), p.83

Copyright 2007 © Design Corps, (630)761-9650