What are some effective ways to persuade a client who is resistant to your design ideas?

It's all about the presentation! Say you work on a logo design, what is more enticing? 1. A sheet filled with logos? 2. A a logo booklet filled with the logo variations, detailing though, logo in use on mock ups, how to use it, color and typography pairing, etc. A client or customer needs to really feel their design, so put in the extra work to help sell your vision. There are great templates out there to get started, check out solutions at Figma for ideas.

Convince a skeptical client like a master tailor fitting a bespoke suit. You take precise measurements—understand their needs—and craft recommendations. Initially, they may question the fit, but as they move and feel the suit's comfort and see its elegance—the practicality and aesthetics of your design—their trust in your expertise solidifies.

Storytelling proves to be a highly effective tool in my interactions with clients. For instance, if I notice a client wearing red lipstick while discussing the color theme of her upcoming book, I might inquire about the emotions she associates with the color red when applying her lipstick. I then weave this personal experience into a larger narrative, connecting it to the uniqueness of her book. By illustrating how someone lost in a bookstore is drawn to her red-themed book amid a sea of colors, I tie it back to a poignant memory: the only color her grandmother allowed her to wear, marking a significant and cherished aspect of her identity.

You are in business to solve a problem not to sell a product or service, so the moment you realize this, you see your client as a helpless person trying to walk a rather clumsy road and you know the directions well, its easy to listen to their concerns, understand, empathize and proffer solutions that not only solves their problem but also builds trust and engages your client on an emotional level.

Communication is the best way. Be direct with him And try to understand his vision and develop your design with the ideas that you collect. The client is fixed but design is variable.

I always like to share ideas with the client and provide a base to every design choice. Clients usually like to see the idea applied on a finished product, they don't understand the richness of brainstorming. So, involving them in the brainstorming process, providing examples on concrete design samples and application ideas, instead of applying to the final product, is a good way to help them see how the design will look beforehand. Thus, justifying why some of their suggestions may not look so good :)

Offering a test is helpful, especially for packaging design. For example, creating two different designs, one of which the client dislikes, and then conducting a real sales test where consumers can choose between the two designs. It can be done through an online research institute using photos of the packaging, but a real test is more telling. It's important to ensure that the test conditions are the same for each variant, such as placing them at the same level on the shelf. Then, analyze the sales data. The results will speak for themselves.