Most founders brief a designer in one of two ways. They either send a 30-page document stitched together from competitor screenshots, internal Slack threads, and a brand deck somebody made in 2022 — or they write a single line that says "make us look modern, like Apple but for accountants."
Neither works. The first buries the signal. The second has no signal to bury.
A good brief is one page. It tells the designer what the business actually is, who it is for, and what "done" looks like. It takes about an hour to write and saves weeks of revisions. The checklist below is what to put on that page.
One sentence on what the business actually does
Not the mission. Not the vision. The transaction. Who pays you, for what, and roughly how much.
This matters because every design decision downstream — tone, density, imagery, hierarchy — flows from this one sentence. A B2B compliance tool and a weekend pottery studio do not get the same homepage, even if they share a colour palette.
Common mistake: writing the aspirational version. "We empower modern teams to unlock their potential." Nobody can design from that. Write the boring version instead.
One sentence on who the customer is
A real person, not a segment. Their job title, the moment they look you up, and the question in their head when they land on the site.
"A 40-year-old operations manager at a mid-size logistics firm, looking on her phone between meetings, trying to figure out if you are credible enough to forward to her boss." That is briefable. "SMBs" is not.
Common mistake: listing three audiences. Pick the one whose decision the site has to win. The others will benefit anyway.
Three sites you like, and one sentence on why each
Not five. Not ten. Three. And the sentence matters more than the link.
"I like Linear because the typography feels confident without shouting." That tells a designer something. A bare URL tells them nothing — they cannot read your mind about which part you liked.
Common mistake: sending references that contradict each other without saying which direction wins. If you love both Stripe and a maximalist Awwwards site, say which one you would pick if forced.
What success looks like one year after launch
Concrete. Measurable if possible. "We want 20 qualified enquiries a month" or "We want to stop being embarrassed when investors visit the site."
Even soft goals are fine if they are honest. What is not fine is "we want it to look great." Looking great is the means, not the end.
Common mistake: confusing launch-day success with year-one success. The site that wins on Product Hunt is rarely the site that compounds for twelve months.
What you absolutely do NOT want
This is the most undervalued line on the brief. Negative constraints are faster to act on than positive ones.
"No stock photography. No carousels. No dark mode. No three-column footer with 40 links." Each one of those saves a round of revisions.
Common mistake: being polite. Designers would much rather hear "I hate gradient blobs" up front than discover it in round three.
Hard constraints — budget, timeline, must-haves
Budget range, launch date, and any non-negotiables — a CMS the team already knows, a domain that must redirect, a payment provider already integrated.
This matters because every design problem has many correct answers, and constraints are what narrow the field. A designer with no constraints will give you the most expensive version of the answer every time.
Common mistake: hiding the budget. It does not protect you — it just guarantees a misaligned first proposal.
Decision-maker named, with their availability
One person who can say yes. Their name, their role, and roughly when they are reachable.
Projects stall when feedback comes from a committee with no chair. Naming the decision-maker on the brief sets the expectation that their word is final, and that the designer is not refereeing internal politics.
Common mistake: "the team will review." Teams do not review. People do.
What to leave out entirely
Your full brand history. Your founder story. Internal org charts. Every competitor you have ever resented. The 14-tab spreadsheet of feature ideas.
None of it helps a designer make the first three decisions. Save it for the kickoff call, where context becomes conversation instead of homework.
Common mistake: confusing "thorough" with "useful." A brief is not an archive.
The smallest useful next step
Open a blank document. Give yourself one hour. Write the eight lines above. Do not format it. Do not design it. Just answer the questions.
If you cannot fill in a line, that is the most valuable thing the exercise will tell you — because whoever you hire next was going to ask that exact question anyway.
When the one-pager is ready, send it over and we can talk about what to build.