Branding is not about how it looks. It’s about how it works

Ah, perfect. Or rather, about how elegantly we argue over personal taste instead of measurable results. Yes, it sounds familiar. It’s that national sport played between “I like it” and “I don’t know what’s wrong, but something is wrong.”

If you’ve ever worked in Romania, in any creative industry or graphic services field, you’ve probably heard—or said—one of these lines:

• “Well, I like it!”

• “I’m not really convinced. I can’t explain exactly why, but it doesn’t move me.”

• “I asked a friend, my parents too, and they all said it should be different.”

Does this sound familiar? If yes, you’re not alone. After many years of hands-on experience, I’ve reached a conclusion that may sound harsh to some, but is hard to avoid: we don’t know how to give proper feedback.

In Romania, feedback is widely misunderstood and poorly used

We sit far too comfortably inside our emotional and professional bubbles, constantly confusing personal opinion with objective performance. In this article, I want to address this deeply rooted cultural issue and explore a better alternative.

After dozens of branding projects at BroHouse—from complex rebranding initiatives for large companies to brand launches for startups-I’ve noticed the same recurring pattern:
“I have to like it” has become an evaluation criterion.

The hero and the victim: “I Like It” vs. “It Needs to Work”

Let’s start with a fundamental truth many of us tend to ignore: liking something is a bonus, not a requirement.

Take a simple example: a microwave oven. When you buy one, do you care if you like the design or if the color matches your kitchen? Maybe, to some extent. But what truly matters is whether it heats your food quickly, evenly, and efficiently. Performance is the ultimate goal.

The same principle applies to business, marketing, design, or any other field. A client may personally like a certain shade of blue, but if market research shows that this color does not resonate with the target audience and fails to drive action, the choice is clear: performance beats personal preference.

The problem we often observe is the assumption that if we like something, it must be good and correct. In reality, a successful product or service has far less to do with you or me and far more to do with how well it solves a real problem for a broader audience. In short, it’s not about us—it’s about them: the customers, the users, the market.

The Romanian Bubble: Why We Get Feedback from the Wrong Sources

Here lies one of the biggest obstacles to constructive feedback: the bubble.
Clients and managers often gather opinions from people “around them”—friends, parents, family members, or office colleagues outside the field.

These people, while well-intentioned, exist within the same socio-cultural and professional context. They share similar values, tastes, and biases. As a result, their feedback cannot meaningfully differ from the opinions of the person asking for it. It becomes an echo chamber—a vicious cycle that stifles innovation and fails to reflect real market needs.

A well-known concept, “The Bike Shed Effect,” explains this phenomenon perfectly. People tend to offer strong opinions on simple things they understand (like how a bike shed should be built) while avoiding complex topics (like nuclear reactors) because they feel unqualified. In the “Romanian bubble,” everyone feels qualified to comment on a logo, a cover, or a piece of copy because these seem accessible. As a result, feedback gravitates toward aesthetics and emotions, while strategic foundations are ignored.

According to Baymard Institute’s UX Research, 73% of failed design decisions in European companies result from feedback collected from stakeholders without domain expertise, who evaluate based on personal preferences rather than performance data.

Why everyone’s opinion can hurt your brand

Emotional Feedback vs. Goal-Oriented Feedback

This leads us to the most important distinction we need to make.

Emotional feedback dominates our culture. It sounds like this:

• “This font makes me uncomfortable.”
• “I don’t feel good when I see this color.”
• “This doesn’t represent me.”

This type of feedback is subjective, vague, and impossible to act upon. It centers the discussion around one person’s feelings instead of the project’s objectives.

Eye-tracking studies by the Nielsen Norman Group show that strategically placed CTA (Call to Action) elements, based on heatmaps, increase engagement by 76% compared to placements driven by “intuition” or “what looks better.”

On the other hand, objective, performance-based feedback sounds very different:
“This CTA is difficult to find on the page; our conversion rate is 15% below the industry average. How can we improve its visibility?” “Research shows that blue conveys trust in the financial sector. Our target audience—people aged 50+, prefers more conservative palettes. This electric purple shade may push them away.”

Do you see the difference? The second type of feedback is grounded in data, clear goals (conversions, trust, audience relevance), and offers a concrete direction for improvement.