How would you address conflicting feedback from multiple stakeholders on a marketing design project?

Collaboration doesn’t just mean that everyone is in the same place physically or virtually at the same time, it’s engaging in a collaborative way. Allowing those in the room to speak and be heard and understood. Valuing all input and taking valuable notes to create an outcome beneficial to the business and the project. Sometimes the best ideas come from those stakeholders further away from the project or idea and all voices in the room need to be heard. Often times we make our own conclusion and just allow others to speak to check the due diligence box, but true collaboration is active listening to all stakeholders and attendees and valuing each and every contribution.

In my experience I have found active listening at the very beginning of the project to be extremely useful. Instead of dismissing any particular stakeholder, it is crucial to actively engage each and every member to understand and learn about their own ideas that they place forward, in order to grasp the larger picture. Each human has the ability to perceive projects differently in multiple ways and it is of immense use, both for building your self and the team, to listen to everyone’s contributions prior to coming to any one particular conclusion.

Documenting feedback can be done either by a designated note taker or a collaborative living document. However, the documentation plan needs to be defined upfront so that there is confidence that all feedback will be documented but also so that the process of documenting doesn’t become a distraction to the feedback process. Document for the sake of reviewing to come to a conclusion or decision that’s right for the business and also for later reference when new ideas come about that might benefit from previous feedback given

Creating an agenda for the facilitated discussion is key. This will give comfort to all attendees to know what will be covered and ideal outcomes, but also to allow attendees to prepare their specific feedback points in advance. Coming into a discussion that’s a booked meeting with a subject line will not allow for robust and valuable discussion and often leads to wasting people’s time and a follow up discussion needed to actually achieve the outcomes.

Do not be defensive. Conflicting feedback can feel like dodging a volley of dodgeballs – confusing and potentially painful. But instead of getting defensive and turtling behind your initial concept, here's the secret weapon: emotional aikido. Channel your inner feedback whisperer. Acknowledge the stakeholders' comments, not as personal attacks on your creativity, but as intel from the marketing battlefield. Each opinion is a piece of the puzzle, revealing what resonates (or flops) with different audience segments. By working together to translate this feedback, you can transform a potentially messy situation into a design that resonates with a broader target and packs a serious marketing punch.