Steps to Writing a Successful Creative Brief

 

Writing a brief is the first task you need to complete when you are charged with managing an advertising campaign. Your brief gives background information on a product or service which will guide the creative team in the performance of its role in getting ready the finished advert copy, among other things. It is the foundation of any advertising or marketing campaign and essentially holds the marketing campaign together. To write or get a good creative brief, a mix of due preparation, good habits, proper account management, creative direction and effective training, all come into play.

Let’s look at some helpful steps to getting a great brief out there.

Get the Information You Need from the Client

Writing a good creative brief is dependent on the information provided by the client. That’s why it is important you leave no stone when it comes to asking questions and seeking clarification. All information about the product or service you want to advertise should be provided in detail: the strength, weakness, target audience, what problem it solves, etc.

Use the Product Or Service

Believe it or not, if you have not tested the product or service for yourself, you may not hit the right spots with your campaign. Note this may not necessarily be you if the product or service does not apply, but you can get a consumer to give you a rating and take it from there.

Document All the Thoughts Gathered

You simply have to write things down. There’s no way around that. Your experience with the client and the product/service should go into documentation among other things like the advertising and client’s objectives, the budget, deadline, etc.

Arrange Your Thoughts

Set with all the needed information, you can now begin to put them together to get a unified piece that makes practical sense to you and to anyone else.

NOTE:

No two briefs are exactly the same owing to the difference in ideas, products/services, objectives/goals, etc. However, there is a template which is followed in writing a creative brief and these are as follows:

Background

Target Audience

Objectives

Tone of voice

Single-Minded Proposition (Also called Unique Selling Proposition (USP), Key Message, Direction)

Key benefits

Reasons to believe

Audience Takeaway

Deliverables (Outdoor, Print, TV etc)

Budget

Schedule

Develop your ‘Single Minded Proposition’

The SMP is also regarded as Key Takeaway or Message. Regardless of what you call it, the important thing is that you need a key point that becomes the core around which your entire brief revolves. It shows the creative team the right way to go.

Shorten the Document to a Simple Draft

Done with the SMP, and the needed information, it’s time to write a concise, and not wordy brief. Remove any unnecessary babble and retain only the most needed in the brief.

Get Feedback

Yes, it is the duty of your line supervisor to review your work, just as much as it is your duty to present your work for review. Discuss the brief with him or her, ask questions, seek clarifications or feedback, etc.

Get the Client’s Endorsement

This is needful owing to the fact that the client owns the job and would also foot the bill. Doing a good job requires allowing the client to give their impression of the brief and the general direction for the campaign. Let the client be involved from the start to the end. It amounts to a waste of time to do a job alone only to get the disapproval of the client in the end.

 

The Ready Writers has furnished you with these workable steps; try it out and see yourself writing a great creative brief eventually.