It's a situation that happens frequently in the advertising world: as a deadline looms, marketers rush to create an ad and later find themselves disappointed by the results. Underwhelmed by the final product, many advertisers find themselves questioning the quality of the work they’re getting from their advertising team.
In this article, we look at the information your team needs to gather to create effective advertising. The guiding questions are collected in a form—the Creative Brief—that helps marketers collect answers in one place. Perhaps the real genius of the Creative Brief is that it leads users through the thinking that is required to create effective advertising.
Let's assume you've decided what kind of marketing piece you're creating (ad, brochure, direct mail package, etc.). To create an effective ad, your agency (or internal team) will need to know the following.
Audience
For whom are you creating this advertising? Men? Women? Football fans? Where are they located geographically? And where are they psychologically? The composition of your audience is going to influence how you address them. It may also affect the look of the ad.
Customer Attitude
Do customers like the product being offered? Or are they skeptical? What do they think about the company offering the product? Is it a well-known market leader? Or a scrappy little challenger? The answer to this question is important because it helps your creative team see the product (or service) from the customer's point of view. And it may suggest a good way to approach prospects.
Competitors
Who is the competition? And what does your audience think of them? Is the field crowded? Or are there only one or two competitors? What promises are competitors making to the same prospects? Are there any non-obvious competitors? For instance, you may think Bowling Alley A only competes with Bowling Alley B, which is located across town. But it’s also contending with a nearby movie theater for a person’s entertainment dollars. Identifying all your competitors helps you address what is likely to be an assortment of challengers.
Primary message
Unfortunately, the communication process is not a straight line from your ad to the customer's brain. The average person is on the receiving end of hundreds of messages every day. So, you need to identify the single most important message you wish to deliver in the hope that readers have enough brain cells available to absorb your key idea.
Message support
After you've identified the most important message, you'll want to identify reasons why people should believe what you say. Assemble several ideas to support your main message.
Media
Where, exactly, is your ad going to appear? You'll want to give some thought to the environment where the audience will see your ad. A few possibilities follow: The side of a bus. Cosmopolitan magazine. MSN.com. The New Yorker. Top Chef. Acknowledging the media environment where your ad appears can increase its impact and relevance.
Tone
Of course, you want your ad to reflect the personality of the brand. Is your brand conservative and stuffy? Or does it have more of a surfer-dude personality? In other words, Brooks Brothers is going to look and sound different than Hollister.
Offer
Is there a simple proposition you can make to potential customers? Something to which they can easily say "yes" or "no"? There are many offers you can use (such as a free trial or a 10 percent discount) to motivate prospects to act.
Call to action
What do you want prospects to do next? Since you want people to respond, let prospects know exactly what you want them to do (for instance, share their contact info).
Guarantee
Does your company offer a guarantee? If prospects aren't sure whether to respond, a guarantee can help move undecided folks off the fence.
Nuts and bolts
What's the budget? What's the deadline? Who needs to approve the material? Does an ad usually go through several rounds of review? Are there rules about colors? How about the position and/or size of the company logo?
When you have an initial layout, check it against the Creative Brief on a point-by-point basis. Does the primary message come through loud and clear? Is there support for the primary message? Is the tone in keeping with the brand? If not, you may have more work to do.
As you can see, even a small ad may have many moving parts. The Creative Brief gives your team a solid foundation on which to build. In a methodical way, the brief pulls you through the key items you need to consider. And while it may seem to have a lot of steps, using a Creative Brief will streamline the creative process and help you avoid wasting precious time.
So, the next time a rush project lands in your inbox, reach for a Creative Brief. You’ll end up with a stronger piece of advertising.