This document provides guidance on how to write an effective creative brief. It discusses that creative briefs are typically written by planners or account teams to guide creative teams. The key elements of a creative brief include the business challenge, target audience, single thought or key insight, research supporting the insight, and mandatories. An example brief from Old Spice is presented to illustrate these elements. The document concludes with 8 tips for writing great creative briefs such as knowing the audience well, using concise language, challenging assumptions, and iterating on the single thought.

1. HOW TO WRITE A
CREATIVE BRIEF
LUIS DELGADO

2. AGENDA
1. Who writes the creative brief
2. What is a creative brief
3. The advertising process – where does the creative brief get involved
4. What makes a good creative brief
5. Creative brief main headings
6. Industry examples
7. Wunderman’s creative brief
8. 8 tips to write a great creative brief

3. WHO WRITES
CREATIVE BRIEFS?
ACCOUNT TEAM PLANNERS CREATIVES
? ? ?

4. PLANNERS
WRITE CREATIVE
BRIEFS

5. OR THE ACCOUNT
TEAM (IN SMALL
AGENCIES)

6. THERE ARE DIFFERENT
KIND OF BRIEFS
CLIENT
BRIEF
CREATIVE
BRIEF
BRIEFING

7. CLIENT BRIEF
CLIENT
BRIEF
• The most important piece of information agreed between
an agency and the client.
• Where the client states their problem to an advertising
agency.
• The account team agrees on the deliverables from the brief
with the client and passes the client brief to the planning
team.

8. CREATIVE
BRIEF
• The client brief is ‘translated’ into the agencies’ own
creative brief.
• This translation is necessary because the client brief is
preoccupied with problems. In contrast, the creative brief is
preoccupied with solutions that should direct creative teams
to solve business problems.
• The creative brief is written by the planning team and
passed to the creative team after a ‘briefing’.
CREATIVE BRIEF

9. BRIEFING
BRIEFING
• Traditionally this is the meeting where the creative team is
first exposed to the problems outlined in the brief.
• It is often the planners briefing the creative, although the
account team might also be involved
• Planners must know the brief inside-out.They will be
questioned.

10. A CREATIVE BRIEF IS
• An authentic short story to inspire creative imagination.
• A guide to help the creative team to produce great work that is aligned with
both the client’s objectives and the consumer’s interests.
• A distillation of everything you have learned.
• A conversation.
• All about getting the one message we want to communicate.
• Simple and easy to understand – speak like and for a consumer.
• Accurate – all the required information is correct and to hand.

11. CLIENT
BRIEF
INSIGHTS
MINING
DEVELOP
STRATEGY
WRITE
CREATIVE
BRIEF
WRITE THE AD
COMMS
FRAMEWORK
PRESENTATION
PROCESS OVERVIEW

12. The brief is the creative’s
roadmap.
If you can’t give directions
they will get lost.

13. DIRECTION
WHAT MAKES A
GOOD BRIEF?
INSPIRATION
ONE CLEAR AND
COMPELLING
THOUGHT ABOUT
THE BRAND

14. EINSTEIN QUOTE
IfIhadanhourto
solveaproblemI’d
spend55minutes
thinkingaboutthe
problemand5
minutesthinking
aboutsolutions

15. CREATIVE BRIEF:
MAIN HEADINGS
BUSINESS
CHALLENGE
business
situation, market
situation.
1

16. BUSINESS
CHALLENGE
TARGET
AUDIENCE
business
situation, market
situation.
demographics
(age, gender),
psychographic
s (personality),
channels/
lifestyle habits.
1 2
CREATIVE BRIEF:
MAIN HEADINGS

17. BUSINESS
CHALLENGE
TARGET
AUDIENCE
business
situation, market
situation.
demographics
(age, gender),
psychographic
s (personality),
channels/
lifestyle habits.
1 2 3
SINGLE
THOUGHT
A simple
truth that
connects the
brand’s
offering with
the
consumer’s
interests.
CREATIVE BRIEF:
MAIN HEADINGS

18. BUSINESS
CHALLENGE
TARGET
AUDIENCE
WHAT
SUPPORTS
YOUR KEY
INSIGHT
business
situation, market
situation.
demographics
(age, gender),
psychographic
s (personality),
channels/
lifestyle habits.
what are the
findings from
your research
that support
your key
insight.
1 2 3 4
SINGLE
THOUGHT
A simple
truth that
connects the
brand’s
offering with
the
consumer’s
interests.
CREATIVE BRIEF:
MAIN HEADINGS

19. BUSINESS
CHALLENGE
TARGET
AUDIENCE
WHAT
SUPPORTS
YOUR KEY
INSIGHT
THOUGHT
STARTERS
business
situation, market
situation.
demographics
(age, gender),
psychographic
s (personality),
channels/
lifestyle habits.
what are the
findings from
your research
that support
your key
insight.
anything else that
might help the
creative team i.e.
links to additional
documents, brand
guidelines.
1 2 3 4 5
SINGLE
THOUGHT
A simple
truth that
connects the
brand’s
offering with
the
consumer’s
interests.
CREATIVE BRIEF:
MAIN HEADINGS

20. BUSINESS
CHALLENGE
TARGET
AUDIENCE
SINGLE
THOUGHT
WHAT
SUPPORTS
YOUR KEY
INSIGHT
THOUGHT
STARTERS
MANDATORIES
business
situation, market
situation.
demographics
(age, gender),
psychographic
s (personality),
channels/
lifestyle habits.
A simple
truth that
connects the
brand’s
offering with
the
consumer’s
interests.
what are the
findings from
your research
that support
your key
insight.
anything else that
might help the
creative team i.e.
links to additional
documents, brand
guidelines.
rules the
creative
team have
to live by.
1 2 3 4 5 6
CREATIVE BRIEF:
MAIN HEADINGS

21. RE-DIFINING THE
BUSINESS OBJECTIVE
• The client’s business objective is not
always very creative.
• Reframing the problem can often lead to
better creative output.
• AMV BBDO famously reframed
Sainsbury’s business challenge of ‘grow
revenue by £2.5bn to ‘get each customer
to spend an extra £1.14 per transaction.

22. SINGLE
THOUGHT
WHAT IS THE
SINGLE THOUGHT?
AUDIENCE
INSIGHT
PRODUCT
BRAND INSIGHT

23. SINGLE
THOUGHT
• The most important part of the brief.
• A simple truth that connects the brand’s offering with the
consumer’s interests.
• Also known as:
• Single message
• Single minded proposition
• Unique selling proposition
• Unique selling point
• The proposition must be one that the competition either
cannot, or does not, offer.
• The single thought is not the brand headline. However, a
good proposition will inspire the tagline.
SINGLE THOUGHT

24. LET’S LOOK
AT AN
EXAMPLE

25. If you want to smell
like a man, there is
only one choice:
Old Spice
AUDIENCE
INSIGHT
PRODUCT
BRAND INSIGHT
Wives and
girlfriends are
more likely to buy
men’s body wash
than men
The man your man
could smell like
SINGLE
THOUGHT
OLD SPICE
EXAMPLE

26. AND HERE IT IS
EXPRESSED IN AN AD:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owGykVbfgUE

27. CREATIVE BRIEFS
ARE DIFFERENT

28. OUR CREATIVE BRIEF
LOOKS LIKE THIS:
PART 1 PART 2

29. Creative brief
Job name:
Briefing/Kick off date:
Materials needed:
Big Idea/New Campaign/New execution:
Planner:
The product is:
The business challenge is:
The role for communication in addressing this challenge is:
Mandatory deliverables:
What will success look like:
KPIs:
How they’ll be measured:
Client:
Client presentation date:
Budget production:
Media:
Sign offs
Job no:
WIP date:
Activity live:
Account Lead:
The booked media plan:
What other channels could we used:

30. How should this feel?
Who are they?
What single thought will inspire them?
The key insight
What discoveries support this thought?
What they care about
When & where (or via whom) will we reach them?
Thought starters

31. 8 TIPS TO WRITE GREAT
CREATIVE BRIEF

32. MAKE SUREYOU HAVE
A CRYSTAL CLEAR
UNDERSTANDING OF
YOUR CLIENT’S
OBJECTIVES.
TIP #1

33. KNOWYOUR
AUDIENCE
LIKEYOU
KNOWYOUR
BEST FRIEND.
TIP #2

34. CREATE A
PERSONA TO
REPRESENT
YOUR TARGET
AUDIENCE.
TIP #3 Meet Jessica.
She’s 19, single and recently
on her own at college.
She loves to have fun at the
weekends, being up to date
with the latest fashion news
and interested in trying
products that reflect her
sensitivity to the
environment.

35. DON’T USE 10
WORDS WHEN
YOU CAN USE
ONE.
TIP #4

36. READ A LOT!
TIP #5

37. DON’T TAKE WHAT
THE CLIENT TELLS
YOU AS GOSPEL.
CHALLENGE.
TIP #6

38. WRITE A
PROPOSITION.
GO AWAY.
HAVE A BEER.
COME BACK.
REPEAT.
TIP #7

39. ALWAYS
CHALLENGE
YOURSELF ON HOW
TO MAKE THE
BRIEFING MORE
THAN A MEETING.
TIP #8

40. MAKE SUREYOU
DON’T
• Don’t copy & paste from client’s brief.
• Don’t use meaningless descriptions – tell the creative team in plan
language!
• Don’t just provide basic demographics – help the creative team really
“get” who the audience is and what motivates them.
• Don’t make it lengthy and wordy – keep it short and sweet.
• Don’t provide information and data you cannot backup.
• Don’t use the brief as a place to show off every fact you have learned.

41. USEFUL LINKS
• What is a great creative brief – Julian Cole
• Creative brief workshop – Dare
• 5 tips for writing a great creative brief – IPA
• How to write a creative brief – advertising.about.com