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While well-executed creative briefs remain a valuable foundational tool for today’s marketers, they do need one thing that marketers lack: time. There is an increasing need to supplement this technique with more active and conversational methods. The rapid speed of organizations, along with new ways of working, necessitates a more flexible approach.
Overdependence on creative briefs
The creative brief, which is typically created by the individual requesting work from creative teams, was traditionally used in content marketing to ensure that the purpose, target audience, key messaging, tone, and deliverables were thoroughly considered before an advertising campaign was launched.
However, some content and creative marketers have overemphasized the importance of a creative brief. Instead of providing broad campaign guidelines, marketers employ creative briefs to kick off even minor projects.
In these businesses, a marketer marketing a webinar may need to produce distinct briefings for email, landing page, and social media posts. It was hardly “brief” at that point! Because of this overreliance on creative briefs, they become administrative roadblocks that encourage little stakeholder interaction and team collaboration.
Limitations of Creative Briefs
In addition, creative briefs leave room for misinterpretation. Information degrades as it is passed from one person to another. The original intent of the task may be lost, resulting in rework and misplaced attempts. Two people can look at the same sentence and have very different perceptions.
Strict guidelines for creative briefs might hinder creativity and innovation. Assume you work for a consumer electronics business responsible for promoting a new smartphone. According to the creative brief, the core message must emphasize on the phone’s increased battery life, using precise language and data. The design team has a concept to demonstrate battery life through real-world events, such as how the battery works when capturing video. Nevertheless, their idea
Shortly after the campaign’s premiere, the rival introduces a smartphone with marginally improved battery life. It emphasizes video recording capabilities, which better aligns with market desire and renders the old marketing redundant.
Making space (and time!) for talks.
In the above case, a conversation might have uncovered the nuance that saved the campaign. Instead of rejecting the concept outright, the teams could engage in a dialogue to better understand the restrictions, viewpoints, and opportunities. Did the brief’s author examine the real-world applicability of battery life? Was there a compelling reason to focus on battery life that was not addressed in the brief? A few basic inquiries could add another layer of clarification.
The challenge remains: how do marketers schedule these critical conversations when everyone is strapped for time?