Why you should start every project with a brief

Have you ever given an assignment to a writer, and when the copy came back it wasn't at all what you wanted?

It happens. Whose fault is it? There are two possibilities:

1. It's the writer's fault. The writer wasn't paying attention to the assignment, or lacks the skill to correctly complete it. (Give your writer more training, or easier assignments. Or get a new writer.)
   
2. It's your fault. You didn't make the assignment clear.
   

That's because creating clear, complete, thought-through assignment is very hard to do. So hard, in fact, that most people don't bother to do it.

That's where the brief comes in, as described at Ted Grigg's Reflections about Direct Marketing in The Seven Essentials of the Direct Marketing Creative Brief. (This post focuses on creating a brief for a commercial direct-marketing project, but nearly all the principles apply to fundraising projects.) Here's some of Ted's advice about a good brief:

1. Get a handle on the product or service benefits.
   
2. Share the objective(s) and what we have to do to win?
   
3. Who are the targeted prospects or customers and what makes them tick?
   
4. What is the call to action or offer for this particular communication?
   
5. How does the target audience view the offered product in the competitive environment?
   
6. What are the executional mandatories or "givens"?
   
7. What is the executional budget for this creative effort?
   

The key: Put all the important stuff in writing. If it isn't written down, don't assume anyone knows it. Even if everyone knows it, put it in writing to make sure. Then require your writer to read and understand it.

Every hour you put in at the front end of the job (before the creative process starts) saves you between two and ten hours later on. So writing a brief may be a pain, but it's less painful than trying to figure out what you want said through multiple drafts of copy.

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Comments

[Paul]

Seven steps? Product or service benefits? executional mandatories? This is the kind of business-gobbledygook that stifles creativity and kills good letters.