I freelance now, but I used to work on the other side of the equation — I was the content marketer who assigned work to freelance writers and edited their submissions.
While in that role, I discovered an important formula:
More time spent writing a creative brief = Less time spent editing a submission
When I was careful and thorough with the briefs I wrote, I was much more likely to get the results I wanted from freelancers. When I gave them sparser briefs, I often got decently-written but ultimately off-topic submissions.
A little extra work on creative briefs upfront saved tons of time and effort overall.
Being a freelancer — and thus receiving creative briefs instead of writing them — has only made me a bigger believer in the importance of good briefs. I love having all the information I may need about an assignment from the moment I start working.
So what, exactly, is a “good” creative brief? Based on my experience both writing and receiving them, here’s what I think every creative brief needs to include.
What the Content Is
Let’s start with the basics. Your creative will obviously need to know what they’re creating in the broadest sense — whether it’s social content, a case study, an infographic, etc.
This seems easy, but there can be situations when a client and a contractor have slightly different concepts of what a certain type of content entails. So, it’s always better to overexplain than underexplain by including details like:
- The length of the content
- The scope of the content (i.e., how much information it should cover)
- The content’s publishing format (print vs. digital, web page vs. PDF download, etc.)
Who the Content Is For
It’s also important to be clear about who the content’s target audience is. Knowing who will be accessing the content — and how they’ll be accessing it — helps a creative make choices about their tone and overall approach. To help them make the best choices, a creative brief should mention:
- Who the target audience is
- Where the target audience is in the marketing funnel
- How and where the target audience will encounter the content
What the Content Should Accomplish
Once those basics are established, it’s time to explain what the content is about.
The question of what something is about, though, is a very broad one. And I personally think that its broadness makes it a little useless.
Imagine, for example, that three writers receive a brief asking them to write a blog post about bunnies. One might write about how to keep bunnies as pets, one might write about the characteristics of the offspring of different wild rabbit species, and another might submit a Buzzfeed-style listicle of cute bunny pics.
All of these writers would have followed the instructions to the letter. It’s not their fault that the instruction to “write about bunnies” can be interpreted in so many different ways.
This is an extreme example, of course, but I have seen plenty of instances in my career of a writer going in a different direction than expected because the brief wasn’t specific enough.
To avoid this kind of misunderstanding, I believe the best briefs focus not on what a piece of content is about, but on what a piece of content should accomplish.
That means detailing:
The content’s main idea
Ask yourself what you want the reader to learn from the content. Then, put your answer into a full sentence. This full sentence is your main idea.
A marketer for a pet care company producing a blog post on bunnies may want readers to learn that bunnies are challenging but fulfilling pets. That’s the post’s main idea.
They can easily turn this main idea into a very specific instruction: “Write a blog that explains why bunnies are fulfilling but challenging pets.” This is much clearer than “Write a blog post about bunnies,” so it’s now more likely that their writer will submit what they want.
What actions the content should encourage
Some content is intended to just convey information. Other content is intended to push the audience — subtly or not — to take an action that moves them farther down the marketing funnel. Explaining which category your content falls into is another important dimension of communicating what the content should accomplish.
If your piece about bunnies really is just intended to share information, the writer can include any bunny care tips they find relevant. If it’s to drive readers to buy rabbit food and toys from your company, though, you’d want the blog post to include sections on nutrition and enrichment.
Describing the actions you want readers to take in your brief helps ensure that you get content that’s not only well-written, but that also helps you reach to your marketing goals.
Anything Else Unique About the Content
The above are what I consider creative brief “must-haves.” Every company has their own quirks and requirements, though, and it’s good to take a minute and consider whether you have any unique needs a freelancer should know.
For example, if you have a preference for how the creative approaches SEO or how many cross-links a blog should have, write that down in the brief. If you like bulleted lists or hate passive voice, those are things a writer should know.
Additionally, if there are any details you definitely want to make sure are in the final product, now is the time to add them. You may assume that any article about bunny care will include a section on nutrition, but your writer may not. If there’s anything you know you want from your content, no matter how small or obvious, it’s safer to put it in the brief.
All this may seem involved, but if you get in the habit of writing thorough creative briefs, the process will gradually become quicker and easier. (The headings in this post can be used as a checklist, if you want.) You won’t regret it when your creatives start submitting drafts that barely need editing.
Nicole D'Angelo 