When establishing your marketing objectives for a new product, campaign, or project, your first step is to develop a creative brief template.
A creative brief in advertising is your roadmap to success. It outlines each step of the marketing process, including your key messaging, content needs, and expectations.
You’ll assign a role to every person involved in your newest marketing project, and they’ll use the details in the brief to execute their strategy, ensuring that it aligns with the campaign’s messaging and target audience.
Creative briefs provide all the critical information managers and staff need as they work through their processes. If you need help preparing your next brief, Galactic Fed has several creative brief samples to get you started.
Critical Elements of a Creative Brief
What essential factors should a creative brief contain? Ideally, all of the following.
Project Name
You’ll want to begin your creative brief with a name for your project. If you have multiple campaigns running simultaneously, your team can refer to its name if they have questions. Naming your project also makes it easy to compare it with other projects when measuring their effectiveness.
Project Objectives
Your project objectives describe why the campaign is essential and should provide an overview of the project’s goals. This section should be brief, just a few short sentences.
Target Audience
All good creative briefs include a section identifying the campaign’s target audience. The marketing team uses information about the audience to curate content that’s relevant to their needs.
You’ll want to go beyond simple demographic details here. Instead, touch on the audience’s motivations or pain points.
Competitor Summary
The competitor summary provides a high-level overview of your competitor’s strengths and weaknesses. If they’ve implemented a similar campaign, highlight their project’s strong points and flaws. You’ll want to take advantage of their weaknesses to reach more individuals in your target audience.
Messaging Guidelines
Your messaging guidelines convey the points you seek to communicate to your audience. This section should summarize the value proposition of the campaign or its significance. You can also identify any messaging the project shouldn’t include.
Specific Deliverables
Every marketing project will have specific deliverables that play a part in getting your message out to your audience. Deliverables can include social media ads, video content, articles or blogs, whitepapers, or promotional emails. Assign each deliverable to specific people involved in the project.
Timeline
You should set deadlines for each deliverable to make sure your team has plenty of time to meet their goals. Smaller projects may require only a few days, while large-scale campaigns might take weeks to complete. Consider scheduling regular meetings if your project is lengthy to guarantee that the process flows smoothly.
Generally, your briefs will use text to describe the project. However, creative brief graphic design can further inspire your marketing team and highlight specific items central to your campaign.
Creative Brief Templates for Motivation
We’ve curated a few illustrative creative brief examples to inspire your next advertising project.
Social Media Advertising Creative Brief
In a social media advertising creative brief, you’re defining the objectives of a social media campaign and how you’ll reach them. For example:
Project Name: Facebook Ads for ABC Jewelry’s Diamond Necklace
Project Objective: The ad will increase ABC Jewelry’s Diamond Necklace sales by 10% for the Valentine’s Day holiday. We’ll want to showcase the necklace’s beauty in an eye-catching ad while highlighting its low price.
Client Information: The client is a jeweler in Tampa, Florida. They have an online store that serves consumers in the continental U.S. Most of their customers are between the ages of 25 and 45, and they have a 50-50 mix of in-store and online clients.
Website: https://www.abcjewelry.com
Facebook URL: https://www.facebook.com/ABCJewelry
URL to Client’s Facebook Profile: https://www.abcjewelry.com/diamondnecklace123
Target Audience: People seeking to purchase a diamond necklace for their significant other for Valentine’s Day. Ages 25–45 living in Tampa, FL.
Competitor Summary: Competitors include national jewelers like Zales, Helzberg Diamonds, Tiffany & Co., and Pandora. One local competitor, XYZ Jewelry.
While competitors offer jewelry sales for Valentine’s Day, they emphasize engagement rings. We’re taking a different approach by discounting a popular diamond necklace in the shape of a heart.
Messaging Guidelines: Our diamond necklace is cheaper than other options but doesn’t compromise on quality. We have limited stock available, so shop in-store or order online today. Describe how a diamond necklace can solidify your relationship with your partner.
Specific Deliverables: Two Facebook ads, including a carousel photo post and a short-form video. Both ads should be viewable on desktops and mobile phones.
Marketing Budget: Initially $500; will increase spending depending on revenue from the first round of ads.
KPI Measurements: Click-through rate (CTR), average engagement rate, conversion rate, cost-per-click
Timeline: Create ads within two days; measure results by the end of the first week.
Sample Creative Brief for Video Advertising
In this creative brief template, the company is seeking to expand brand awareness through a video campaign.
Project Name: Espresso X’s Toffee Nut Coffee Video Campaign
Project Objective: Create awareness for Espresso X’s Toffee Nut Coffee, a new flavor they’ve released for the winter holiday season. The goal is to drive more traffic to Espresso X’s website.
Client Information: Espresso X is a producer of gourmet coffees in Canada. They ship their coffee worldwide and do not have a store outlet.
Website: https://www.espressox.com
Facebook URL: https://www.facebook.com/espressox
Target Audience: High-end consumers with excess disposable income, ages 30–50, living in Canada and the U.S. People who love gourmet coffee, including previous customers. Executives and other professionals.
Competitor Summary: The Great American Coffee Company, Starbucks, Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, New England Coffee. While many coffee companies offer holiday flavors, Espresso X’s Toffee Nut is unique in this space.
Key Messaging Guidelines: Emphasize the toffee nut flavor with hints of caramel, almonds, and butter. No other gourmet coffee company offers Toffee Nut; Espresso X does. Premium and luxury flavor that will please coffee lovers everywhere.
Specific Deliverables: A 15-second video to place on Espresso X’s website and distributed through Facebook and Instagram.
Marketing Budget: $2,000 for a two-week campaign
KPI Measurements: User engagement and click-through rate
Timeline: Video planning, filming, and editing — one week. Go live during week two, with results measured weekly.
Creative Brief Example for Blog Post
In this creative brief sample, we’ll outline the writing requirements for a new blog post intended to attract organic traffic and establish authority.
Project Name: How to Knit a Sweater (for Beginners)
Project Goals: Explain the process of knitting a sweater to individuals new to knitting. Use lots of pictures and informative descriptions to ensure that readers leave with the knowledge they need to start their first sweater project. Build awareness of the company’s knitting books and kits they can use to begin their knitting journey.
Client Information: The Knitting Universe is a one-stop shop for all knitters, including beginners, advanced knitters, and experts. The company offers several self-published books containing instructions for knitting projects and dozens of kits for beginners.
Website: https://www.theknittinguniverse.com
Future Blog Post URL: https://www.theknittinguniverse.com/how-to-knit-a-sweater-beginners
Target Audience: Primarily women in the U.S. interested in learning to knit. Readers will likely range in age from 15 to 65. The interests of the target audience include handcrafts, sewing, and knitting. The audience will consist of people who want to learn to knit but don’t have access to in-person classes or a mentor.
Competitor Information: Few competitors offer detailed descriptions and pictures to create a sweater from scratch.
Wikihow provides general instructions but doesn’t delve into details like knitting in the round or casting on. The Spruce Crafts provides generic guidance without instructions. Neither site offers a complete kit to get the beginning knitter started.
Keywords to Include: Incorporate a mix of relevant keywords, including all of the following, in subheadings where possible:
- How to knit a sweater for beginners 3x
- Knitting a sweater 2x
- Materials for knitting a sweater 1x
- Knitting in the round 1x
Content Requirements: Provide a step-by-step guide for knitting a sweater for beginners. Include at least 10 pictures readers can reference as they work. Minimum word count of 3,000.
Include a CTA for The Knitting Universe’s complete kit containing all the materials needed to knit a child’s, men’s, or women’s sweater in various sizes.
Key Messaging: The tone should be explanatory and informational while inspiring aspiring knitters who want to knit a sweater for the first time.
KPI Measurements: Total visits to the blog page, comments and shares for the post, orders for the kit to make a sweater from the post link, bounce rate.
Timeline: Complete writing and editing of blog content within one week. Measure the results from the post over six months from the publishing date.
A Creative Brief Sets the Tone for Your Marketing Project
Our creative brief templates will guide you the next time you have a critical marketing project that needs a clear roadmap. Using your creative brief, you’ll explain the essential elements of the project while providing your advertising team the room they need to express their talents.
