“We Have Met the Enemy and It is Us” (Actually, It's the Brief)

As we discussed in Chapter 3, the starting point is the strategy, or as it's sometimes called, the brief. The brief is a blueprint that gives us direction by helping us understand objectives, the audience, and what needs to be communicated.

For years, the standard advertising briefs (Figure 11.3a) were designed to reduce a target audience to a single motivating insight and produce a single message platform. “What's the one thing we need to say?”

Because of its focus, lots of creative folks liked this format; they knew the one thing the advertising had to convey. And there's nothing wrong with this IF we're dead set on making a message-based ad. But as you might expect, considering the way most briefs are written, it's not surprising we see a lot of advertising that talks at people. It's possible that such a brief can actually become a deterrent to doing work for a digital age.

If we're to create fresh, original work that connects with people, invites them to play along, and adds value to their lives, our brands probably need to do something rather than say something.

So what would happen if we were to toss out the old advertising brief and craft one that doesn't ask for an advertising answer, doesn't ask for a message? Then, what if we added a part titled “deliverables” just to make it clear we're not necessarily looking for an ad? And what if we focused more on simply solving problems? Embraced our customers, rather than targeted them? Included them rather than interrupted them? Listened more than talked?

If we did all that, our brief might look something like this (Figure 11.3b).

That's not to say this brief is the only alternative. In fact, what we're showing here is intentionally an oversimplified form, one we've made to emphasize doing vs. saying. Ideally, a new, improved brief might ask and answer some or all of these questions:

1. What problem are we trying to solve?
2. What do we want to happen?
3. With whom are we trying to connect, influence, or engage?
4. What can we do for them: solve a problem, provide service, entertain, inform?
5. What is the context for engaging with them?
6. What cultural or media trends are our customers already following that make sense for us to align with?
7. Is it consistent with the brand's position and purpose?
8. What digital platforms are the most relevant?
9. Could customers and prospects be potential cocreators or sharers?
10. What will inspire them to participate?
11. Does greater participation make the experience more appealing, i.e. the network effect?
12. Are we making something temporary or enduring?
13. Can we create something of social value?

In Paid Attention, Faris Yakob offered his new format for a brief (Figure 11.4). Note it refers to a community, not a target audience. It takes into consideration the current discussions going on in social media. It asks what the brand can do for the community. And it concludes not with an attitude change so much as a change in behavior. That behavior might be to buy something, but it may also be an intermediate behavior such as sharing something, joining in an experience, or creating some cool content. whipple5anewbrief

The Post–Bill-Bernbach Creative Team

In the 1960s, when Bill Bernbach first put copywriters and art directors in the same room to work as a team, his simple coupling launched the industry's Creative Revolution and dramatically changed how advertising was created. But today, if you're a writer or art director, you might also want to be in the room with a creative technologist, a user experience (UX) designer, and a social media strategist. Maybe even a media creative.

A good creative technologist knows not only how to write code and build things, but can also inspire you with the possibilities of the new technologies. A UX person can think about experiences, installations, digital or otherwise. Someone who knows social media might contribute ideas on how to engage users and get them to spread an idea. And a media creative might have ways of connecting a brand to users and communities you'd probably not get to on your own. Some variation of the new team makes sense whether you're creating work that is digital or work that simply gets digital (see page 175).

Partner with Creative People Who aren't in the Advertising Business

In the early days of the social Web, Mullen (now Mullen/Lowe) wanted to establish itself as an ad agency that also understood social media. The brief was simple: Convince prospects that the agency could handle their social media. Facebook was still new and Twitter was in its infancy, but Mullen correctly predicted the new platforms would be a growing source of business for both their clients and the agency.

Mullen also knew an ad in the trades wouldn't do much. And a new business mailer to prospects and consultants certainly wouldn't have clients knocking the doors down, either. Instead, the agency assembled a team that included a developer, a 22-year-old social media intern, a digital designer, and a copywriter, and the team came up with the “Brandbowl,” a platform that tracked, in real time, viewers' reactions to Super Bowl commercials on Twitter.

The agency partnered with a semantics analysis company, scoured the trades for information about every advertiser planning to run a commercial on the game, generated a list of keywords that could be tracked, seeded the conversation on Twitter with the hashtag #Brandbowl, and tapped into Twitter's Firehose which enabled access to Twitter's full stream of content in real time. The Mullen team then built a website to capture, analyze, and rank the most talked-about and best-liked ads on the game. It started a conversation, captured user comments, converted conversations into data, and generated awareness for the agency's social media capabilities.

The results are worth noting: 140 million overall Twitter, blog, and media impressions; 1,000-plus new followers for the agency's social influence team; a 300 percent increase in traffic to Mullen's website; and four new clients, including Zappos and Timberland.

Combine Art, Copy, and Technology

What made Brandbowl work was a collaboration that blended storytelling creatives with technologists and systems thinkers. The core idea—track and rank viewer sentiment—came from the intern. The name, along with the look and feel of the website, came from the designer. But it was the systems thinkers who figured out how all the different parts had to come together to make the experience both functional and creative.

Another notable example in this space is Wieden+Kennedy's acclaimed Old Spice Twitter Response campaign. The agency had already created the iconic character in the “Old Spice Guy,” aka “The Man Your Man Could Smell Like,” played by Isaiah Mustafa. Wieden's people figured if they took the character to Twitter and had him engage directly with users, it could generate even more social buzz. The Twitter Response campaign had Isaiah responding directly to fans' social media comments in the form of YouTube videos posted in near real time. whipple5oldspice

In just three days the team produced 186 personal video messages.¹

Some of the videos were written, filmed, and uploaded within 15 minutes. W+K had to construct a digital system to source questions from social media, quickly assess their creative and viral potential, write answers, and send them to a teleprompter for near instant recording. Granted, that took a talented creative team of writers, art directors, and producers to pull off, as well as a client at the ready to approve ideas extremely quickly. But it also called for digital strategists and developers, folks who knew how to use Twitter as a social search engine and a distribution channel and who could design the system and process to make the campaign work.

According to Fortune,² the idea was also attributable in large part to the arrival of Iain Tait, the agency's new interactive creative director. Iain had recently joined W+K from the London-based digital agency Poke, where he'd been doing innovative things with Twitter such as developing a tweet-generating dial that let bakers alert customers whenever tasty treats where coming hot out of the oven. Tait knew how to apply new technologies—everything from Arduino microcontrollers to Internet shields—that most traditional creative teams wouldn't even know existed.³

Brandbowl and Old Spice Twitter Response show the value of a more diverse team for digital projects that get digital. The need for different roles around the table becomes even more apparent when you're making things that are digital.

It's no Longer About “the Dude With the Idea”

A few years ago, Google's Art Copy & Code team launched an experiment called Project Re: Brief, to reimagine several famous ad campaigns as if the briefs were written today. Google's team believed too many agencies and clients were still producing message-based advertising when they could be using technology to connect with and engage customers. The exercise was conceived to show how creative ideas and technology could coexist beautifully. It also dramatized the importance of adding new members to the original art director and copywriter (AD/CW) team.

You can visit projectrebrief.com for the entire story, but for now let's look at just one example. Art, Copy & Code reimagined the classic Coca-Cola “Hilltop” TV commercial as a digital experience (Figure 11.5). Instead of singing “I'd like to buy the world a Coke,” a team of creatives, technologists, engineers, and UX people, working with the original ad creator Harvey Gabor, turned what was just a message into an experience.

The team created a platform that let you make good on the promise of the 1971 hilltop commercial; it allowed you to buy the world a Coke, right from your computer or phone. The experience let Coke drinkers connect with people on the other side of the world. You could select a location, attach a personal video or text message, and then watch as your video was delivered to a vending machine thousands of miles away, along with the pleasing “thunk” of a free can of Coke being dispensed. From the other end, the happy recipient could use the vending machine's built-in webcam to record a thank-you message and instantly dispatch it back to you. Instead of an ad that sang about buying the world a Coke, the new concept, with the help of a little technology, let people actually do it. whipple5hilltop

Gone are the days when the copywriter and art director were expected to come up with “the idea” and then throw it over the wall for the tech team to “make it digital.” You need some serious digital and systems thinking in the room from the beginning. According to Google's Aman Govil, a core team today should have copy, art, UX, visual and motion design, and a digital developer.

But this new team also has to work differently, too.

Unite Storytellers and Systems Thinkers

The Project Re: Brief team has something else going for it. It combined what we call traditional creatives with skilled systems thinkers. Traditional creatives tend to be storytellers. Art directors and writers are very good at distilling a brand to a single, memorable story line or tagline. Systems thinkers, on the other hand, are versed in building and connecting platforms and technologies to make something complex work.

“Storytelling is about simplifying, while systems thinking is about possibilities,” says Nick Law, chief creative officer at R/GA. “Since the emergence of digital, architectural and spatial thinking are as important as good storytelling.”

Historically, most ad agencies have labeled the storytellers “the creatives” and relegated the systems thinkers to execution and building. R/GA's Law cautions this is too limiting a definition of creative and will likely result in shortsighted ideas. “When all you have is simple storytelling, you get lucid thinking but no innovation,” Law explains. “When all you have are systems thinkers, you get interesting and multiple tactics, but they don't ladder up to a simple brand idea.”

“Keep the Team to Two Pizzas”

All of this implies we need a team with more than Bernbach's original duo.

Of course you don't want the group to be too big, either. Ben Malbon, another Google employee who leads a group of technologists, producers, and creatives, suggests you limit a team's size. In a recent talk, he explained the 7, 10, 4 Principle: Seven people do the work of seven people. Ten people do the work of seven people. And four people do the work of seven people. So you might as well keep the team to four people. A writer, art director, producer, strategist. Or a designer, developer, UX, and writer. Whatever is appropriate for the task at hand. But if you do need even more, Ben has another suggestion. “Never let the team get larger than two pizzas. If you can't feed the team with two pizzas, the team is too big.”

A good size for the modern team was also expressed in the way Toronto-based agency Taxi came up with its name: “A team should be able to fit into a cab.”

Fewer Generals, More Soldiers

If the two-pizza team is absolutely not possible, you'll quickly discover that getting a larger group to work seamlessly can be a challenge. Sometimes the most vocal member doesn't have the best ideas, and sometimes the person who does is the least likely to speak up. In an ad agency, especially one that's historically been advertising-centric, there's also the possibility the creative director will be less digitally savvy than others on the team. Too often the team anticipates the creative director's default setting for traditional media and comes up with ordinary work. Other times it can be the general culture of an agency that fosters a mindset of solving every problem with an ad; ads have been the way they've done things for years.

What all this suggests is that to build an effective creative team, it's important to eliminate any hierarchy and bring everyone to the table as equals, especially at the conceptual stage. As it turns out, the table itself is a great place to begin changing how we do business.

At Pixar, creative teams meet at round tables rather than the standard rectangle. In Creativity, Inc., Pixar President Ed Catmull said that for some 13 years, they held their production meetings at a long, elegant conference table. Despite the table's beauty, Catmull grew to hate it because he saw how it exerted too much control over the team's dynamics. In the conference room at Pixar's headquarters, 30 people would sit at the table facing each other in two long lines. The big cheeses—director and producer—who had to be at the center of the conversation always occupied the middle of the table while everyone else was relegated to the outer ends. But sitting on the far ends meant it was harder to hear, difficult to establish eye contact, and ultimately very hard to be included in the conversation.

The table's shape declared, “If you sit in the middle, your ideas matter. If you sit at the ends, they don't.” But one day, quite by accident, a production meeting had to be moved to a smaller room, one with a square table. What happened was transformative. Nobody felt at a disadvantage. Eye contact was automatic. New ideas flowed freely. Everyone was involved. And team communication was vastly improved.

Take the head of the table away and everyone's ideas stand a chance.

Shut Up and Write

Another way to foster a more collaborative post-Bernbach team (art, copy, tech, production, and design) is a simple but smart process created by Tim Leake of RPA and former instructor at Hyper Island.

Assemble the team, pass out the brief, and tell everyone there'll be no discussion at all.

Instead, insist on dead silence and ask everyone to write down as many ideas as they can. And—this is the important part—ask everybody to think about the problem from only their perspective. A developer, then, should be thinking particularly about what can be built, about what new technologies might be relevant, and whether there are ways to engage or inspire the developer community. The UX person should concentrate on ideas that start with user behaviors. A writer might jot down multiple creative expressions or story ideas. This simple exercise will accomplish four things:

1. It will prevent any one person from dominating the conversation.
2. It will assure even the quietest member of the team gets his or her ideas on the table.
3. It virtually guarantees you won't start with messages or ads.
4. It usually yields 50 to 100 fast ideas worth further exploration and development.

Bottom line: If you want to conceive and produce digital ideas, you need a digital approach to how you think, the brief you write, the team you assemble, and the way you work.

Like the old saying, “It's simple. All you have to do is change everything.”