Elevating Your Creative

The secret to producing great advertising doesn't just lie with an agency. Great 'clients' are as responsible for effective, motivating and creative campaigns as their agency partners. In fact, in the agency world, they say that 'clients get the advertising they deserve'.

So what is a marketer's role in the creative process and how can you become expert in it? All of the essential touch points, skills, techniques and insights will be covered in this highly interactive and dynamic workshop lead by a former agency Creative Director.

Over two days, participants will take a deep dive into the critical areas requiring skillful collaboration and learn how to deliver the kind of information, inspiration, focus and clarity that will make you not only a dream client, but a more powerful and effective marketer capable of activating and empowering successful creative campaigns every time.

Who is This Course For?

Managers responsible for advertising development or agency relationships and those new to managing advertising, including brand managers, assistant brand managers and senior professionals wishing to refresh their skills.

Key Takeaways

• How to better understand, manage and empower in the Creative Process.
• How to set the course for advertising success
• Understanding what truly triggers consumers and why – Targets & Insights
• The power of a positioning statement and how it's used
• How to write an inspirational and strategic Creative Brief
• Best practices for evaluating Creative & providing actionable feedback
• How to ask for, empower and recognize a Big Idea vs. a Loud Idea
• The difference between creative execution & full-fledged advertising campaigns
• Understanding Integrated Marketing Communications and the kind of campaigns that result from it
• What it feels like to walk in Agency Creative shoes

When

Where

Reed Smith, LLP
305 Wacker Drive
Chicago, IL 60606

Registration Pricing

Agenda

DAY 1

Introductions to session & instructor

Session Objectives

Understanding the Creative Mind

• What is creativity?
• Marketer’s role in the creative process
• The triune brain
• Empowering creative partners to success

Defining Advertising Objectives, Criteria and Success      

• Understanding what advertising can and can’t accomplish
• Developing a ‘single-minded objective’
• Applying strategy across campaigns – what will work where and for who?
• Developing credible criteria
• What will success look like and how will it be measured?

Demystifying Positioning Statements

• What is a positioning statement and what is it used for?
• Examples of good brand positioning
• The 4 elements
• The difference between a positioning statement and a brief

Developing a Great Creative Brief        

• Questions to ask and answer to inform any Brief
• Getting past the ‘template’
• Targets: From demographic to psychographic
• Going from insights to action
• Balancing information & inspiration
• How to write a Brief that makes the creative team say “I get it!”
• Interactive Exercise(s)

DAY 2

 Evaluating Creative

• How to assess creative work
• Marketer’s role in creative presentations
• Using the Brief
• Evaluation and assessment tools

 The Art of Feedback         

• What is effective feedback?
• How to deliver it
• Interactive Exercise(s)

  What’s The Big Idea                     

• What defines a Big Idea?
• Big Ideas vs Loud Ideas
• Recognizing campaignable ideas vs. one-offs
• Applying Communication strategy in idea selection
• Interactive Exercise

 Ideas in Action - Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC)     

• What and why of Integrated Marketing Communications
• Elements of a good IMC campaign
• Testing the theories
• Interactive Exercise (The Idea Satellite)