Recap of Session plan

BIMTECH - IMC
Session-wise Plan (3 hours/session) 1! Introduction to IMC 2 Organization for Advertising & Promotion! 3 Source Message and Channel Factors! 4 Creative Strategy: Planning & Development! 5 Media Planning & Strategy! 6 Sales Promotion! 7! Public Relations! 8 Direct Marketing & Personnel Selling! 9 Events Marketing! 10 Group Assignments & Presentations! !

Creative Strategy:  Planning & Development

(30-Jan-2012)

Rishabh Mehrotra

http://www.linkedin.com/in/rishabhmehrotra | email: rishabh@rrth.co

Module aim

1. o discuss what is meant by advertising creativity and examine the role of T creative strategy in advertising. 2. o examine creative strategy development and the roles of various client T and agency personnel involved in it. 3. o consider the process that guides the creation of advertising messages T and the research inputs into the stages of the creative process. 4. rovide you with some best practice guidelines on how this works in the P real life scenario.

Point for discussion with the class:

What

is advertising creativity?

Point for discussion with the class:

What

is the role of creative strategy in advertising?

Determine

what the advertising message with say or communicate and how will we say it...

Point for discussion:

If you have a product like this do you really need a creative strategy to talk about this?

The creative process of advertising is guided by specific goals and objectives and requires the development of a creative strategy or plan of action for achieving the goal. Creative Strategy development actually begins with a thorough assessment of the marketing and promotional situation and a determination of what needs to be communicated to the marketers target audience. Creative strategy should, however, also be based on a number of other factors that are stated in the Briefing Process.

The Brieng process

Provides a plan or checklist that is useful in guiding the development of an advertising message or campaign. This document is prepared by the agency team or group assigned to the account and may include creative personnel as well as the account coordinator and representatives from media and research. The advertising manager and/or the marketing and product manager from the client side will also be involved in the process and must approve this document.

Forget, just

for a minute, that you are preparing a creative

brief.

Instead

pretend that you are standing on the bank of a river about to build a bridge

Around

you are architects, builders, all sorts of different experts that you have hired to help you. They might come from different specialities, companies, they might come from a single-one-stop-bridge-building company
really does not matter - all that matters is that you can build the best and most effective bridge you can
what brief should you give them in order to get that perfect bridge?

It

So

How

about - Where it should start from?

How

about - Where it should start from?

are you standing right now?
is point A

where where they

need to know that - it is not up for debate... right?

And

what about - where it should nish?

And

what about - where it should nish?

is point B - the destination - right?

where if

i were an architect - thats the bit of information i would want made pretty clear --

Finally

- what about - how to build the bridge itself?

Finally

- what about - how to build the bridge itself?

Probably

not - may be you would give them some ideas on what the bridge may look like, what vehicles will need to go over it or under it, how high the hand rails should be, etc.
you are not going to tell them how to build that bridge thats their job - you are going to sit back and wait to see the drawings

but

Its

the same with brieng the agencies:

need to know where you are now

They and

they need to know where you want to get to

will success look like?

What How

will it be measured?

Why write a brief?

There

are three compelling reasons why it is worth writing a brief - for every piece of work that you commission an agency to do?

It It It

leads to better, more effective and measurable work

saves time and money
makes remuneration fairer

The principals behind a good brief

Written Clarity Clearly

briefs

of thinking
dened objectives

written briefs

Research

shows that 94% of clients and 98% of agencies believe that a combination of written and verbal brieng is ideal

Clarity of thinking

good brief is not the longest and most detailed,

one whose clarity and focus

its

they

are briefs because they are meant to be brief - they are a summation of your thinking

Clearly dened objectives

Ultimately

the point of communication is to get people to do things. Which people? What things? Youve got the basis of the brief right there. Everything else is detail

(Source: ISPA - Brieng research 2002: Agency Sample)

what a good grief should contain

Project Where Where What Who How

Management
are we now?
do we want to be?

are we doing to get there?

do we need to talk to?

will we know we have arrived?

Practicalities
Approvals.

project management

Ensure

basic facts of the project are provided:

name, project type, job no. etc.

Date, project Company/

operating company/ brand owner

Brand: Name/ Varient

Client Team: Names/ Agency(s): Names/

titles/contact details

titles/contact details

Where are we now?

Describing the current position of the brand

its background
key issues it faces
denes the start point for the journey on which communication will take the brand

The brief should try to contain the following information:

product or service description (including key attributes and benets)

manufacturing or service delivery
distribution channels
market size (volume and value)
customer usage data
the brands positioning
its history of brand communications
competitive brands/ products and their communication activity, etc.

Where do we want to be?

This

section denes the desired destination of the journey on which the successful communication will take you
single minded and measurable objective is usually a prerequisite

Typical

objectives are to effect improvement in sales, usage, awareness, image, reputation, protability, customer prole, shareholder value, and/ or response levels - although there are many other possible objectives of communications

What are we doing to get there?

Marketing Campaign

strategy
strategy

WHo do we need to talk to?

all communications are designed to elicit a certain form of response from a particular group of people
these target groups should be dened and prioritized as accurately as possible via

demographics
lifestyle
product usage
attitudes, etc

equally important are the insights that you and your agency(ies) already hold about these target groups that can be leveraged to create the desired reaction
often your agency will conduct further research to generate even greater understanding - and your existing insights will provide them the useful and welcome platform to build on.

How will we know weve arrived?

you

and your agency needs to know what success (or failure) will look like

ideally

measures should be put in place to establish weather the campaign delivers against the desired objectives

how

will the campaign be measured?

will it be measured?

when who

will measure it?

remember

that most communication campaigns are steps along the path of a bigger journey - progress towards the bigger longer term and corporate goal should also be measured

PRACTICALITIES

BUDGETS
TIMINGS
OTHER

CONSIDERATIONS

APPROVALS

Name

of the person who has the authority to sign off the

work?

recap

Start Here
1. Project management
2. Where are we now?
3. Where do we want to be?
4. What are we doing to get there?
5. Who do we need to talk to?
6. How will we know weve arrived?
7. Practicalities
8. Approvals
Brief Now

A. The Briefing Process A copy platform provides a plan or checklist that is useful in guiding the development of an advertising message or campaign. This document is prepared by the agency team or group assigned to the account and may include creative personnel as well as the account coordinator and representatives from media and research. The advertising manager and/or the marketing and product manager from the client side will also be involved in the process and must approve it. B. Advertising Campaigns Most advertisements are part of a series of messages that make up an advertising campaign, which consists of multiple messages, often in a variety of media that center on a single theme or idea. The determination of the central theme, idea, position, or image is a critical part of the creative process as it sets the tone or direction for the development of the individual ads that make up the campaign. C. The Search for the Major Selling Idea An important part of creative strategy development is determining the central theme that will become the major selling idea or big idea for the ad campaign. There are several different approaches that can be used for developing major selling ideas and as the basis of creative strategy. Some of the best known and most discussed approaches include: 1. The unique selling proposition this concept, which was mentioned in the opening vignette, is described in Rosser Reeves Reality in Advertising. Its three characteristics include: each advertisement must make a proposition to the consumer the proposition must be one that the competition either cannot or does not offer the proposition must be strong enough to pull over new customers to your brand 2. Creating a brand image some competing brands are so similar it is difficult to find or create a unique attribute or benefit so the creative strategy is based on the development of a strong, memorable identity for the brand through image advertising. 3. Finding the inherent drama -Leo Burnett believed advertising should be based on a foundation of consumer benefits with an emphasis on the dramatic element in expressing these benefits. D. Positioning the basic idea is that advertising is used to establish or position the product or service in a particular place in the consumers mind.

Sources, References and additional reading material:

THE CLIENT BRIEF - a best practice guide to brieng communication agencies - Communications Agencies Federation (CAF) & ISBA-The Incorporated Society of British Advertisers (ISBA)
TRUTH, LIES & ADVERTISING - THE ART OF ACCOUNT PLANNING - JON STEEL

ADVERTISING MANAGEMENT - BATRA, AAKER & MYERS

OGILVY ON ADVERTISING - DAVID OGILVY

CONSUMER BEHAVIOUR - INSIGHTS FROM INDIAN MARKET - RAMANUJ MAJUMDAR