By Peter Mountford, freelance senior copywriter at AFFINITY Agency Group As a freelance copywriter, you get to see how lots of agencies work. They all have their quirks. Some are run with German precision; others are run with seemingly no processes at all – a blur of frantic energy and creativity.
Some have beer fridges that would put your local to shame; others start Mondays with a group yoga session. One thing most have in common is that they struggle to consistently nail great propositions on their briefs. There’s no doubt a lot of valid reasons for that, but here’s what I’d love to see if I had three wishes: 1.
Keep it simple Oh so obvious, I hear you say. But why then is it so difficult to achieve in real-world briefs? Creatives are taught the power of a simple and single-minded brief right from the start of their careers. At Award School, we were given a series of mock briefs, usually with blissfully simple propositions, like: • Windex Glass cleaner – For the cleanest glass • Vanish Napisan – Effective against all stains • Banana Boat – Spend more time in the sun Then, when we start working in agencies ‘for real’, things become complicated.
Propositions are rarely single-minded and are more often a shopping list of generic product features. The Vanish Napisan example from above becomes something like, ‘Brightens colours, removes stains, works in cold wash, is good for the environment and is great value.’ Ummm, where to start? There’s every .