Creative excellence is the result of a meticulous brand strategy.

You will always get the creative that you deserve based on your precision and singularity when you’re developing your strategy.

So before engaging in any creative, define your brand strategy. This is your foundation for building a brand aligned with something that only you own.

And then, when you are ready to develop creativity, write a tight creative brief that sets the strategic direction for this particular piece of creative.

A creative brief identifies your choice along each of these dimensions:

• First, what’s the format? What type of creativity is this? A tagline? An ad? A logo? A photoshoot?

• The second choice is target audience. Who are we trying to reach with this particular piece of creativity?

• Third, the net takeaway. What is the single most important thing that you want the audience to take away from this piece of creative?

• Fourth, support. What is your proof for this net takeaway?

• Fifth, desired action. What is the action that you want your target audience to make after interacting with this creative?

• Sixth, tonality. How should you come across? What is the tone?

• And finally, executional mandatories. What are the specific, nit-picky tactical elements that need to be present for this creative to be viable?

Do you write a brief before embarking on developing any piece of creativity? Remember, when you set the strategic direction with a tight and choiceful creative brief, you set the conditions for effective creativity.