A brand that receives six unusable videos almost never picked the wrong creators. It sent the same vague brief six times, and six different people read it differently, which is exactly what a vague brief asks for. The brief is not the formality before the work, it is the only part of the work the brand fully controls.
What a brief actually buys
A brief does not buy a video, it buys a shared intention. The difference shows on delivery: when the brief has done its job, the brand gets what it expected without having described it shot by shot; when it has not, the brand gets something competent that does not serve.
The costliest reflex is mistaking a brief for a script. A script written in the creator's place produces a video that sounds like a read advertisement, which cancels the one thing UGC brings, whereas a well written brief gets the opposite result by saying less. A brief describes the frame: who is being spoken to, what they should understand, what must not be said, and where the video will live. The rest belongs to the person holding the camera.
The six lines a brief has to name
| Line of the brief | Useful length | What it prevents | Cost when missing |
|---|---|---|---|
| Target audience | 1 sentence | A tone addressed to everyone | 1 video reshot |
| Single message | 1 sentence | Three arguments in 30 seconds | 1 video reshot |
| Distribution platform | 3 words | A vertical cut for a horizontal feed | 1 re-edit |
| Expected length | 3 words | A 90 second video trimmed to 15 | 1 re-edit |
| Explicit no-go list | 3 bullets | An unlawful health or price claim | The whole batch |
| Rights purchased | 2 sentences | An unpaid advertising reuse | A dispute |
Those six lines fit on one page and take twenty minutes to write. Most French briefs run to three of them and name only two, which amounts to paying for a full production in order to discover on delivery what could have been written beforehand. The last two lines are the ones whose absence is paid not in a re-edit but in a lost batch, and they are statistically the two that go missing.
The line almost everyone forgets
The no-go list. A supplement brand that does not tell the creator what may not be claimed will receive an enthusiastic and unlawful video, and will have to bin it. A cosmetics brand that does not spell out that "anti-ageing" and "erases wrinkles" are not written the same way will find out after the shoot. Writing three prohibitions costs two minutes and saves an entire production.
The line that costs most when it is missing
Rights. A brief that says "a video for Instagram", followed by a brand that runs it as paid advertising and then on the homepage, bought one use and took three. In France a creator's video is an authored work: what is not assigned in writing is not assigned at all, and the brief is the first place the scope of that assignment should appear.
Write the constraint, not the intention
"We want something authentic" is not a brief, it is a wish. A creator cannot act on it, so they do what they usually do, and the brand calls that a casting problem.
The useful phrasing is always a constraint: "shot in daylight", "no music", "product visible in the first three seconds", "no price mentioned". A constraint can be checked on delivery. An intention cannot.
The third-party read test
Before sending, hand the brief to someone who does not know the product and ask what they would film. If the answer surprises you, the brief is not ready. The test takes five minutes and replaces a full round of revisions.
What French law requires you to write
Since the law of 9 June 2023 governing commercial influence, a commercial communication must be identifiable as such, and a missing disclosure exposes the brand as much as the creator. The wording "publicité" or "collaboration commerciale" has to be visible throughout the video, not only in the caption.
In practice that changes one line of the brief: instead of letting the creator decide how to flag the collaboration, the brand writes the exact wording and where it appears. That is not a creative constraint, it is the only way not to discover the problem once the campaign is live.
Serious creators already know this and ask for it. The ones who do not ask are precisely the ones you have to write it for.
The deadline, which is almost never in the brief
The brief says what to film and forgets when the product arrives. A creator who receives the sample on Tuesday for a Friday delivery has 2 useful days, not 4: they need time to actually try it in order to speak about it honestly, and that is precisely what is being bought.
Writing two dates instead of one settles the question. The shipping date and the expected delivery date, with the number of working days between them, make the deadline negotiable before the agreement rather than reproachable after it. A food or cosmetics brand will add a third line, the minimum usage period expected before filming, without which the opinion is not one.
The brief a creator can refuse
A good brief is refusable. If it is not, it is because it says nothing precise enough to disagree with.
A creator who answers "I am not the right person for this" after reading the brief has saved you a production. A creator who accepts everything without a question has probably not read it, or intends to deliver what they always deliver. The most common objection, when a brand dares to invite it, is about the deadline: many briefs ask in four days for a shoot that needs eight, and nobody says so before the late delivery.
What changes when you brief five creators
One brief sent to five people produces five variations on the same angle, which is useful for testing a hook and useless for covering a product. Five slightly different briefs produce five videos that do not replace each other.
The method that works has four steps.
- Write the shared base: audience, message, prohibitions, rights, length. It does not move.
- Give each creator a different angle: morning use, comparison, unboxing, problem solved, opinion after three weeks.
- Leave the form free inside the angle.
- Ask for revisions on the base only, never on the form.
The fourth point is the one French brands hold least. A revision requested on the form turns the video into an advertisement, and the second version is almost always worse than the first.
Sources
- Law no. 2023-451 of 9 June 2023 on commercial influence
- DGCCRF, influencers and their responsibilities
- ARPP, digital advertising communication guidance
Checked on 6 September 2026. Rules change: where this guide and the official source disagree, the source prevails.
