The seven lines of a usable brief, what to leave open, and the question nobody writes down.
The seven lines of a usable brief
Seven, and a longer brief does not get read to the end.
The exact product, with its reference.
The person targeted, described by a situation and not by an age bracket.
The sentence to remember, the one from the previous paragraph.
The format and length, with the number of versions expected.
What must appear on screen: the product opened, the box, the action, the label.
What is forbidden: claims not to be spoken, competing brands, music, locations.
And the delivery date, in working days after the product arrives.
One rule of form: a brief fits on a phone screen. What does not fit goes into an annex, and nobody is required to read it in order to shoot.
The language question nobody writes down
That is the local point briefs from elsewhere forget.
Everyday vocabulary changes from one Spanish-speaking country to another, and sometimes from one region to another inside the same country: the name of a garment, a utensil, a dish, the way of addressing somebody.
Three useful instructions. State where the video will be shown, which settles the matter without having to talk about accents. Supply the list of words the brand uses and those it avoids. And let the creator rephrase in their everyday language: a sentence corrected to sound like a catalogue is heard in two seconds.
What to leave open
Three things, and locking them destroys the format.
The setting: the creator's home, as it is, is what you are buying.
The exact words: give the message, not the text word for word, except for mandatory statements and legally framed sentences.
And the order of the sequences: somebody holding the product often knows better where to start.
One clear exception: in regulated categories, the script is approved word for word before the shoot, and that is checked with a lawyer.
The instruction that ruins a video
Four formulations to delete from your briefs.
Be natural: an instruction impossible to carry out, and it produces exactly the opposite.
Make something viral: nobody knows how to do that on demand, and it pushes towards effects that age in three months.
Copy this video: a reference with no instruction makes people copy what was not the point.
And speak with enthusiasm: acted enthusiasm is the first signal of advertising.
What a brief must fix, and in how many lines
| Element | What it avoids | Length |
|---|---|---|
| The product and its reference | Filming the wrong model | One line |
| The forbidden sentences | A complete reshoot | Three lines |
| The formats and naming | An export to redo | Two lines |
| The date and delivery channel | An unseen delay | One line |
What goes in an appendix rather than the brief
The brand charter, the legal notices and the reference samples. The brief fits on one page; the rest is attached and consulted as needed.
What you ask the creator before the shoot
A photo of the set and the first line of the script. Two minutes of checking avoid a whole day being redone.
The detail that changes everything
One only, and it costs two minutes.
Send three photographs of what the brand considers a good result, and three of what it rejects.
Three reasons. An image settles in one second what a paragraph explains badly. It avoids the first round of corrections. And it often reveals that two people on the same team were not expecting the same thing, which is better discovered before the shoot.
One last point, to write into the brief rather than in a separate message: the number of rounds of modifications included, and what counts as a new order. That is the line avoiding the only truly unpleasant discussion in this trade.
