Creative Brief Checklist

Use the agency project-code convention so finance, traffic, and resource management can tie hours, POs, and deliverables back to the same job. Confirm the client entity and billing contact match the active MSA in Workamajig or Advantage.

One paragraph: what business problem are we solving, not what creative are we making. Reference the client's category context, competitive pressure, or share-of-search decline. Avoid restating the deliverable — "we need a 30-second spot" is not a business challenge.

One sentence the audience would believe, find relevant, and act on. The SMP gets pressure-tested by the strategist and CD before the brief moves forward — a brief with two propositions produces work with no proposition.

Mark the in-market date and back-plan from it: client presentation, internal review, concepting end, brief approval. Flag any hard fixed dates (event sponsorship, retail window, network upfront commitment) so producer and traffic know the deadline is not negotiable.

Go past demographics to attitudes, behaviors, and category relationship. "Women 25-54" is a media buy, not an audience. Reference the persona from the brand's CDP or research deck if available; if not, write one and flag it for client confirmation.

A tension or truth the audience would recognize in themselves. Insights come from research, social listening (Brandwatch, Sprinklr), or category interviews — not from the brief writer's head. Cite the source so creative can interrogate it.

What is happening in category, culture, and competitor activity right now. Pull recent category spots from iSpot or Pathmatics so creative does not land on an idea a competitor ran last quarter.

Pull the latest brand book from the client's DAM (Bynder, Brandfolder, Aprimo) — not a copy on someone's desktop. Confirm logo lockup, color specs (including Pantone, CMYK, RGB, and broadcast-safe equivalents), and typography are current; brand refresh cycles are a common reason a brief ships with stale assets.

List the mandatories: legal disclaimers, tagline lockup, end-card requirements, sponsor logos, partner co-branding. Note the tone-of-voice descriptors from the brand platform so copywriters do not invent their own. Mandatories missed at brief stage become reshoots at picture lock.

Pharma (FDA fair balance, ISI), alcohol (industry self-reg, age-gated targeting), tobacco / cannabis (platform restrictions), financial services (SEC / FINRA pre-approval), gambling (state licensing), and children's products (COPPA) all impose creative and media constraints from the start. Flag here so the brief routes correctly.

Spell out the actual constraints creative must work within: fair-balance length and legibility for pharma; age-gating and no-talent-under-25 for alcohol; FINRA pre-approval lead time for financial; no health claims for supplements. List the client-side regulatory reviewer and the review SLA so producer can build the timeline around it.

Name channels explicitly: linear TV, CTV / OTT, paid social (which platforms — Meta, TikTok, YouTube), OLV, OOH / DOOH, programmatic display, audio, owned channels. Channels in scope drive talent use cycles, music license scope, and aspect ratios — gaps here cause rework downstream.

Map every cutdown: hero 60s, broadcast 30s and 15s, social cutdowns at 6s / 15s / 30s in 16:9, 1:1, 9:16; statics; end cards; banner sizes. Producer uses this matrix to bid the production and post; trafficker uses it to set network specs. An incomplete matrix at brief is the #1 source of late-stage scope changes.

English-only, English + Spanish, multi-market? Localized versions need M&E stems from the mix, separate VO casting, and translation through Smartling or Lokalise. Decide here, not at picture lock.

Name the north-star metric and 2-3 supporting KPIs. Awareness work measures reach, frequency, brand-lift; performance work measures CPA, ROAS, CTR, CPCV. A brief that lists every metric measures nothing — force the client to a primary.

Brand-lift study (Kantar, YouGov), MMM contribution, MTA via DCM / GA4, incrementality test. Name the tool, the cadence (30 / 60 / 90 day pulls), and who owns the report. Measurement decided at brief stage avoids the "we never set a benchmark" wrap conversation.

Working media vs. non-working (production, fees, talent, music, post). Producer needs the production envelope before bidding directors and shops; media needs the working budget to model reach. Note pass-throughs and mark-up convention per the MSA.

Strategy and account walk the CD (and ECD on larger accounts) through the brief before it goes to client. CD signs off that the brief is inspiring and answerable; if the CD can't crack a concept against it in 10 minutes, the brief gets rewritten — not the creative blamed later.

Address CD feedback specifically — note what changed and why in the brief revision log. Recirculate to the original reviewers, not just the CD, so account and strategy stay aligned. Track this loop in Workamajig so hours are billed against the right phase.

Walk the client through the brief live — do not send-and-hope. Capture the named approver (decision-maker, not just the day-to-day contact) and the signature. A signed brief is the artifact account leans on when scope creep starts in round 3.