Creative Executive Brief

COMM  3303:  Creative Brief Assignment Description 

The creative brief is a roadmap from which you build all strategic messages for a particular product, service or organization. A version of it is used for ideas as large as an advertising campaign and as small as public relations tactics, such as Twitter content creation or an informational brochure. The creative brief is explored in detail in Chapter Two: Strategy and Branding (with simple examples offered).

Your final creative brief will focus on the newly designed UHD Communication Studies degree (see flyer attached) and will be much more detailed. You should incorporate the research conducted and feedback received in previous assignments.

Background:

The University of Houston-­â€Downtown’s Bachelor of Arts in Communication Studies is one of  the  largest  and  steadily  growing    degree  programs  in  the  College  of  Humanities  and  Social  Sciences.  In the past year, the Communication Studies program has undergone major changes, including a newly  aligned  Arts  &  Communication  department  (formerly  Arts  &  Humanities)  and  a  newly  designed  degree  plan  featuring  concentration  areas  in  Corporate  Communication,  Health  &  Relational  Communication,  Media  &  Public  Communication,  and  Communication  Studies  (general).

The  new  changes  to  the  degree  plan  include  pairing  health  courses  with  interpersonal  courses;  adding  media  courses  and  interests  alongside  public  and  rhetorical  communication  courses;  and  providing  a  general  Communication  Studies  concentration  to  allow  for  an  easier  transition  for  transfer  students  to  declare  as  Communication  Studies  majors.  Other highlights for  the  B.A.  in Communication  Studies  program  include  the  abundance  of  courses  offered  online  and  the  new  UHD  iRadio  station.  As  the  Fall  2018  semester  approaches,  the  Communication  Studies  program  looks  forward  to  implementing  these  new  and  exciting  changes.

DESCRIPTION:  A  creative  brief  is  a  roadmap  from  which  the  creative  team  builds  strategic  messages  for  a  particular  product,  service  or  organization.  For  your  final  assignment,  you  will  produce  a  creative  brief  for  the  Communication  Studies  program  with  the  goal  of  marketing  the  newly  designed  B.A.  in  Communication  Studies  degree.  The  goal  of  the  creative  brief  assignment  is  to  encourage  you  to  think  about  strategic  messaging  and  consider  the  necessary  steps  of  building  an  effective  advertising  campaign.    

INSTRUCTIONS:  Use the information above  and  additional  research  to  develop  one  advertising  objective  for  the  new  degree  implementation.  Your objective should  address  a  specific  target  audience  and  highlight  specific  features  and  benefits  of  the  Communication  Studies  program.  Building upon your  one  objective,  you  will  produce  a  creative  brief  in  executive  report  format.

Below will give you a little detail about the client that will need to be elaborated on with a little research:

1. Who is the client?
   • University of Houston Downton – Bachelor of Arts in Communication Studies
2. What is the client’s business/product/service?
   • The product that the client provides are degrees in the Arts & Communication field.
3. What word would you use to describe the business/product/service?
   • Education/Learning Development
4. Who is the competition?
   • Rice University
   • Houston Community College
   • Baylor University
   • Texas Southern University
   • All Universities & Community colleges within the Texas area
5. Is there a target audience? If not, who would you target and why?
   • Yes, there seems to be a targeted audience that capitalizes on persons of the age group 30+.
   • I would like to target individuals that are of the age 30+ seeking to continue their education while working full time.
6. What is unique about your business/product/service?
   • What’s unique about the University of Houston Downtown Arts in Communication Department is that most of the required courses offer hybrid, online courses, and late in-person courses that can offer several options for those that are full time and part time workers flexibility to accomplish their goal of obtain a degree.
7. What are the growth opportunities (untapped markets)?
   • The growth opportunity the university has are to structure their programs to capture the young adults graduating from high school.  By capturing young adults provides more revenue to bring about more programs, and resources.
8. Why are you interested in this client?
   • I’m interested in this client because it affects me personally, as I too am an person over the age of 30, and are working towards obtaining my degree in B.A. Corporate Communication, with a minor in Human Resource Management.

Your  final  document  should  include  the  following  components,  in  this  order: 

   Front  Cover  (title,  subtitle,  name)

   Executive  Summary  o   This  should  be  a  brief  overview  of  at  least  two  well-­â€written  paragraphs.  Define  the  industry,  client/company,  and  product/service  first.  Is  there  a  specific  problem  or  issue  that  needs  to  be  addressed?  What  is  the  specific  opportunity  that  lends  toward  a  new  marketing  or  branding  campaign?  Next,  give  some  background  –  a  bit  of  history  (no  more  than  one  paragraph)  of  the  product.  Finally,  summarize  where  your  product  and  company  are  today.

   Advertising  Challenge  OR  Opportunity  o   Describe  the  challenge  or  opportunity  your  advertising  campaign  seeks  to  address  or  accomplish:  Boost  Sales?  Change  behavior?  Raise  awareness?  Other?  Pick  one!

   Objective  o   Objective(s):    What  measurable  objective  needs  to  be  achieved?    This  is  directly  related  to  the  challenge.  Your  objective  should  be  stated  as  clearly  as  possible.  For  example,  if  the  client’s  challenge  is  from  a  lull  in  sales,  the  objective  should  be  to  increase  sales.  However,  instead  of  simply  “increase  sales,”  a  specific  objective  would  be  to  “increase  sales  with  our  25-­â€34-­â€year-­â€old  audience  by  8%  in  the  next  6  months.”       Target  Audience

                                                                          -­â€1-­â€

o   Demographics.    Is  there  a  focus  on  men,  women,  or  both?    Geography?    Income?  All  consumers,  heavy  consumers,  light  consumers?  Others?  Be  sure  to  include  a  justification  for  choices  made  in  this  section.

o   Psychographics.    What  is  the  mindset  of  your  target  audience?    How  does  your  product  fit  uniquely  into  their  lives?  What  do  you  know  about  the  values  of  their  generation?

   Features  and  Benefits  o   Include  a  list  of  features  with  accompanying  benefits.  You  should  clearly  indicate  how  the  features  listed  offer  benefits  to  your  target  audience.

   Brand  Image  o   Current  Brand  Image.  Is  the  brand  image  sincere?  Rugged?  Cheap?  Sophisticated?  Some  other  adjective?  Remember  to  provide  evidence  of  why  you  describe  your  product’s  brand  this  way.  This  evidence  can  be  in  the  form  of  written  words  or  pictures  of  previous  advertisements  or  previous  product  spokespeople  to  illustrate  your  point.  Do  you  want  to  alter  it  or  maintain  it  with  your  strategic  communication?  What’s  the  buzz  in  blogs/reviews?

This  section  should  be  1-­â€2  paragraphs.  Appropriate  images  would  be  preferred.    o   Desired  Brand  Image.  Briefly  speak  to  where  –  ideally  –    you’d  like  your  brand  image  to  be  in  the  mind  of  your  target  market.  What  do  you  want  your  target  audience  to  say  about  your  product  after  being  exposed  to  your  campaign?

   Creative  Strategy  o   Your  creative  strategy  should  detail  how  you  intend  to  execute  your  campaign.  This  should  be  the  most  detailed  part  of  your  creative  brief  as  it  explains  just  what  you  plan  to  do.

• Key  Message:  What  exactly  is  the  advertising  going  to  say  to  get  the  consumer  to  change  their  behavior,  or  take  action,  or  take  notice?  This  answers  your  consumer’s  question:  “What’s  in  it  for  me?”  This  is  your  point  of  differentiation.    Your  strategic  message  should  be  clear  and  no  longer  than  1-­â€2  sentences.    It  needs  to  be  a  great  sentence.
•   Call  to  action:  What  will  your  campaign  ask  consumers  to  do?
• Tone:  Describe  the  tone  of  the  campaign,  including  the  writing  and  the  imagery;  the  feelings  you  are  trying  to  evoke;  and  the  impression/personality  you  hope  to  convey.  Is  it  formal?  Sophisticated?  Casual?  Funny?  Shocking?  Include  your  justification  (why?)  for  this  choice.
• Deliverables:  How  will  your  campaign  meet  the  advertising  challenge  and  deliver  its  message?  Are  you  going  to  produce  a  commercial?  Purchase  a  full-­â€page  ad  in  a  magazine?  Send  direct  mail  or  e-­â€mail  blasts?
• Mandatory  Brand  Elements:  Include  the  “must  haves”  to  execute  your  campaign.  Will  you  need  a  custom  logo?  A  specific  image?  A  social  media  hashtag  or  account  created?  A  billboard?

   References  o   You  should  include  bibliographic  references  for  your  sources  in  APA  format.

APPENDICES  (Select  one.) 

As  an  appendix,  include  the  exact  copy  you  would  use  in  your  proposed  advertising  campaign.  For  example,  if  your  creative  strategy  includes  long  copy  or  a  radio/television  script,  write  the  copy  out  and  attach  as  an  appendix.  Also,  include  any  headlines  or  taglines  that  will  accompany  your  product/service.

Select  from  one  of  the  following  options  (500-­â€word  maximum):

o   Sample  copy  for  a  one-­â€page  magazine  advertisement

o   Sample  copy  for  direct  mail  or  e-­â€mail  letter

o   Transcript  for  radio  or  television  commercial  advertisement