If the first round of creative work doesn’t hit the mark, it might not be the work that’s off – it might be the brief.
There’s a reason so much creative work needs revision – and it has nothing to do with talent or AI. It’s because too many campaigns start before the thinking is finished. Deadlines loom, pressure mounts and briefs get sent while the strategy is still half-baked. The hope is that the creative process will magically sharpen the thinking. And sometimes, it does. But most of the time, the work falls flat because the problem it was trying to solve was never clearly defined in the brief.
Clear intent is everything
Outside the world of marketing, being clear about the strategy, describing what needs to be accomplished and why it matters, is fundamental. An army commander might say, "Secure the bridge so our forces can cross the river and continue the advance." It defines the goal and its purpose, but leaves the how to those on the ground who can best read the situation.
Emergency response leaders do the same. “Evacuate everyone within the flood zone to ensure zero casualties" gives firefighters and paramedics a clear objective while allowing them the freedom to adapt their tactics as conditions change.
And in filmmaking, a director might tell an actor, "Your character desperately wants to be accepted," instead of dictating every gesture and line delivery.
A brief needs a clear what and why, so the creative can focus on the how.
Strategy first, ideas second
There’s a natural order to things: strategy should lead creative thinking, not emerge from it.
But strategy is hard. It’s messy and abstract – it takes time and rigour before anything tangible appears. Creative work, on the other hand, feels exciting and immediate, so it’s tempting to dive in and “work it out as we go.”
The BetterBriefs Project shows 60% of marketers admit to using the creative process to clarify their strategy. In other words, most briefs don’t have a clear strategy.
It’s not creativity’s job to solve strategy
Agencies are built to solve creative problems. They’re not built to solve strategic indecision. When a brief doesn’t make clear strategic decisions, it becomes a choose-your-own-adventure game, leaving all the decision-making to the agency. Teams spend their time trying to work out what the brand really wants, instead of fully exploring the best way to deliver it.
Clear strategy unlocks better ideas
The irony is that the best creative work can sharpen strategy, but only when it’s already clear. When the team understands what the problem for communications to solve is and why it matters, they can focus on finding the most creative solution.
A great example is Sprite’s ‘Heat Happens, Stay Cool’ brand proposition. The brand briefed their agency to help solve a clear problem: seasonal consumption. For decades Sprite had positioned itself as the ultimate summer ‘cool down’ drink. Sales soared in summer, but consumption declined for the rest of the year. A clear problem, solved by the agency by reframing Sprite as the year-round antidote to moments of physical and mental heat.
Lesson: the clearer the strategy, the better the work. Or to look at it another way, analyse any run-of-the-mill ads and you’ll soon realise how hard it is to identify the strategy.
Don’t hate the player, hate the game
Why do so many marketers use creative ideas to figure out their strategy? It’s not because they’re lazy or bad marketers. It’s because they’re all facing the same issues:
– internal pressure to get campaigns moving before all the thinking is done
– a belief that “creative exploration” will naturally reveal the right strategy
– too many stakeholders pulling the brief in competing directions, reducing focus
– a culture that rewards speed over clarity
None of this is malicious; it’s simply how marketing often works today. But the result is a system where creativity is used as a crutch for strategic indecision.
And that’s the real issue: creativity is too valuable to waste on fixing what should have been fixed upstream.
How to fix it
If you want to stop strategy from leaking into the creative process, there are a few things you can do:
1. Frame the change you’re trying to achieve.
Strategy is about driving change: getting people to think differently about your brand or moving them from doing one thing to doing another. You must clearly define the change you seek. What are people feeling, thinking and doing today? What do you want them to believe, feel or do tomorrow? You can’t write a brief or brief an agency if you’re not clear on this.
2. Choose your audience deliberately and narrowly.
A strategy designed to reach “everyone” rarely reaches anyone effectively. Be precise about who you’re talking to and why they matter most. If you can’t picture them clearly, neither can the creative team.
3. Articulate the problem to solve.
Not all campaigns solve the same type of problem. Specify what the problem is that you want communications to focus on and solve. Is it about repositioning the brand? Growing awareness for a new product? Changing perception? Addressing falling trust levels? Clarity here shapes the tone, message and creative territory dramatically.
4. Brief when the thinking is done, not when the calendar says so.
Yes, deadlines matter. But they shouldn’t dictate the timing of your brief. It’s better to delay the briefing by a week and give the creative team a clear problem to solve than to rush and waste months going round in circles with the agency creating work that gets ignored.
5. Use creative reviews to test ideas against the strategy, not to develop one.
Every round of creative should answer the same question: “Does this idea solve the problem we defined?” If the answer isn’t obvious, revisit the strategy, not the execution.
When marketers take these steps before briefing, agencies stop wasting time “figuring out” the strategy and start spending more time amplifying it.
That’s where the magic happens: when strategic clarity meets creative talent.
This article was published in Campaign Asia on 18 December 2025: https://www.campaignasia.com/article/stop-using-the-creative-process-to-define-your-strategy/506677