Creating Ads:
Strategy and Process
Chapter 8
McGraw-Hill/Irwin
Copyright © 2012 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Learning Objectives
• LO1: Identify the members of the creative team and
their primary responsibilities.
• LO2: What makes great advertising?
• LO3: Explain the role of the creative strategy and its
principal elements.
• LO4: How does creativity enhance advertising?
• LO5: Define the four roles people play at different
stages of the creative process.
8-2
The Creative Team
• Creatives
– Copywriter: words
– art director: layout and design
– creative director: head creative
8-3
Creating Great Advertising
• Resonance
– attention
– Wow
• Relevance
– An ad can get you to think, but is it getting you to
think about the right thing?
8-4
Formulating Creative Strategy
• Creative Strategy
– A written statement guides
the team who is writing &
producing an ad.
– Includes the who, what, when, where, and why.
• Also: Creative Brief, Work Plan,
Copy Strategy, Copy Platform
8-5
Formulating Creative Strategy
• Writing the Creative Strategy
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The basic problem advertising will address
Objective of the Advertising
Target Audience
Benefits to communicate
Support for the benefits
Brand personality
Special requirements
8-6
 What are the important parts of the creative strategy (or
creative brief)?
 What is the message strategy? What are its important
parts?
8-7
How Creativity Enhances Advertising
• What is Creativity
• The combining of two or more previously unconnected
objects or ideas into something new.
• The Role of Creativity in Advertising
– Creativity helps advertising inform
• good creative work helps advertising
more vivid, attracts attention, maintains
interest, and stimulates thinking
• visual clues can aid in communicating ideas
8-8
How Creativity Enhances Advertising
• The Role of Creativity in Advertising
– Creativity helps advertising persuade
– Creativity helps advertising remind
– Creativity puts the “boom”
in advertising
8-9
How Creativity Enhances Advertising
• Fact-Based vs. Value-Based Thinking
– fact-based thinking fragments
concepts for analysis
– value-based thinking uses
intuitions, values, & judgments
8-10
 What is creativity?
 How does creativity help
advertising inform? Persuade?
Remind?
 What is the “boom” factor in
advertising?
8-11
The Creative Process
• The Explorer
• Searches for information & unusual patterns
• The Artist
• experiments with a variety of approaches
• The Judge
• evaluates experiments to find the practical approach
• The Warrior
• overcomes excuses, idea killers, setbacks, and obstacles
8-12
The Creative Process
• Transforming a Concept
– Many strategies for transforming things
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•
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adapt: change contexts
imagine: ask, “what if”
reverse: look at it backwards
connect: join two unrelated ideas
compare: take one idea, use it to describe another
eliminate: subtract something
parody: fool around
8-13
The Creative Process
• Blocks to Creativity
– Caused by information overload, mental or physical
fatigue, stress, fear, insecurity, or even the type of
thinking
– Can also occur when the agency “thinks like the
client” or when the agency has served the client for
too long
– Bad for the agency
8-14
The Creative Process
• The Creative Pyramid
• converting ad strategy to creative strategy
Action
Action
Desire
Desire
Conviction
Credibility
Comprehension
Interest
Awareness
Attention
8-15
The Creative Process
• The Creative Pyramid
motivate consumers to use product
Action
get prospects to imagine using the product
Desire
well-known presenters help credibility
keep prospect excited/involved
break through screens
Credibility
Interest
Attention
8-16