Week 1
The real brief
What has to change, for whom, and the actual budget and channels rather than the aspirational ones.
Creative direction · Campaign concepts · Sydney
Campaign concepts
Most campaign ideas die in production rather than in the pitch. They were approved as a sentence, and nobody checked whether the sentence could be made in the budget, in the formats, and within the rules.
Grab the snowball. Give it a spin, and watch it grow as you scroll. Just like the idea.
3routes developed, not one
4tests every route has to pass
Produciblechecked before it is presented
Sydneyconcept, production and measurement
The short answer
What is a campaign concept, and what makes one work?
A campaign concept is the organising idea a set of work hangs on: the thing that makes twelve assets feel like one campaign rather than twelve assets. It works when it is specific enough to generate executions and flexible enough to survive the channels it has to run in.
The two failure modes are opposite and equally common. A concept too vague to generate anything, which produces twelve unrelated assets. And a concept so tied to one execution that it cannot be made at fifteen seconds, in a static frame, or in the format the budget actually allows.
So we test routes against production, channel and legal before presenting them, which sometimes means killing the most exciting one early. It sits inside our wider creative direction service, and because our Snowball SEO platform automates the search heavy lifting other agencies bill by the hour, more of your budget goes into making the work.
The difference
What has to be true for a concept to survive?
Four tests, applied before presentation rather than after approval. A concept that fails any of them will be discovered in production, when changing it is expensive and morale is involved.
Signs of a concept that will hold
- It suggests executions nobody has thought of yet
- It survives being described without any visual
- It still works at fifteen seconds and as a single frame
- Someone can explain it to a supplier in one sentence
Signs it will not
- It only works as the one execution it was presented with
- It needs a specific piece of talent, music or location to make sense
- It relies on a claim nobody has checked with legal
- The budget in the concept is not the budget in the plan
For the ads themselves once a concept is chosen, that is our video ad production and paid advertising work.
The cost
What drives the price of concept development?
How many routes, how far each is developed, and how much testing happens before presentation. Developing three routes properly costs more than one and saves more than it costs.
One route, developed
Single
One concept taken far enough to be judged properly, for teams who already know the direction and need it made concrete.
Three routes
The usual
Three genuinely different approaches, each tested against production, channel and legal, so the choice is real rather than one idea and two decoys.
Concept to production
End to end
The chosen route developed through to the asset list, so the idea and the making are not handed between two teams with a gap in the middle.
We quote by routes and depth after a free consult and a look at the brief and the real budget. See video ad production for what happens next.
What moves the number, in order
- How many routes are developed, and how far each one goes
- How many channels and formats each has to work in
- Whether production feasibility is tested before presentation
- Legal and regulatory review, in constrained categories
- Whether any route needs a demonstration piece to be judged
- How many rounds and how many approvers
Three real routes, not one and two decoys
The standard agency presentation is one idea the team loves and two they have engineered to lose. It is efficient for the agency and it wastes the client's decision.
Three genuinely viable routes cost more to develop and produce a better outcome, because the discussion becomes which of these is right for us rather than yes or no to a single proposal.
It also means that when the favourite fails a production test, which happens, there is somewhere to go that is not back to the beginning.
The scope
What you receive
Routes developed far enough to judge, and tested far enough to trust.
The routes
Each described in a sentence and shown in enough execution to be judged, rather than presented as a mood board and a hope.
Ten executions each
Proof the idea generates work, which is the difference between a concept and a headline somebody liked.
Feasibility notes
What each route costs to produce and what it needs, checked against the real budget before you fall in love with one.
Legal and platform flags
Claims, comparisons and platform rules identified before approval rather than during production.
The one-sentence version
What a supplier can be told, because a concept that needs a deck to explain will drift across every asset made from it.
An asset list
What the campaign is actually made of, so the concept hands over to production without a gap.
The return
Which route should you choose?
Not the most exciting one, and not the safest. The choice is a trade between how distinctive an idea is and how reliably it can be produced across everything the buy needs.
Test the smallest format first
The fastest way to know whether a concept will survive is to make the fifteen second vertical version of it before making anything else. If the idea still lands there, it will land anywhere.
Almost every campaign that falls apart in production does so because it was conceived at the largest format and adapted downward, and the adaptation is where the idea disappears.
So we develop the smallest and most constrained execution first, which feels backwards and is the cheapest insurance available.
The process
How concepts get developed
Three to five weeks, with the feasibility testing done before presentation rather than after approval.
Week 2
Routes generated
More than three, then narrowed. The narrowing matters more than the generating and is usually skipped.
Week 2
The four tests
Each surviving route checked for executions, smallest format, real budget and legal, before anyone sees it.
Week 3
Develop three
Each taken far enough to be judged, with ten executions and a feasibility note attached.
Week 4
Present and choose
Three viable routes, so the conversation is which rather than whether.
Week 5
Hand to production
The chosen route with its asset list and the one-sentence version suppliers can be given.
The brief
What to ask before you commission a campaign concept
Concept work is bought on excitement and judged on what survives production, which is a gap worth closing before you commit.
Are all three routes genuinely viable?
Or is it one idea and two decoys? Ask whether each has been tested for production, and be suspicious if only one has been developed properly.
Has this been checked against the real budget?
Not the budget in the brief, the one that will exist after media. Concepts that need a production budget you do not have are the commonest way this work is wasted.
Does it work at fifteen seconds?
Ask to see the smallest, most constrained version. An idea conceived at hero size and adapted downward usually disappears on the way.
What has legal seen?
Claims, comparisons and platform rules. Discovering a problem after approval costs a campaign; discovering it during development costs an afternoon.
We are happy to answer all four and to look at the brief before you commit. For the making, see video ad production.
Start here
Ready for an idea that survives?
Send us the brief and the real budget. The free consult is a working session, not a sales call, and you leave with three things whether or not you book us.
- An honest read on whether the brief is answerable at that budget
- One route sketched, with its ten executions listed
- A fixed price by routes and depth, with feasibility testing included
Good questions
Campaign concept FAQs
What is a campaign concept?
It is the organising idea a set of work hangs on, the thing that makes twelve assets feel like one campaign. It works when it is specific enough to generate executions and flexible enough to survive every channel and format the buy requires.
Why do campaign ideas fail in production?
Almost always because they were approved as a sentence and never tested against the real budget, the shortest format or the platform rules. All three checks cost an afternoon during development and cost a campaign afterwards.
How many routes should we see?
Three genuinely viable ones. The standard presentation of one idea the agency loves and two engineered to lose is efficient for the agency and wastes your decision, and it leaves nowhere to go when the favourite fails a production test.
How much does concept development cost?
We quote by number of routes and how far each is developed. What moves it is how many channels each has to work in, whether feasibility is tested before presentation, whether legal review is needed, and how many approvers there are.
Should we develop the biggest execution first?
No, the smallest. Make the fifteen second vertical version before anything else. An idea that survives the most constrained format will survive anywhere, and one conceived at hero size usually disappears on the way down.
What makes a concept distinctive rather than safe?
Whether somebody could substitute a competitor's logo and have it still make sense. If they could, it is a category message rather than a campaign, and it will be made and then ignored.
Who owns the idea afterwards?
You do, including the routes not chosen, which are frequently useful later. We hand over the one-sentence version specifically so suppliers can be briefed without the deck.
What happens after the concept is chosen?
It goes to production with an asset list attached, so the idea and the making do not sit with two teams and a gap between them. That handover is where a great many good concepts quietly become ordinary assets.