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🚀Creative strategy in advertising - it all starts with an idea

👍 Creative strategy in advertising – it all starts with an idea


👍 Creative strategy in advertising – it all starts with an idea

Any good and effective advertising is memorable to the audience for years. It introduces new slogans into the colloquial language or generally recognizable motifs-mascots. It contributes to increasing product recognition and sales increases. In today’s competitive world surrounded by a variety of media, consumers are faced with a wide choice of products and services. Promotional activities without creative ones will not influence the desired reactions of the target audience. How do you create creative ads that will stand out, intrigue and sell at the same time? This is where a refined creative strategy is essential.

🚀What is a creative strategy?

Meaningful and substantive advertising is based on one key element – creativity. The Big Idea is much more than just a catchy advertising slogan, it is the entire concept of a creative ad or series, key visuals and a well-thought-out strategy that will bring recognition and increase brand sales.

Creative communication is the key to marketing success. Jef I. Richards, a professor in the Department of Advertising and Public Relations at a university in the United States, once said that ‘Creation without strategy is called “art”. For that, creative strategy is called ‘advertising’.'” He added that the high evaluation of creative and innovative advertising campaigns by various media outlets encourages advertising agencies to go beyond the standard norms: for example, abandoning the traditional work environment in favor of a completely unique place that will foster a creative strategy through appropriate decor, selection of elements in the office or activities organized outside the office. This will ensure freshness and going outside the box, which leads to experimentation and surprising results, essential in the advertising industry.

Creativity is a subjective term. Given the individuality of thought and the diversity of opinions on the term ‘creative,’ it is difficult to specify exactly whether or not to define an activity as creative. However, certainly within the circle of meaning of ‘creativity’ will be imagination and innovation, driven by practice, skill and discipline. Creativity, especially in relation to creative strategy in the advertising industry, is the production of something original and valuable. It is a whole set of ideas that create a narrative, telling a story in such a way that it is memorable. In a creative strategy, original solutions, a sense of humor, lightness are necessary. But do not forget that the product or service has a specific target group, to which you need to tailor the message and select the appropriate channels of communication. In summary, creative strategy in advertising is a creative process, the purpose of which is to create the content of the advertisement – the main idea, narrative, message and the way of presenting the advertising campaign.

🚀What is the Big Idea?

Big Idea is the main concept of a creative strategy, the dominant theme of an advertising campaign. It is said of advertising that some are effective because they are creative. Others, meanwhile, are creative because they are effective. There is also a third group of ads that are neither creative nor effective. Thus, in the advertising field, creative communication is “to be or not to be,” while for an advertising agency it is one of the reasons for an advertiser to choose an agency. Advertising agency professionals have to focus all the time on how to make creative ads and implement innovative ways to attract and retain customers.

Psychology scholars define creativity as a combination of knowledge, creative thinking and motivation, where creative thinking is the ability of imaginative people to approach a problem flexibly, and motivation is the equivalent of passion and interest in work. As the market is overflowing with competitive products, in many ways today’s consumer is not tied to one brand. Often it is impulse and the moment that determines which product ultimately lands in the shopping cart. For a company to survive in the business world is constant consumer patronage. Therefore, advertisers more than ever need to use creative strategy in advertising as their main tools, especially when there is a noticeable decline in brand loyalty.

🚀What place does a company’s creative marketing strategy have?

All marketing activities should be based on the data and statistics of a specific business. What does this mean in practice? Creative and media strategy is an action plan that is developed in accordance with the brand profile and is based on data drawn from an audit, Google Analytics or Facebook Manager. Without a properly tailored strategy, it is difficult to talk about good product promotion, brand recognition or satisfactory sales results.

Why is creative and media strategy so important? Without it, even the best product has no chance to get noticed and to sell. This doesn’t just apply to setting up advertising in Google Ads or Facebook Manager. It’s about developing an overall way and channels of promotion with SEO, PR, Social Media, Mailing or desktop advertising. Over the past few years, we can observe an incredible leap in the e-commerce industry, for which digital marketing is the basis for standing out in such a rapidly growing market. A well-developed creative strategy in advertising is an effective balance between attracting and keeping in the attention and memory of the customer, and selling. A creative advertising campaign is increasingly about promoting an emotion or a lifestyle rather than encouraging a product or brand by its/their best features or price.

🚀When should a creative strategy be developed?

A creative and media strategy should be developed before any marketing efforts are undertaken, that is, with the launch of a business or brand. It is also not a one-time process – creative ads should be developed for a specific season, and the creative strategy should be updated once a year or once every three years. It can also include rebranding if the business has a long history and much has changed in trends, consumer behavior or design. Long-term declines in sales, lack of prospects for further growth of the company or unsuccessful attempts to reach new customers is also a great time to develop a new creative strategy to refresh the image of a company that has been operating for many years.

What is the purpose of a creative strategy and how to create effective creative ads?

The team of specialists who develop creative and media strategies should have clearly defined goals not only for creative ads, but also for the business or product itself. Developing a new strategy is a complex process that usually involves an experienced strategist, copywriters, graphic designers, Google and social media ad specialists. The goals of the creative strategy should resonate with the business development strategy, but also relate to ongoing changes in the brand related to, for example, the arrival of a new product line, rebranding, etc. Creative ads are most often developed on the basis of an analysis of the client’s business, as well as a study of the competition. Such action is aimed at eliminating incoherent random concepts that may be temporarily catchy, but do not coincide with the image or spirit of the brand. Once the budget for such advertising is spent, sales will also end. That’s why it’s important to invest in creative ads with a long-term strategy that relies on storytelling, brand-associated themes or promotional cycles involving well-known influencers or seasonal promotions.

Creative strategy step by step

  • Analysis of statistics, sales results, general know-how and DNA of the brand – its mission, goals, image, as well as competitor research
  • Development of a preliminary design by strategists and marketers
  • Brainstorming of the creative team
  • Outsourcing the refinement of the creative ad to copywriters and graphic designers
  • Key visual and described creative strategy lands with client for initial evaluation

🚀Creative concepts for marketing campaigns, or out-of-the-box creative ads

The area of creative ads is still also standard media and public space, i.e. bus stops or billboards. When the target of a particular business is broad, it is worthwhile to combine different communication paths and advertising media in a creative strategy. The most effective ads are memorable thanks to great visuals, engaging storytelling, a brilliant sense of humor or a catchy musical layer. The history of creative advertising knows examples of texts that have permanently embedded themselves in the vernacular, and the same applies to motifs and characters-mascots of a particular brand. In an era of such a dense advertising field, both in the real and digital worlds, it is good for the creative strategy, in addition to the sales goal, to also speak out on important topics, such as the recent advertising campaigns of the Yes I Am Woman brand and the image of women also as nursing mothers. The growing discussion towards breastfeeding and the image of famous women from the world of media or culture is also the result of a great strategy, which does not so much contribute to the sales of a specific jewelry line, but incredibly gains PR. At such a point, the jewelry brand becomes a symbol of a social campaign that popularizes and publicizes an important discussion. Great creative strategies can also include promoting new albums by the younger generation of musicians. Dawid Podsiadło’s campaign has already gone down in history, as he personally sold his album “Małomiasteczkowy” at a traffic kiosk set up outside the Palace of Culture in Warsaw. It’s also worth mentioning at this point the great creative strategy and real time marketing creative ads we’ve been seeing in IKEA’s operations for years. Real time marketing refers to direct response to current events in pop culture, media, which captures in a brilliant way and appears almost immediately after the news is publicized in the media.

Creative strategy is certainly a key to successful business development, an effective way to increase brand recognition and sales. It’s no longer just information about a promotion and an inviting price, it’s increasingly also the important voice of a generation or boldly reaching out to the public with taboo topics. It’s also brilliance, emotion and deep thought leadership.

As BE Media, we provide comprehensive services and implementation of advertising campaigns. Thanks to years of experience, we know exactly where to look for your potential customers and what means to use to achieve the desired goal. We will develop and create the best creative advertising strategy for you, which we will then implement and execute, taking care of the smallest detail.

Joanna Pełech-Mikulska

Charismatic manager of the creative and client department of BE Media agency. A graduate of economics, political science and management. The author of numerous publications in the field of advertising, marketing and persuasion in communication. She has always been associated with marketing, and above all with creative outdoor advertising. She took her first professional steps in marketing departments in the United States, where she completed a 2-year graduate internship. After returning to Poland, she worked in the Polish branch of an American technology company, where she was responsible for the company's day-to-day contacts with Polish media and key business partners. The author of texts and a traveller with a passion for singing who adheres to the principle that there are no short-cuts to success.