Frank Meeuwsen (The Incredible Adventure) – digital strategy

“A brief has got all to do with a sense of language and strong formulation skills. It’s strategic language at the start of a project. Mostly, a copywriter is asked to deliver a service at the end. But I agree that language is needed beforehand to formulate the assignment and all the decisions.

With a verbalizer in your team, the start is slower,  but it will help you along the process, since all the steps are more ‘formulated’. You can give more grounded feedback to your client: “Are we agreed on this? If not, we go one step back, not all the way back.

Every step – from the initial briefing till the execution – is the responsiblitity of the client. You only start the creative process of the making if every argument was agreed on.

Language is essential for the brief. With the right questions you search for the right brief. It has nothing to do with word magic or clever synonyms. It’s plain language to say what we all mean. The one idea we all agree on.

The word ‘copywriter’ has a operational connotation. It’s about writing, ‘I write copy’. For me, the whole thinking process is not involved in the term copywriter.”

Photo Frank Meeuwsen by Guido van Nispen