What are effective ways to collaborate with creatives in Brand Management?

I've seen this happen very often where suggestions by creatives aren't welcome in business conversations. Design, copy, visuals play as really important role in establishing a brand. Without these you can never build an aspirational brand. Everything in marketing depends on these people: CTR for your ads depends on your ad copy and creative, how people perceive your brand depends on your design etc Creatives come with a very different approach and thought process. More often than not, they understand the user better than the business teams, know what creatives and copies would work. We involve them in all the business meetings so that they understand the objectives clearly and then give them complete freedom on the creative.

Open Communication: Foster an environment where ideas flow freely between brand managers and creatives. Regular meetings and brainstorming sessions aid in understanding perspectives. Shared Vision: Ensure everyone is aligned with the brand's vision, values, and objectives. Collaborate on mood boards, design briefs, and style guides for a unified approach. Feedback Loop: Encourage constructive feedback and collaboration loops to refine creative outputs. Allow creatives space for experimentation while aligning with brand guidelines.

-Acknowledge Their Expertise: Creatives bring unique skills and insights to the table. Recognize and appreciate their capabilities. -Understand Their Perspective: View the project from the creative's standpoint. Consider their opinions and process as valuable contributions. -Recognize Mutual Stake: Understand that creatives have a stake in the project's outcome, impacting their reputation and portfolio. -Build Trust and Rapport: Demonstrating an understanding of their perspective fosters trust and rapport. This, in turn, creates a positive relationship. -Be Receptive to Feedback: Encourage an open dialogue by being receptive to the creative's feedback and suggestions. This collaborative approach enhances the overall project dynamics.

To effectively collaborate with creatives in brand management, focus on: - Creating a detailed brand profile that serves as a single point of reference for the creative team can significantly enhance collaboration. This profile should include logos, fonts, brand guidelines, color palettes, previously created collateral, and emotional attributes of the brand - Foster a culture of cooperative problem-solving to increase collaboration with creative teams. This approach strengthens teams, encourages idea-sharing, and improves marketing results

Additionally, - Implementing a great creative collaboration platform can be critical for successful collaboration. These platforms work hand-in-hand with project management and enable fluid and dynamic creative processes, ultimately leading to successful creative production

I often experienced during shooting that giving time to freedom to agencies , ad or photographer could give birth to the best pic, forgetting for a while the intention. It may not happen but when it happens, it can be magic. To allow this, the client responsibility is to be able to think that this given time may not be lost, on the contrary. Trying is never a lost time, even for the client ??.

Enablement is key. Would encourage pulling back the business ‘veil’ and allowing design team members to be included within the monetization strategy and to have challenging conversations with cross-functional team members further enshrining the most desirable business outcomes. Allow appropriate bandwidth to marinate thus enabling designers to come back to the table with competitive set, workshop user personas and thus inform the customer journey. Then the best ideas will reveal themselves through meaningful buy-in. It goes both ways, it’s more than one way communication via creative brief, it’s a shared understanding of success!

Feedback to a creative team should always be built around the fit their work has with the overarching strategy. Not trends, nor personal tastes, nor how beautiful they are. Creative work shouldn't cater the likes of a client or an internal team but honor the brand positioning you are trying to build. A good constructive feedback should go in the lines of: "this piece does not reflect the premiumness of the brand" or "the playfulness and cheerful personality we are trying to express is not quite reflected". Try asking questions and talk to the team to understand their approach. "How would you transmit the attribute of professionalism the whole brand is about?" "Do you think we stand out in the category?" In sum, be strategic and kind.

Poking at colorway choice, font, etc. only gives the symptoms of misalignment more power. The root cause of not aligning around the definition of success and the north star ?? of desired business outcomes is what drives inefficient finger pointing. Leadership’s goal and role should be to cast the vision that designers should seek to solve and ultimately manifest within their design. It enables all team members to graduate from collaboration to meaningful co-creation.

Creativity isn't a switch you can flip on and off. When interacting with creatives - respect their process! This is so crucial for a positive outcome. By establishing clear expectations, a goal/vision, and a realistic timeline from the beginning then the process should move along more smoothly. Avoid making unnecessary edits or last minute changes which can impact delivery timing. When projects are rushed it is more likely for small mistakes to be made, or for your designers to have to put in extra time pulling them away from other tasks. Respect their time, their process and their opinions! After all, they are the experts you've decided to partner with.

Fair point, however the onus goes both ways. Designers need to strive for transparency in communication of their bandwidth. The goal of utmost clarity within the communication of competing priorities will always win the day, as it enables a more aligned understanding of prioritization that will ultimately drive enablement of allocated resources thus more confidently driving the impact of activities applied in the delivery of effective design.

To be a good partner with your creative team, brand managers should help creatives clearly understand the objectives. If their input has been irrelevant, or off the mark, it might be a result of them not having enough of the right info from the start...

Keep in mind that majority of creatives have immense amount of talent and skill. Art can take many shapes, and each creative specializes in their own art form. Seeking out a professional often means you need the support and guidance that they can offer. Trusting their expertise in their craft, respecting their style, and establishing clear communication will elevate the relationship and project outcome. Creative teams aren't just a necessity, but a benefit and significant asset when utilized correctly. They should be treated as a team's secret weapon, catapulting everyone towards a unified vision.