Brief for Performance & Learnings.

Before you start putting pen to paper, a crucial element is to lay the foundation to attribute actionable learnings from your campaign. Let’s say you worked with only 1x influencer and gained a RoAS of 3x using 1x Instagram Reel. For your next campaign, it will be impossible for you to know what worked and what could be improved upon. Did you get the result of the influencer? The Instagram Reel Format? Would TikTok prove an even better channel for you? You can read more about running TikTok ads in our previous post, here.

You must start by writing down hypotheses to test in your campaign, as this will fundamentally impact the scope of the brief. Example:

Hypothesis: Influencers in my product area will drive better performance. ‍

‍Consider the following recruitment split:

- 70% influencers in your direct product area. (E.g., Fitness supplements.)
- 15% in an adjacent area (E.g., Cooking.)
- 15% in an adjacent area (E.g. Vegetarian/vegan.)

Hypothesis: TikTok will drive more sales for me.

Then perhaps the following split would help you gain actionable learnings:

- 60% TikTok video.
- 20% Instagram video.
- 10% Instagram photo.
- 10% YouTube video.

Once your hypotheses are ready, you must link them to a trackable KPI. For your business, it might be the number of Clicks on your website, in which case, after the campaign has concluded, you can run all your hypotheses through this lens to know precisely which format drove the most clicks and which influencer.

15x Mandatory Inputs for Performance-Driven Briefs.

With the hypothesis clear, it’s time to start writing, which can feel daunting. If you get it wrong, it will cost you time and money going back and forth with the creators and countless content revisions. To set yourself up for success, you must consider all the below inputs.

To run paid social ads, which we always recommend, you must specify the required dimensions, resolution, and ratios to the influencer(s).

By covering the above, you set yourself up for getting the right content right from the start.

A Final Word

We’ve created over 20.000+ influencer campaign briefs over 8 years. During this time, we’ve learned and started to recognize clear patterns in every single campaign brief clients have put forward. We also actively discovered what creative briefs drive results and, more importantly, which ones didn’t. Loads of brands hire expensive agencies to craft the most compelling briefs, which can seem necessary. Our advice is to give more general pointers around what creative(s) drive performance. We encourage clients to give creative freedom to influencers, restricted to unambiguous guidelines that guarantee brand safety.

You can book a meeting with him here if you’d like to discuss an upcoming brief and get pointers.