Preparing for a briefing meeting

A good briefing meeting gives everyone the confidence that things are clear and understood and forms a solid foundation for the creative work to follow. This list of questions gives you an idea of the things we will ask you.

General questions

• What does your organisation do?
• How are you distinct from other organisations?
• What has been the build-up to this project?
• What are you trying to achieve with the proposed piece of work?
• What ideally do you want the reader or receiver to do, think, feel or remember afterwards?
• What is your main message and what, in order of importance, are the other messages?
• Who is your target audience and why might they be interested in what you're saying or offering?
• What is this audience like and can you give us a typical profile of them?

Practical questions

• Might you need someone to edit your work to give it consistency or focus for a particular target group?
• Do you have a source of images or photographs, or might you need a photographer or illustrator?
• Do you need someone to come up with ideas for campaigns or new names for organisations or projects?
• Have you already got logos and colours that are part of an established visual identity?
• Are there practical considerations of size and weight to consider for post costs and envelope sizes?
• Do you want to use recycled or environmentally-friendly materials?
• Do you need to give information in other languages?
• Are there particular accessibility standards you want to meet, like the guidelines in RNIB's ‘See It Right’ pack
• Is the new publication to be part of a future or existing family of resources?
• How will the communication be distributed?
• Do you have an idea of quantity?
• What is your timescale?
• What is your budget?

Questions, questions!

Don’t worry if you can't answer all these questions. A briefing meeting is not meant to feel like an exam and you'll probably have lots of questions for us too.

Anything else I need to think about?

If you have any materials that have inspired you – an eye-catching advert, a well-designed leaflet, a report you enjoyed reading – then bring them along to the meeting. They could be promoting something totally different but might have the ‘feel' you're looking for or use colours you want to use.