Most disappointing copy can be traced back to the brief. Not because the client wrote a bad one, but because there wasn’t one, and the copywriter filled the gaps with guesses.
A brief doesn’t need to be long. It needs to answer the questions the writer would otherwise have to invent answers to.
What a brief is actually for
It isn’t a specification for the writing. It’s a description of the problem.
The distinction matters. If you tell a copywriter to write 500 words for a homepage, you’ll get 500 words for a homepage. If you tell them your homepage isn’t converting, that visitors seem to think you’re an agency when you’re a consultancy, and that your sales team keeps having to explain what you do on the first call, you’ll get something that fixes it. Possibly not on the homepage, and possibly not in 500 words.
Good copywriters solve problems. Give them the problem.
The things worth writing down
Who this is for. Not a demographic. A person with a situation. “Finance directors at manufacturing firms who’ve been told to cut costs and don’t know where to start” beats “B2B decision makers aged 35-55” every time.
What you want them to do. One action. Book a call, request a sample, understand what you actually sell. If you list five, the copy will do none of them well.
What’s stopping them. The objection, the confusion, the thing your sales team spends its life explaining. This is often the single most useful line in a brief and the one most often left out.
What you sell and why anyone chooses you. Be honest here rather than aspirational. “We’re not the cheapest and we’re not the best known, but we’re the only ones who do X” is far more useful than a list of values.
Where this will appear. A page, an email, a leaflet, a sign. Context changes everything about how something should be written.
What’s already there. Existing copy, brand guidelines, tone of voice documents, previous versions that didn’t work. Especially the ones that didn’t work, and why.
Anything that can’t change. Legal wording, regulated phrasing, a headline the CEO is attached to, a character limit. Say so at the start rather than in the second round of edits.
When you need it, and who approves it. The approval question is the one that derails projects. If four people need to sign off, the copywriter needs to know that before they start, not when the feedback arrives contradicting itself.
What you don’t need to include
Word counts, unless there’s a hard constraint. Structure, unless it’s fixed. Instructions about tone that amount to “professional but friendly”, which describes almost all writing and rules out nothing.
You also don’t need to write it well. A brief is a working document. Bullet points and half-sentences are fine.
The conversation matters more than the document
Most copywriters will want to talk it through, and the brief is better thought of as the agenda for that conversation than as a substitute for it. Expect to be asked questions you don’t immediately know the answer to. That’s the job working properly.
Be prepared for the brief to change as a result. A writer who accepts every brief at face value is less useful than one who says the real problem seems to be something else.
Feedback is part of the brief
Agree at the outset how many rounds of revision are included, who gives feedback, and how. Consolidated feedback from one person beats three sets of contradictory comments arriving separately.
When you do give feedback, describe the problem rather than prescribing the fix. “This paragraph loses me” is more useful than rewriting the paragraph. You hired a writer; let them write.
A template you can use
Download the briefing template
It’s a single page with the questions above, in order, with space to answer. Fill in what you know, leave the rest blank, and send it. The blanks tell the copywriter as much as the answers.