This is a group of responses based on one of the most popular posts I've written in the three years since Creative Streak began. How To Make A Creative Director Cry outlines the ten most common responses I've heard as a creative director, with links to each subsequent post giving more thoughts and suggestions to address each statement. This is statement #9: "That's an interesting idea. What else do you have?"
Statement #9 is a distillation of many debates in my creative director career about the best way to present ideas to a client or project manager.
There are two schools of thought. Present the client with several ideas from which to choose. Or, present the client with one definitive idea.
Several ideas?
From the presenter’s point of view, a selection of ideas demonstrates the breadth of their creativity, and by extension, a range of alternatives for implementation for the client. But from the client’s point of view, a selection of ideas can look overwhelming, if not unfocused.
The problem typically lies in how the ideas are presented. In what order are the ideas presented? In what context or reasoning? Like a comedian, do you start with your funniest joke? Or like a storyteller, do you take the client on a journey with the most compelling idea coming at the end? Or, are the ideas presented without preference, neither highlighting nor elevating one idea about the others?
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