4. HAVE A PROCESS. TRANSFORM IDEAS INTO REALITY.

Creative ideas are the product of a solid and thought out process from ideation to execution. It’s a linear, step-by-step process that gets creative and strategic heads involved. We thought we’d share with you the few tips that we use at every stage to generate creative ideas and bring them to life.

1. HAVE A PURPOSE: Understand what the business challenge is, why a creative solution is required and what it needs to deliver. Spend time truly exploring the brief, asking any relevant questions about objective, target audience etc. Make sure there is a purpose before you start. 

2. COMPLETE IMMERSION: To come up with great ideas, you need to know your subject inside out. Get well acquainted with as much intelligence on the subject as possible. This can involve anything from reading through a piece of consumer research, searching the web for online conversations on the topic or going out to experience the product yourself. 

3. REMOVE BARRIERS AND RESTRICTIONS: Process is important, but creativity can’t be forced. It has to be natural and organic. As such the conventional 2-hour brainstorm is becoming something of the past. It is unrealistic to expect creative teams to solve a problem and come up with the next big idea within the confides of a one hour meeting huddled around a boardroom table. Creativity needs to be free flowing. Creativity is always an outcome of passionate minds meeting. It doesn’t only have to be the creatives who come up with the ideas. Everyone can get involved.

4. GO IT ALONE FIRST: Too often organisations believe that big meetings are the most effective way to generate new ideas. We believe that you should have the confidence to go it alone first. It is our individual experiences that define how we interpret information and interact with brands. Channel your thoughts before coming together with others and bring your own flavor to the table. Learning how your mind works is the key to success. Anthony Mayfield at Brilliant Noise believes that creative thinkers need to become more familiar with how they think. Understand when and where you’re most creative and modify your approach accordingly. The time of day, weather, amount of sleep and food we eat can impact the way we think and may prohibit us from coming to that creative eureka moment we’re all searching for.

5.  COLLABORATE AND DEBATE: Once everyone involved has had time to collect their unique thoughts on the project, get together to throw the thoughts on the table. At this stage it is imperative that such a session is free flowing and accepting. No idea is a stupid idea. It is then the duty of the team to sanity check and test each idea in the context of the challenge or situation and the audience. This is where patterns are found, connections are made, and good ideas are made better together.

6. GET REAL: Once a few ideas are developed, acid test them to see whether they are practical. A nice way to do this may be to create a prototype or a model of the idea. Alternatively this would also be a perfect time to share the proposed ideas with industry experts to determine whether they would ever truly work and determine how to bring them to life. The best idea isn’t the most creative – it’s the one that’s most effective. Which of your ideas is best?

Hope you are now feeling more creative after reading the above tips and feel as though you have the power to be creative.

Go forth and CREATE! 

Good Luck.