This document provides strategies for successfully managing creative projects that deliver results. It discusses defining the project goals and timeline, assembling the right internal and partner teams, aligning expectations by establishing a clear process and sharing assumptions, and managing the process by understanding what motivates creatives and reminding teams where they are. Great communication, trust between partners, flexibility, and investment in the project are keys to success.

15. All of those projects were easy.

16. All of those clients had a great experience.

17. Step 1
Admit you have a problem.

18. Oh,
It Ain’t
My Fault
Building Successful Marketing Relationships

19. Delivering Successful Projects

20. Woohoo!
Your project got approved!

21. Chaos
Stress
Hurt Feelings
Cost Overruns
Paying More for Mediocre Work

22. Strategies for Success
Avoiding Common Mistakes
Planning for a Successful Project
Implementing a Successful Project

23. Results
That’s what I like.

25. The result is that we’ve been able to
double our revenue goals in two
years, and we continue to accelerate
with their help.
— Charles Josephs, CEO Acute Medical

27. Instead of our customers getting
frustrated and leaving the website,
Line 58 simplified and streamlined our
entire system, creating a responsive
e-commerce website that makes it easy
for our customers to intuitively
make purchases.
- Jon Sherman, Owner Flavor Paper

28. What
undermines
great work ?

29. Unclear objectives

30. Gate keepers

31. New Players

32. Loss of momentum

33. Lack of trust

34. Micro managing

35. So,
How do you
get results ?

36. Define the Project
Assemble Your Team
Align Expectations
Manage the Process

37. Defining
Your Project

38. Articulate The
Business Goals
What are the business goals?
How will you measure success?

39. Focus on Outcomes
Articulate Desired Results
Avoid Dictating How to Achieve Them

40. Have a Budget
Share Your Budget

41. Establish a Timeline
Is this hard or flexible?

42. Understand the
relationship between
design and content
Is this a pure design project?
If not, what are the content requirements?
What is the budet for content creation?

44. Assembling
Your Team

45. Identify Your
Internal Team
Who needs to be on this project?
What is the role of each person?
Articulate who owns this project.

46. Be Realistic About
Time Commitments
During the Process
During Implementation

47. Be Realistic About
Team Capabilities

48. Set Expectations
Everyone attends every meeting
Each person speaks to their expertise
Everyone remains solutions focused
Everyone acknowledges the expertise of others
No one needs to win
Maintain the same team

49. Select Your Partner
Do they have a record of success?
Can they do what you are asking?
Are they a good cultural fit?
Do you have a partner on the creative team?
Do you trust them?

50. Aligning
Expectations

51. Establish a
Clear Process
This is harder than it sounds

52. Share Your
Insights Into Your
Team & Culture
Articulate motivations
as you understand them

53. Articulate
Assumptions & Risks

54. Assumptions
Management will not insert themselves into the process
Project Managers will deliver project info on-time
Marketing team will reduce portfolio categories to 6
Video team will complete work in 4 weeks

55. Risks
Management will insert themselves into the process
Principals won’t approve copy in a timely manner
10 RFPs will land in the spring
Video team will not complete work in 4 weeks

56. New ideas are rejected.

57. New ideas are scary.

58. Managing
the Process

59. Understand What
Motivates Creative
Professionals

60. What gets you excited
about a client project?
What maintains your
enthusiasm?

61. Working with clients that are open to
genuine discussion of ideas or
solutions and not focused on pushing
pre-conceptions through. Architects
don’t want to be CAD monkeys for
their clients for the same reason we
don’t want to be told “just do what I
tell you”.

62. Clients that are passionate,
thoughtful, have clear goals and trust
that we know what we’re doing. They
have to like what they are doing if
I’m going to do the same.

63. What are challenges
you have experienced
working with clients?

64. With respect to Architects specifically,
it can be hard to work with their
tendency to think they can do any
design-related job well, including
web-design and branding.

65. Inability to focus on the big picture or
take a step back, not interested in
understanding and being a valuable
partner in the design/development/
execution/whatever process. Have to
be able to work through things
together, otherwise it all breaks down.

66. What can clients
do to increase the
odds of getting a
great project?

67. Trusting that they hired a competent
team and be open to what they
suggest. It becomes a miserable
process when the trust is lacking
and each side struggles to control
the other.

68. Clear communication and consistent
expectations, flexibility to let the
project evolve into something better
than they imagined and willing to
invest (time, energy, dollars) in the
best version of it. Pick people that
you want to work with and admire,
hopefully they’re doing the same.

69. Remind your team
where you are in
the process

70. Build a contingency
fee into your budget

71. So, How do you improve
your odds of getting a
great creative project
that delivers results ?

72. Define the Project
Assemble Your Team
Align Expectations
Manage the Process