Nearly THERE

The hardest part of a brand strategy project is when you’re really, really close.

You’ve done 99% of the work - the interviews, downloads, workshops, development, research and summary.

You’ve agonised over the recommendation until you run out of time.

But you’re still not quite there. Round you go again, in ever-decreasing circles.

This may not help, but here are ten things to try:

1. Stop trying. Take the dog for one more walk. Declutter your mind.

2. Have a long, slow look back through all your notes, right back to the start of the project. Re-read them like you’re a detective.

3. Pay particular attention to what you wrote down straight after the fieldwork. For me, this will be the notes on my phone, sitting there with an Americano on the 08:47 train from Leeds back to London on a Friday morning, tired.

4. Look for a project from the past that was in the same territory. Same corner of the Need Map for me. Those deeper needs, they’re unchanging.

5. Road-test your answer with your partner or an honest friend, as long as they aren’t in marketing. That should bring you down to earth with a bump.

6. If necessary, present your recommendation to the client team in clunky long-hand. Don’t play copywriter. Write a paragraph for the proposition. See where they bite.

7. Make sure your antennae are on receive when they respond. A favourite quote of mine, courtesy of Keith Richards.

8. Encourage the team to kick the answer around on Slack for a day or two. Remember, you want it to be their strategy.

9. Make your final contribution to edit their thoughts. Another genius quote, this one from Oscar Wilde: "I was working on the proof of one of my poems all the morning, and took out a comma. In the afternoon I put it back again."

10. When it comes to making the decision, politely remind them that strategy is choice and it’s time to choose.

Go on then, get on with it.