Over the last few decades in numerous CMO roles, I have written, received, rewritten and quietly apologised for more marketing briefs than I care to remember. I have also been on the other side of the fence, receiving briefs so poor they make me wonder if the sender should be issuing a brief to help them write a brief.
A good brief is about clarity. It exists to remove ambiguity, so the people you want to pay to solve your problems are on the same page as you and set up to succeed, in a way that you and your team actually benefit from.
In b2b marketing, most briefs start with a decision that has already been made. A campaign is needed to launch a new product. The team has decided it is finally time for marketing automation. It is time to refresh the brand identity. Somebody wants to jump on the account based marketing train. Completely normal.
The brief is not there to pretend you are starting from scratch. It is there to explain the thinking behind the decision, what you need and why, what resources you have to play with, and how you will know an agency is the right one for you. If a brief is too bad, the perfect agency might even decline to pitch in the first place, so shooting yourself in the foot.
Most bad marketing briefs are not written by bad marketers. They are written by busy people trying to move things along.
The problem is that small mistakes at the briefing stage snowball. What starts as vagueness turns into guesswork. Guesswork turns into key people being on different pages. This could lead to shoddy work. And that turns into frustration on all sides.
Like all things, everyone has their own opinion. But here are the most common mistakes I see in b2b marketing briefs.
Mistake 1. Treating the brief like admin
This is the big one. When a brief is treated as something you have to get done, rather than something that helps you think, it shows. The language is vague. The logic is loose. Key decisions are missing.
Sometimes I get the impression people think the brief is just admin that will be put right in the face to face briefing. It is not. The brief is the one truth. It is the moment you decide what you actually want and explain it clearly enough for someone else to help. If you rush it, you will pay for that later in time, money and goodwill.
Mistake 2. Pretending some decisions have not been made
Many briefs dance around reality. The business already wants a campaign. Or a new brand identity. Or outside help. Or a new direction. But the brief is written as if everything is still up for debate.
This creates confusion immediately. Agencies do not know whether they are being asked to diagnose a problem or execute a solution. Be honest. If a decision has been made, state it clearly. You have 100% decided to use Sitecore over WordPress? Say so.
Clarity is not limiting. It is invaluable.
Mistake 3. Being vague about the problem
Briefs often describe what needs to be done without explaining why. We need more awareness. We need better leads. We need to stand out. None of this helps.
What is actually not working as it should. Where are things breaking down. What prompted this brief now. Without that context, people are forced to guess at the real problem and the work will drift.
Why not help agencies by giving them valuable context upfront. Do not rely on them asking the right questions. Give them the lowdown. Give them the inside track. Proactively.
Mistake 4. Asking the work to do too many things
If your brief has ten objectives, it has none. One brief should have one main job. You can include secondary goals, but you need to be clear about what matters most and what trumps everything else if time or resources get tight.
When everything is a priority, nothing is. This is how work ends up watered down and compromised. Focus is not a nice to have. It is what makes work effective.
Mistake 5. Defining success with buzzwords
Success is often described in language that sounds impressive but means very little. And as b2b marketing people, we can be the worst offenders. Best in class. Cutting edge. Market leading. These phrases do not give anyone something to aim for.
Describe success in plain English. What needs to happen for you to know this project has been successful. What about from your stakeholders’ perspective.
Ideally the metrics are quantifiable. At a minimum, they should be SMART: specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time bound. If you cannot explain success clearly, you will struggle to recognise it when it happens, praise those who delivered it, or hold people and agencies accountable if it did not.
Mistake 6. Rubbish personas
Everyone is not a target audience. And neither is a rubbish persona.
I am generally alarmed at how bad b2b marketing people are at personas. I have seen personas cross my desk with entirely useless traits, like they have three kids, like skiing, reading books and eating Mars bars. That is a real example. It serves no purpose. It fools nobody. More importantly, it adds nothing to the brief or the outcome.
An agency will never know your customers as well as you do. Good personas help them make better decisions on your behalf. Focus on what matters. What job titles buy your services. What pressures are they under. What does success look like for them. What do they fear. What do they need to believe to choose you. What tools and processes do they live in. That is the sort of thing I want to see, not where they go on holiday.
Mistake 7. Listing features instead of benefits
Much like personas, b2b marketers people also struggle with value propositions.
Listing features, locations, or how many employees you have is not a value proposition. The best briefs articulate why prospective clients would be interested in your service and why. How will you help them be more successful. What challenges do you solve and how. What does that mean for them as a business and as an individual. Why should they choose you rather than a competitor.
Mistake 8. Hiding constraints until later
Budget, timelines, legal requirements, internal politics, technical limits. These things exist whether you write them down or not. Leaving them out of the brief does not make the work more creative. It just pushes the problem down the road.
Hiding the budget is often framed as being savvy. It rarely is. It just forces people to guess, then compromise decent ideas later when the budget inevitably comes out. That helps no one.
If you cannot share an exact budget, give a range. If you cannot talk about the politics, at least describe the internal perception you will need to overcome. If legal is normally extremely risk averse, flag it early. Give agencies a chance of charting a course through the maze.
Agencies can work within constraints. What they cannot do is plan around information they do not have. Put the reality on the table early. And yes, there are always ways to say the sensitive stuff without spelling it out. Come on. You are marketers. Be creative.
Mistake 9. Being unclear about what is fixed and what is flexible
Many briefs leave agencies guessing about where they can challenge you and where they cannot. Is the message locked. Is the channel fixed. Is the timeline immovable.
If everything feels fixed, you will get safe work. If nothing feels fixed, you will get confusion. A good brief separates non negotiables from areas where thinking is welcome.
Mistake 10. Forgetting to say how you will choose
If this is a pitch, one of the biggest mistakes is not explaining how decisions will be made. What matters most. Thinking or polish. Experience or fresh perspective. Chemistry or credentials. Who is involved.
When you do not say this, agencies pitch to whatever they think you secretly want. That rarely ends well. Being clear about how you will choose is basic fairness and improves the quality of responses dramatically.
Mistake 11. Not giving all agencies the same information
I have been a stakeholder in pitches where some agencies were given more information than others. I always call it out. It is not fair and it skews the outcome.
I once had a head of procurement ask me to answer a question from one agency during an RFP process. I was happy to do it, but only if the question and answer were shared with all bidding agencies. They pushed back and said the other agencies should ask better questions if they wanted the extra context.
I reject that thinking. The agency asking good questions is great but my team want the best outcome and we do not have time to play games. Share the information and get to a better result faster.
Mistake 12. Sending the brief and hoping for the best
A brief is not finished when you send the document. Writing it and briefing it are not the same thing. If you do not talk it through, answer questions and confirm shared understanding, you are leaving too much to chance.
Send the brief. Talk them through it. Be prepared to refine it. If you just email a brief, it is a waste of time. You will not get anyone’s best people or best thinking aligned to the brief. And from an agency point of view, I would not want to bid on anything for someone I have not had a conversation with. The best agencies will push back on this. That is one of the ways you spot them.
Mistake 13. Not considering compensating bidders for their time
This may be controversial and not every budget allows it, but I have compensated losing bidders for their time, even if it is a small but meaningful gesture.
Agencies spend real time and expertise responding to your brief. Creative agencies incur real costs. If your budget allows, recognise that. Even if you went in a different direction, you valued their thinking and it helped you get to the right decision. A simple gesture can leave the door open to work together in future, and it is the decent thing to do.
The simple rule that avoids most mistakes
If there is one rule I stick to, it is this. A good marketing brief should make it obvious what is being bought, why it exists, who it is for, what success looks like and how the work will be judged. If any of those are unclear, the brief is not ready yet.
Most briefing mistakes come from rushing, avoiding decisions, and treating the whole thing like an administrative task. Slow down. Decide properly. Write it clearly. It is one of the highest ROI things you can do in b2b marketing.
