This is a blog about initiative, disguised as a blog about inspiration.
in·spi·ra·tion
/inspəˈrāSH(ə)n/
- the process of being mentally stimulated to do or feel something, especially to do something creative.
- a sudden brilliant, creative, or timely idea.
Creative Agency: Idea Factories
When you hire a creative agency, you’re looking for ideas. You have a problem and need a solution. It could be that your website isn’t working the way you want it to, perhaps your brand requires an overhaul, or maybe you’ve got a product launch that requires an interesting angle to move units. So, you call people who solve those issues for a living: a creative agency.
We noodle the obstacle to your success until we find an inspiring solution. And it’s here, at this crucial moment in the process, that things get compelling… Clients aren’t looking for obvious answers. They have those. They’re all full up on the conspicuous conclusions. People pay creative agencies for out-of-the-box, effective connections.
How Creatives Meet Inspiration
Some creatives wait for inspiration to come to them. It can happen, but tends to test the patience of clients. It can also be a symptom of agencies who do work to win awards, not to address their clients’ woes.
Others creatives may just look at what their peers are doing and do what is, essentially, copying. This can lead to less-than-stellar results, as audiences don’t tend to engage as desired with work they’ve seen (or think they’ve seen) before. Plus, you know, it’s copying.
The best creatives work with their teams to seek out inspiration, drawing on their collective personal experiences—past, present, and future—to address their client’s problem in a refreshing way. The difference? Initiative.
in·i·ti·a·tive
/iˈniSH(ē)ədiv/
- the ability to assess and initiate things independently.
- the power or opportunity to act or take charge before others do.
Find Your Perfect Agency
The questions you have to ask yourself when you’re hiring an agency is: What types of creatives have I found? Will these people wait for the perfect creative? How long will that take? Will their work make them look awesome and serve me secondarily? Will they give me work that’s already been done somewhere else by someone else? Can I trust that the answer to all of the above is no?
Or will this agency leverage strategy and initiative to generate genuinely new creative that can positively impact your business, while giving you something you’re proud to have your brand’s name on?
That last one? That’s what Mad Genius does. We pride ourselves on our ability to get past associative ideation (the obvious connections), through explorative thinking (shots in the dark), to inspired thinking—fresh ideas that draw fresh links to unexplored possibilities.
And here’s the part where this blog drops its disguise and reveals its true self: Initiative matters. Don’t be lazy. Don’t take shortcuts. Do the work and embrace potential failures. That thing you need to get done? Go do it. It’s going to be inspiring.
Get in touch with us, and we’ll talk with you about your business over coffee. Or beer.