How to Brief a Marketing Agency: What Syrian Companies Should Prepare
A good marketing brief tells an agency what you want to achieve, who you are speaking to, what already exists and how you will judge success. Prepare one or two pages covering goals, audience, competitors, brand assets, decision makers, timeline and success measures before the first meeting, and you will receive sharper proposals and fewer revision rounds.
Why does a written brief matter?
Most agency relationships that go wrong do so in the first week, not the sixth month. The company explains its needs in a phone call or a long WhatsApp voice note, the agency fills the gaps with assumptions, and both sides discover the mismatch only when the first designs arrive. A written brief prevents this by putting the essentials in one place that everyone can read, question and approve.
A brief does not need to be long or polished. One or two clear pages are better than a twenty-slide presentation. What matters is that it answers the questions any serious agency will ask anyway, so the first conversation starts from facts rather than guesses.
Start with the business problem, not the deliverable
"We need a new website" is a deliverable. "Distributors in Aleppo and Latakia cannot find our product range online, so our sales team spends hours sending catalogues over WhatsApp" is a problem an agency can solve properly, and it may lead to a better answer than the one you expected.
State one primary goal and, at most, two secondary goals. Too many goals produce a campaign that tries to say everything and convinces no one. If you are unsure how to prioritise, ask which result would make the biggest difference to revenue, reputation or workload over the coming year.
- Generate more qualified enquiries from a specific city or sector
- Launch a new product, branch or real estate project
- Reposition the brand for a more premium or international audience
- Support recruitment, partnerships or investor relations
- Reduce repetitive questions handled by phone and WhatsApp
Who exactly is the audience?
"Everyone in Syria" is not an audience. Describe the people who actually make the purchase decision: their role, city, age range, language preference and how they usually contact you. A private clinic in Damascus may speak to patients, referring doctors and corporate partners at the same time, each with different concerns and different questions.
Be explicit about language and location. Many Syrian companies serve customers inside the country and Syrians abroad together, and the two groups search, browse and decide differently. Note whether your audience reads mainly Arabic, English or both, and whether they reach you through Instagram, Google, WhatsApp, referrals or walk-ins. Most of them will be on a phone, so say that too.
Which competitors and references should you include?
List a handful of competitors, local or regional, and explain in a sentence what you think each does well or badly. This tells the agency where you stand in the market and what you want to be distinguished from. Add companies outside your sector or outside Syria whose style, clarity or tone you admire.
Equally useful is a short list of things you do not want. If you dislike generic stock photography, crowded designs or an overly formal tone, write it down. Clear dislikes save more revision rounds than vague likes.
What brand assets and access should you hand over?
Agencies lose a surprising amount of time chasing files and passwords. Collect what already exists before the project begins and note who controls each account. If a former employee or freelancer registered your domain or Facebook page under their own name, flag it now, because recovering access can take time.
If you have none of this, say so plainly. Starting from almost nothing is common for Syrian companies rebuilding their presence, and it changes the scope, so it is better known on day one.
- Logo in its original vector format, plus any brand guidelines
- Fonts, colours and existing templates
- Approved photos and videos, with permission to use them
- Website, hosting and domain access details
- Admin access to social media accounts and Google Business Profile
- Previous campaigns, what worked and what did not
Who decides, and what is the timeline?
Name the person who briefs the agency, the person who approves the work and anyone who can overrule it late in the process. In family businesses and partnerships, a final opinion from a senior figure who never attended the meetings is one of the most common causes of delay. Bring decision makers in early, even briefly.
Build the timeline around real business dates: a product launch, a season, an exhibition or the opening of a branch. Leave room for your own team to review drafts, gather content and approve both language versions, because internal approvals often take longer than production itself.
What does success look like? A ready-to-use brief outline
Define success in terms you can check: enquiries through the website and WhatsApp, the quality of those leads, visibility on Google Maps in a target area, or a website your sales team is proud to send to partners. Agree how each measure will be tracked before work starts, not after.
Use the outline below as your template. Fill it in, send it before the first meeting and ask the agency to reply with questions. A serious agency, Taswiqly included, will usually come back with questions that sharpen the brief further, and that exchange is a good early test of the partnership.
- Company overview: what you do, where, and for whom
- Business problem and primary goal
- Audience: roles, cities, languages and channels
- Competitors and references, with likes and dislikes
- Existing assets and account access
- Decision makers, approval process, timeline and success measures
FAQ
How long should a marketing agency brief be?
One or two pages is usually enough. Clarity matters more than length, so focus on the business problem, the audience, existing assets, decision makers, timeline and how success will be measured.
Can I write the brief in Arabic?
Yes. Write it in the language your decision makers think in. If the work will be bilingual, note which content needs Arabic, English or both, and who on your side will review each language.
What if my company has no brand guidelines?
That is common and not a problem, but it should be stated clearly in the brief. The agency can then either include brand foundations in the scope or work carefully from your existing logo and materials.