#15 How to brief ad creatives to a designer with Rachael Nichols

Aggie Meroni: 0:00

Hello welcome to the freelance ads club podcast with me your host Aggie Meroni. Whether you're a seasoned freelance ads manager, or just thinking about taking the leap into self employment, this podcast is for you. Every week, I'll be releasing a bite sized episode, I'll be sharing mistakes I've made and lessons I've learned from my own freelance business. I'll be showcasing some of the amazingly talented freelancers in the freelance ads club. And I also will be speaking to some incredible guests who generously be sharing their knowledge with us to help us keep updated with industry trends. And I really hope that after listening to this podcast, you will come away full of confidence on how to win great clients, how to charge correctly, and most importantly, retain those dream clients so that you build a successful and sustainable business. Hello, welcome to episode 15 of the freelance Ads Club Podcast. Today I'm joined by Rachel Nichols, who is the founder, artistic director and generally all-round amazing designer who's behind our InDesign, and today we're going to be talking about what you need to think about when you're briefing a designer with your ad creative. It's become very apparent, that creative drives ad performance. And now more than ever, designers are becoming more and more involved in the actual ad creatives. As freelancers, some of us are in charge of the ad creative for our clients, but others work like I do with designers who create the ads to our design briefs. I've had so many questions about what I include in my design briefs, how I get over any miscommunications and things like that. So I thought why not just bring in a designer that I've worked with in the past to talk this all through. So listen in and see what Rachel had to say. Hi, Rach, thank you so much for joining me for today's episode.

Rachael Nichols: 2:11

Hi, my business bestie.

Aggie Meroni: 2:13

So as I do with all my guests, I start off by asking who you are and where how you got to where you are now, doing what you do. And you've got quite an interesting story. So I think people be interested to hear

Rachael Nichols: 2:29

Okay, so I currently run a design business and it's me and another girl called Kia. And then how I got there. I studied Fine Art at uni but I suppose actually before that, I was as a kid always glued to a sketchbook. I was always drawing just frickin love to draw. Yeah, I always loved drawing. And then art was like my number one subject at school so naturally went to uni to study fine art. And you would not believe how many people told me I won't get a job doing fine art. But I ended up getting a job as a junior designer in this really small advertising agency in Essex. And they specialised in ads, actually funny full circle here with this episode but paper advertisements. So like job ads in papers, which as you can imagine, was a bit of a dying trade, who applies for a job in a paper anymore. Well apart from your local papers. So anyway, I worked there for a year and then ended up in SoHo in a PR agency. So there was two sides to this. They had like one more consumer side and one more b2b side. So it was a really good learning opportunity to work with different clients like PlayStation, SKY, NOW TV, Canon people like that. I was there for three years and then went freelance. So did a few stints at different agencies and places like in house like Topshop, one stint in a former company called Teva, which was quite boring, but the people were lovely. And then another one in another creative agency working predominantly on Accenture account. And then off the back of that, after COVID, my private work just started picking up, private clients that I've kind of gathered along the way. And yeah, I did less than less, you call it white labelling, contracting stuff, and more just now working privately with clients and designing projects, and I suppose that's kind of the transition, especially when I was doing the creative agency work with Accenture. I did like it became more of an art director role. rather than design and so that's when you start thinking about the strategy of design rather than just start the doing of design. Because I often say that's the difference between a good, and a great designer is a great designer can think about the ideas, where a good designer can just do the ideas. So thats why I'm saying, I'm a great designer.

Aggie Meroni: 5:22

You're amazing conceptually. But I also think there's a massive parallel in that, Facebook advertisers, or any advertisers that advertise visually. So I guess TikTok is one as well. Pinterest is another platform. And that's because anyone, can manage to put an ad in an ad management platform. I mean, it's pretty formulaic. Once you learn what buttons to press, it's pretty standard, but the strategy and the art that needs to go into it, and the messaging and how you communicate that, that is what I think is becoming more important now in the ad world, especially online advertising. And that's why I invited you on today, because I know not just freelancers, but also ads managers in house work really closely with design teams, and they need to brief those design teams with the concepts. And I've had varying success briefing designers, I totally get what you mean, like some designers just get the concepts and they will put their own artistic flair on it. And that's where the magic happens. The times it's really tough is when you're literally telling a designer, what the artistic concept should be, as well. And they sometimes misinterpret what you're trying to get across as well. So I think because we've worked together on accounts, where I briefed you to make the ads for me, I just thought it would be really good taking your experience, not just of us working together, because I know you work with lots of other accounts as well. What makes a good brief, as a designer, what makes it easy for you to do your job when you work with an ads manager?

Rachael Nichols: 7:09

Well, firstly, this isn't a new thing, like there are not that many people that are good at briefing, you cover all your bases, as the person doing the briefing, as we say in our world, your project is only as good as your brief. So if you can make your brief as detailed or as succinct as possible, then that gives us the best opportunity possible to create the best creative outcome. So like, my ethos is always like, we're going to find the best creative solution every single time. So if you are briefing someone, like a few pointers that I would give is like, really concentrate on your who, what, when and how, like, it sounds so simple, like asking, or like specifying what the project is, like, Who would have thought that you would literally just have to write a sentence and be like, This is what we aim to do. And this is how we're going to do it. Just that underlying context is so so helpful. And who you're writing the brief for, what client we're working with, but also like, what audience you're targetting as well. So that gives us a really good feel for like, is it a teenager ad? are we approaching Gen Z kind of people? Or is it more like the older generation, like I know, we spoke about client where their client base was that older people, so that ad would look very different. Someone who was like Gen Z, for instance. With me, specifically, another aspect of being a great designer is being on top of your time management. And when you're going to work on things. And how long it's going to take you so when we're going to get your work in. But also are there any seasonal things to consider from like, your aspect? Like, is it a Black Friday ad? I mean, it's pretty simple anyway, and I think that would probably naturally fly. But also like Christmas, anything else that you need to consider? And also it doesn't have an expiry date almost. So does it feel summery. And if you are, like running the ad for a long period of time, and it's gonna go into the winter, is that like something to consider as well? And I think like, part of our role is like having like a bit of a directive stance, and then like, potentially pulling up concepts and being like, this is the direction I think we should follow. It's always really handy to have like the perspective of the client or a view. And being like, this is an ad that I think works really well. And this is an ad that I think works really badly -seeing what doesn't work informs what does work. So any inspiration I know I send Aggie these ads all the time. This is such a good ad. I know you keep a bank for for all the things you see. So if you could feed into that, and then when looking for something like this, show the examples, I think we should animate it a little bit like this, or could it move a bit like this? It's so handy. And obviously having that clients perspective as well is really, really informative. But having said all that, I would also make a point about sometimes you get that two sides of the coin, right? You get someone who might brief and it'd be, like, really lacklustre. And to be fair, as designers, we should also be interrogating the brief and asking the right questions. But you also get briefs that are like two pages long, and you think Christ, I don't have time to fucking read all that. Bluntly, there is an art to being succinct to the information you're getting across, a balance, right? And I think you'll experience it, the more you do it, but the the right amount of information will not go too far that it starts to muddy the creative thinking. So it will kind of get our cogs turning and then it's up to us to kind of like, run with what you've given us, if that makes sense. So yeah, hopefully, that's enough insight into being like, just enough information, but also not too much. No, 100%. I mean, I'm sure my process could be streamlined as well. But what I usually do, and obviously, feel free to feedback, on this. But I always do research on what the competitors are doing for my clients. So if there's elements I like, so it might just be how they've animated text, or maybe like a geometric colour shape in the background. Or it can be you know, the composition of an ad, so not necessarily what they're showing in the ads. But I've got so many screenshots from a skincare client I worked with. And the skincare industry is fascinating for the ads, I took so many photos or screenshots, because they have to be really clever with like colour and pattern and all that kind of thing. And there's elements from those ads that I put into other industries. I think that's what's really important as well. It's not about copying other people, that's like a massive nono but just trying to give some context. So like when there's text overlay, I usually instruct what that text should be. Because something I've noticed, and this is from designers, is other people working for my clients will get involved and it's suddenly war & peace on an ad. And as we know, less is more when it comes to social ads, because people just don't have the bandwidth to absorb too much information in a blink. And I think that's something that we actually developed together when we worked with one particular client, like completely stripping it back. So just very simple with contrasting colours. So people just knew straight away what they were actually looking at. Yeah, this all links back to like me saying about having receiving a brief so long, it's exactly the same and people are like, being served these ads and like taking them in. You've literally, I can't remember what the stat is. But you've literally got like less than a secon to grab attention. I think feels natural to overload. And to give too much away, but actually, it's the intrigue and the teasing the information, potentially. That is the interesting part. But also, it's interesting as well how the creative can be brought out, as well.

Aggie Meroni: 13:47

And I think something that is an adjustment to some designers I've worked with that haven't necessarily designed for social media ads, is they actually struggle with that a lot. They're like, but we need to put more stuff on there. It's like no we do not, we need to take off about five things that you've added on to this. It's way too busy. And the text is too small. And there's like, you know, there's all these things that just won't work. And also, I think this is just one thing I've noticed about designers, just generally in my experience, they all work on massive Macs. So when they design, they're looking at it from a big, big screen. But then when you look on your phone, you're like, Ah, this doesn't work on a small screen. So it's like having to like look at it in a different format to make sure it's gonna work. But these are all things that you kind of have to bear in mind if you're the ads manager when you're briefing it as well and give examples of what it shouldn't be. Because there are rubbish ads I have like, we share a lot of them between us as well. Don't worry. You look at our DMs it's like oh my god. Have you seen this on? It's horrendous?

Rachael Nichols: 14:48

Yeah, the really bad ones, just get completely cut off because they haven't considered they aren't working from story to grid or something like that. Like that's a classic case of if they'd tested it on there. I find like, even just air drop a jpeg to your phone of what it's going to be like and kind of blocking out where the 1080 square would sit within the story tile. It's just like, yeah, kind of part of the process that needs to be done, especially when you're putting money towards it. So that's what gets me with ads as well. Like you're literally throwing money away.

Aggie Meroni: 15:23

Yeah, definitely. This is the question I get all the time from a designer. Again, this isn't about you. This wasnt to totally criticise Rach here. This isn't Rach. Rach has like a dream to work with. But some designers I work with, even though in the brief, I tell them the dimensions I need. Yeah. And it's on the top of every brief, I still get asked what dimensions do you need this? And I'm like, I don't actually know how much clearer I can be. It's the same on every single brief I give you it's always the same sizes. I mean, that's my bugbear. I'm like Oh, come on. Isn't it obvious as well for social media formats? No, that was pretty standard.

Rachael Nichols: 16:10

Well, I suppose for Instagram, is it? It depends how much you work with social like for me, it would be like, I'd know there was 1080, well actually, it's changed isn't it? Like now that they populate more of the screen as like a an organic post. Yeah, not always for designers to be fair, that it's obvious because it does change so much. Also like a cautionary note here from a designer's perspective. It depends what programme you work in. So I'm always in Adobe Illustrator if I can it's like that's that my ride or die as a design programme. If you've got a more like, kind of editorial designer, they'll probably use InDesign but for illustrative specifically, if you export at 300 ppi, which is pixels or actually DPI dots per inch, it will do what Apple does with their use user interface. So it exports it as like three times the size. So if you're sitting there as an ads manager, like oh my god, I asked for like a 1080, i e button, ie square. And they've given me like something that's like 3000 dimensions. That's why because it exports higher. And then the theory is that Apple uses the bigger file sizes then it shrinks down, so it's even more crisp and high res because it's shrunk down from a larger size down to a smaller size. So that's a little bit annoying. We battle with that all the time, we have one specific client who I literally don't know where they get these dimensions from, they will give me like 324 by 785, or eight to the most ridiculous like, I've like, I don't know where you've got that from because that is not a dimension that I'm aware of. Anyway, that's what they want in so we will builddesign images, export it and it will be big, and then we'll put it back into Photoshop and then export it out , just be conscious of it if dimensions are like a big thing for you and what programme designers are using, but hopefully they should kind of think about your side. Okay, that's a really long answer to your question about it.

Aggie Meroni: 18:16

No, no, not so.

Rachael Nichols: 18:20

Going on that though. They're struggling to digest what you've put in a brief, I always find bullet points rather than big chunks of copy works. But a lot of designers that are visual thinkers, so having big chunks of copy isn't always the best way to cut through with us, like really succinct lines, dimensions, title, messaging, whatever. You might have already done that, which is a bit

Aggie Meroni: 18:46

You know, what I find sometimes when you work annoying. with bigger accounts, you have so many people involved, and you're all working on Asana or clickup, or whatever it is, and things just get missed, because this is just such a mess. And that's not the Ads managers fault. That's not the designers fault. It's the process issue. Like you know, this isthere is no one system to help everyone work well together. And that can be really frustrating. Because, you know, suddenlynotifications are missed and all that kind of thing. I guess that's just one of those things that you just have to work around when you work with other teams, don't you?

Rachael Nichols: 19:24

Yeah, and you're always battling with it. We're amongst such a crazy industry, right? We like consume at such an alarming rate. So that I find that I actually thought about this yesterday, the amount that we produce, like content wise on a weekly basis is unreal. The fact that we're all doing that. It's crazy, like how much has been put out there social media, but what I'm trying to say is that especially for me and like for the client who works with me, we're so busy a lot of the time and sometimes I'm like guilty of giving her like really haphazard briefs and basically doing exactly what I'm telling people not to. But the minute you just get this done, I mean, I need something by end of the day. And it's probably unfair with like the amount of time she's been given. But like, just kind of the nature of the game that sometimes we are working to like really tight deadlines. So yeah, you're right, it might not always be the designers fault on it. But again, we might have missed something, because we've got 10 things on our to do list as well.

Aggie Meroni: 20:28

Yeah, but I think as a freelancer, and this is like whether you're a designer, ads manager, whatever niche you're in, you need to be conscious that that person isn't just working on your account. And I think clients are really bad at remembering that they just assume that they can just call you and like, you know, whatever. And you're like, I do actually have responsibility for other other clients as well, but also paying me I can't just be at your beck and call the whole time. So just being aware of what else other people might have on and what deadlines they might have. And just trying to communicate as much as possible to make sure that everyone's not burning out and stressed, and like crying at work.

Rachael Nichols: 21:09

We have clients exactly the same and they do this. I like working with you, its brilliant working with you. Because we're like friends more than anything. And it's just casual. And we always communicate. But like some clients, they'll give us these fake deadlines. And we know you don't need that on Friday afternoon, because you're not going to fucking do anything with it until like probably Wednesday next week. So like, if you trust your designer enough to get the job done, trust them enough that they'll get it done on the time you ask them - you don't really need to put in like a three day buffer and make their Friday like complete suck. So I'm saying this as well, because like, design is at the end of the line, right? So if you're getting fake deadlines from your client and not pushing back, and then it just goes on and on and on. Yeah, it's fake deadlines galore?

Aggie Meroni: 21:58

it's usually the ads managers that actually at the end of that, like, right,

Rachael Nichols: 22:02

then you've got the bit after that.

Aggie Meroni: 22:05

Yeah, so after we speak now, it's Black Friday, next week, when I'm recording this with you. And we had confirmation last night about the Black Friday event for one of my clients. The creatives are still being designed now and they go live tomorrow. So I'm like literally waiting and waiting on tenterhooks to get that creative. And then I have to build like so many campaigns, because it's all staggered, it's not just one event one ad that's running for like 10 days, as well as about five different things that have to launch. I'm like, getting a bit close. Because it all has to go to approval as well. It's not that I can just push it out, and it's live. And I'm just hearing so many stories,glitches, for check out turnarounds for approvals all that kind of thing. And I just think when you have like, there's so many people involved in that sequence, you know, briefing the designer, the designer designs it and it has to be signed off by the client, and then they might have a amends or legal you know, and by the time you get it, you're like, Oh, this is really close.

Rachael Nichols: 23:17

God, I completely take that back. You are definitely the ones at the end of the line.

Aggie Meroni: 23:22

Yeah, yeah. In a way those ads manager like if there's a delay, close the wire. It's always Facebook's fault. Yeah, because they haven't approved it.

Rachael Nichols: 23:34

Yeah, I might have just pressed submit, like 10 minutes, go over there and approve.

Aggie Meroni: 23:39

Well, to be fair, Facebook does usually approve it really quickly. But at the moment, it's just a nightmare. Like the whole, it's like a meltdown at Facebook right now. It's just crazy. I will be sitting in the dark room for a while after Black Friday, along with every other ads manager.

Rachael Nichols: 23:56

I think I remember last year like

Aggie Meroni: 24:01

I was working, white labelling at an agency actually. Was it last year? Was it the year before? I think it was two years ago. And that was insane. Like, I've never worked such long hours. But amazing experience during lock down. So that was like, even busier. And it's like really varied accounts and all that kind of stuff. And they actually worked with a design team. I think they're based in Ukraine, actually. So that was really weird. Like not actually knowing who your designer was. You just used to submit the request. And they had a really detailed form. You had to fill it out for your briefs. And then yeah, it was actually quite good. I kind of base my briefs on that structure of that form. And it seems to work okay for me, but I still prefer chatting to designers, because I feel like you get more across don't you when you do it that

Rachael Nichols: 24:49

I'm all for a conversation as opposed to like way. email. It's so much more like valuable, isn't it? You pick up so much more like little nuances or like how people like it. But I'm not saying that if you want to write well, but like how people talk, they sometimes type how they talk. But it doesn't always translate when you're reading it on the other side. So you're jumping on a call, although I have said, but I have to admit as a design that I try and avoid calls, and that that might be different for you, because I know you're like, very, like hands on with your clients, you're always face to face. But for us, generally, I have a good understanding of the brief. And if I have a good understanding of the brief, I'm a little bit like, I'll be in touch with any questions. Just for time. Yeah.

Aggie Meroni: 25:35

Well, for me, it's usually like the onboarding call, yes. absolute gold for me, because that's when you really see the passion in a business. So you hear why they love what they're doing, what's coming up. And they always give you more information when they talk to you than on the phone, because otherwise you get mono syllabic answers. And yeah, that no one can be bothered to fill out a form. Let's be honest, you'd rather just chat, and then you can just pick out what you need.

Rachael Nichols: 26:00

Yeah, that is so inhuman,isn't it. And I think what's important with that onboarding call is you deciding if you're going to work with them as well, because that relationship is hard, right? If you've got people that are hard to work with, and it's a high stress environment like that, you're basically saying, spend a really big chunk of money and like, rely on me to make sure or rely on me to make you more of it.

Aggie Meroni: 26:26

So that actually just gave me heart palpitations.

Rachael Nichols: 26:29

That's how it important your job is. Well, everyone listening to this will agree with you, obviously. But on a serious note, though, as an Ads manager, if someone is literally putting all that pressure on you, you should never work with them. Because as you know, there's so many other things that go into making a successful business,.Can you just save us now? It's like, you're on your own? Yeah. Yeah. Saying that. You've got to have all your shit in place before you hand over your 1000s of pounds.

Aggie Meroni: 27:02

Yeah, yeah. So getting back to ad creatives.

Rachael Nichols: 27:07

We go off on a tangent all the time don't we

Aggie Meroni: 27:09

Yeah, definitely all the time. So I have like a small insight into what designers cringe at because you've given me feedback on my designs before, which I love because I'm always like, I know this looks wrong, but I don't know why you're like is because of this.

Rachael Nichols: 27:30

At first, I'd be like let's just start again.

Aggie Meroni: 27:36

It's like, okay, this is, by the way, why I never ever do any design for my clients. It's not my zone of genius. I hate it. It takes me too long. It's why I don't do any graphics work on social media, either. Unless they're like, templates, stuff that I've created for myself. But I think I've become quite trained in what looks good. So I can say, like, the other day, I sent you an image. I was like, is it wrong, Its Bothering me, because it was like a really popular jewellery brand. So I get served jewellery ads, because I love jewellery. And then there was like, a black element in their photo, and it covered some of the black text on the ad. And I was like, This looks so shoddy. Like, I just can't deal with this creative. This is how dorky I am when it comes to ads. So obviously, I screenshot and send it to Rach. And she was like, Oh, my God. Yes, absolutely correct.

Rachael Nichols: 28:37

I was so proud of you. So because actually, you see bad with my perspective and your perspective now. But I feel like a lot of people might not have even really noticed that. Like, you see all those things online, where it's got like jumbled letters. And the human brain can like interpret things. It's just our job is to make it as simple and as beautiful as possible. So it like resonates so nicely. The person viewing it. So yeah, I don't actually think that many people would have noticed that but design people are like fine tuned into making text stand out, like it's just 101 #. Having a piece of black, any product, like a black product, and then a black piece of text over the top of it. Like, don't even get me started on if you were creating that for web site. Accessibility is such a big factor, especially for like big corporate clients, where they're talking about the contrast of colours so and there's actually accessibility and contrast tests you can do online and they give you a score of how well you've ranked. And even like, black against white is a little bit jarring for people because it's so stark like it's two different ends of the spectrum. Like if you were designing for printing, you wouldn't actually put things in pure black because the ink wouldn't absorb well into the paper - you'd get a really, really muddy black. And I think that's actually a really good practice for digital. And so many people are on screens, like, make it easy, make it beautiful. Make sure it stands out, like why not?

Aggie Meroni: 30:16

So on the subject of making things beautiful. I know it's really jarring for people that are designers, that are into branding, I know you do brand strategy as well. Yeah, social media stuff that works, just sometimes is not pretty. It's like UGC. Some user generated content of a blurry image that a customers sent in. Just some text overlay and it literally generates millions of hits, that kind of content. However, I know, that's jarring. Like the branding strategist I work with, like, they just thought, I don't want that on our grid or whatever. And I'm like, This is honestly gonna make you money. However, the composition of these ugly images is really important as well, isn't it? Yeah.

Rachael Nichols: 31:03

Like, when I said earlier about creating the best creative solution every single time? It's actually like a nice challenge, I think, as a designer to get something like that and be like, Okay, we've got a shot from a person's perspective, we've got to use this because it's gonna make the most money. So that okay, cool.

Aggie Meroni: 31:23

Rach the straight talking designer.

Rachael Nichols: 31:26

Maybe that should be the title of the episode. Sorry. Its like when I'm around kids, I feel like I get Tourette's because I've got to not say it, and its like that now I'm going to start swearing. But um, yeah, so you, you get this really blurry image that you've got to use, but like, how can you make that look better and almost like, lean into it not looking like as polished as it should? Like memes are one they resonate really well with people, but how can we make it look good? How can we like composite it in such a way that it's got like a nice frame around it, or at least something that makes it look tailored and polished?

Aggie Meroni: 32:14

Yeah, I think there's actually as well, just little tips and tricks on how you can design things. So one thing I learned when I was working at one of the agencies was just putting a border, a black border around your image in an ad can increase your conversion rate, which is insane. There's literally no reason for that. But it's the psychology of seeing something boxed in a screen a brick grid, or you know, when you're scrolling, it's enough for you to stop and some look at it. So like those little things, I think, I don't know if it's just stuff that you just pick up along the way. Or I don't know, things that you just test is anything that you've noticed that are quick things that you could add to an image to make it scroll stopping,

Rachael Nichols: 33:00

I can definitely give you some things not to do. This is why I love working with you, right? Because you kind of have the data on your side. So from a designer's perspective, I probably wouldn't opt to put a black border around something unless it makes sense of in the brand, if you had like predominantly black brand that was like your core colour or like your core palette. Great. But yeah, that I wouldn't necessarily think to do but I suppose if you combine your knowledge with our knowledge, that's when it's like a place of power, right? Where you're like, really conquering what looks good. And what works well. But I know we spoke about not putting or overloading the visual too much. But thinking about the order of how they're going to read what they're reading, and making sure that it's not overwhelmed, and you've got small bits of text at the top and large bits at the bottom. That just doesn't make sense. And like the copy flow is such a biggie.

Aggie Meroni: 34:19

So would you say the bigger copy has to be at the top?

Rachael Nichols: 34:23

Yes, if it makes sense, but it has to be considered with the visual as well. Are you working with negative space, if any? Like how does it look with that jewellery that we spoke about with the black copy, and then the black piece of jewellery? I personally would have Photoshop that out. But does it work within negative space? I mean more like if you've got a big title at the bottom, and then you're asking them to go back up. You just need to think about the flow of how they're reading it and what order they're seeing it.

Aggie Meroni: 34:57

I guess how you design that can actually guide them on what they should be looking at first as well.

Rachael Nichols: 35:02

Exactly, links into visually what they're looking at, like, where are you drawing the eye? Where are you drawing the eye first. I mean, most designers are so aware of being specific to brand. So like, a lot like larger brands especially will have brand guidelines that you've worked to and stuff. So like colour palette and stuff like that is already a consideration. But that accessibility point is like a biggie. Like, think about your tones and your hues and like what contrast you're offering, like the colours you're using, obviously, but do what you can to make sure that it stands out. And it's easy and digestible enough for the viewer. Or for the person looking at social media ad.

Aggie Meroni: 35:55

Interesting. So I honestly think knowing the big no no's is actually just as powerful, if not more powerful than things that you should do. Because obviously, every ad is going to be different, every audience will be different. So it's just basically clear guidance to the person that's looking at your design on what they should be looking at or focusing on. I also think that's the big thing that sometimes people get lost in what they should be looking at in the design. And I see this a lot with photography. So there'll be a UGC image, someone's taking a shots, but there'd be so much in the photo, you won't actually know what's being sold. Yeah.

Rachael Nichols: 36:34

And like you see, influencers and these really nice, like, places in Bali, and what they're actually advertising is, I don't know, like leggings, or like sports leggings or whatever, but I'm looking at that hotel, as it looks amazing.

Aggie Meroni: 36:49

I want to stay there.

Rachael Nichols: 36:53

So yeah, I mean, that's kind of like a different subject. But yeah, completely.

Aggie Meroni: 36:58

Yeah, I mean, one way around, that is what headline you use if you do text overlay and your ad copy, but I just think people are so not bothered about your ads. This is the thing. It's really like important as an ads manager to communicate and I'm sure you get this as well. But and I guess everyone's guilty of it in a way think, oh, everyone's like really gonna analyse my ad and it's gonna look at it in detail, and they're gonna notice all this stuff. And I'm like, they literally don't give a shit. Honestly, they are scrolling. Their kids are fighting in the in the corner, the dogs just peed on the rug and the kettles boiled and the postman's probably just arrived, and then your ad just happens to be there. Like they don't really don't care enough. Yeah, it's all the subliminal stuff that really needs to like, you need to still take care of it. Yeah, because they might see it again. And they recognise that it's you and your brand.

Rachael Nichols: 37:55

Yeah, and especially if you've got some that like something cool happening or moving or, like, the way that image kind of, I don't know, dissolves into something else, or I don't know, like, animation for us is like a biggie with a social media content, especially. So if you can remember, or if you can lean into the creative to kind of sway them as well.

Aggie Meroni: 38:19

Definitely. One final thing I wanted to ask you about was more operational. So when you're working with various people, so me, for example, and you might have some other partners involved, so you might be working with more than one design team because there might be an animator involved, there might be a videographer. There might be some other people that you need to like share documents with or organise your workflow. What systems do you use and what would you say is kind of like the easiest way for someone to work with you in that sense?

Rachael Nichols: 38:52

So I pride myself on having like a solid filing system like my filing system is shit hot. I know when I've been sharing screens and I've seen yours I'm like, oh my god, Aggie. So Dropbox is a biggie. Aside from all the Adobe programmes that we're using, I suppose there's two sides to this coin like if you want like work and files and stuff, it would always be Adobe for us or like After Effects if you're animating cinema 4d which is like 3d stuff. But we use Dropbox and we tend to share links to clients with here's your export with like your creative download it and have a look at it yourself. Aside from that, if we're say talking to an animator and they've got like a huge files that they need to send our way, we transfer would be my preferred, like, yeah, to transfer big files. I'm not a lover of Google Drive and any Google programme itself? I find it really clunky. And it doesn't really integrate that well with like Dropbox. And any other system really? I don't know. I know you like Google.

Aggie Meroni: 40:12

Yeah. But I like Canva, which you're like, oh, no, like Google Drive, and Trello. So I have got you over to the to the dark side of Trello.

Rachael Nichols: 40:24

Trello works, love Trello so simple. It just kind of like for us, we'd be working on Dropbox. And we just upload our creative, which is just another simple, like, really simple parts process, which is great. On that Canva point, I do think I mean, I wrote an article about this, like, Can designers use the C word, Canva. I do actually think it holds its place, like as a designer. I don't know if any other designers are listening, maybe they are. But any other designer would appreciate that. Like, for us, one of the biggest banes of our life is making sure you've got enough memory on your computer. And because we work with such large files, you kind of have to like, take files off and then keep the files that you're working on, like active and live on your computer. So like, if I'm doing like really simple bits of animation for a social media piece of content, it might just be easier to put it in Canva and animate it quickly. Like if the text is just being like animated in a typewriter fashion, for example, as opposed to like taking the creative from Illustrator important into After Effects. And then after effects needing like 10 gig to run on your computer. So I don't think that Canva is a bad tool. It can really hold its place. I think my issue with Canva lies with people feeling like they have the power or feeling like they are a designer because they've got the tool there to use it. Like it's not the case. There's so many things to learn and know about what makes great design. Just because it's all at your fingertips and Canva with templates that everybody uses doesn't necessarily mean you're a hidden designer,

Aggie Meroni: 42:12

But I think a lot of a lot of ads managers that will be listening to this, do use Canva for their clients ads designs. And if you're a creative person, go for it. It's just not my thing. I'm not able to put into what I'm thinking onto the screen. Yeah. But yeah, wow, we have covered so much today. I just feel like we've talked about what a brief should look like, the massive no no's, logistics, client management, workflow management, insight into how we work together. So yeah, I hope that's been helpful. I mean, if people want to reach out to you, they need support with creating ads for their clients, where can they find you?

Rachael Nichols: 43:13

And so probably on LinkedIn is the best place to find me. I'll give you a link maybe tag it in the show notes. And I do have a website. I'm so guilty, like, I'm one of those designers who is too busy designing everybody else's website to update my own.

Aggie Meroni: 43:34

It's in the works, though, isn't it? It's in the works.

Rachael Nichols: 43:36

I know. Yeah. It's definitely in the works. I'd like a rebrand, but you can find me on indesign.co.uk. And there's a link to my LinkedIn there as well. So don't judge me on that I'm updating my website.

Aggie Meroni: 43:52

Yeah, so Rachel is full name is Rachel Nichols. I'll add all her links in the show notes. She's an extremely talented designer, and has an extremely talented team and she'd be an asset to any of your clients that need support with the ad creatives. But for now, Rach, thank you so much for your time. And yeah, speak to you soon.

Rachael Nichols: 44:14

It's been a pleasure. Thank you so much.

Aggie Meroni: 44:18

Thank you so much for tuning in to this episode of the freelance as club podcast. If you're a freelance ads manager and you're looking to join a community, then apply to join our free slack channel. The freelance ads Club, you'll find the link in the show notes. If you're an agency or a brand, looking for support with your campaigns and your projects, you can also apply to work with our community in the show notes. If you've got any questions, get in touch and I'll see you on the next episode.