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Brutalist editorial illustration of a seven-line creative brief written on a napkin beside a mint coffee cup
The whole brief fits on a napkin.
briefscreator marketingbangkok

How to brief a Bangkok creator without sounding like a corporate

By Mai Influence

Most brief templates start with "Campaign overview" and end with "deliverables matrix." Creators close the tab before they read the brand name. Then they ignore you, or charge double because the ask read like work.

Here's the 7-line brief the best brands on Mai Influence actually send. It fits in a Telegram message. It books faster than the 12-page deck.

Open notebook with a list, pen across the page, on a wooden desk
Seven lines beats seven pages every time.

The 7-line brief

  1. Who we are. One sentence. Who you serve, what you sell. Not your mission statement.
  2. Why you. One sentence. What about this creator's last three posts made you reach out. Specific beats flattery.
  3. The hook. The one thing you want the audience to feel or do. Not a list of objectives.
  4. Deliverable. Format + count. "One Reel, one carousel, one story set." That's it.
  5. Dates. Post window, not a calendar invite. Creators are people, not vendors.
  6. Rate. Number, currency, what it covers. If you're still figuring it out, say "open to your quote."
  7. Approval flow. One round of notes max. Anything more and the creator builds in a buffer you don't see.

What to leave out

Skip the agency-deck things. Skip target personas (they know their audience better than you do). Skip mood boards on the first send unless they're three references max. Skip "brand pillars." Skip any sentence that contains "synergy."

What you're trying to do is start a conversation, not deliver a final spec. The creator will ask the follow-up questions that matter. The questions they ask will tell you more about whether they're the right fit than any self-described "niche."

Person typing on a phone in a Bangkok cafe
If it doesn't fit in a chat thread, it's a deck.

Example: 7 lines, real brand

We're a Thai oat-milk brand launching at Tops next month. Your barista series at Roots is exactly the audience we want in front of. Hook: oat-milk that actually steams — baristas can tell. One Reel + one carousel. Your call on the format. Post window: June 1–15. 18,000 THB, full buyout, we cover product samples. One round of notes before post, no edits after.

That brief gets read. It gets answered the same day. And it rarely gets countered — because there's nothing in it to argue with.

What changes for bigger campaigns

More creators, multiple markets, brand guidelines that actually matter (regulated industries, exclusivity windows) — you'll want a longer brief. But it should still read like the 7-line version with appendices. Not the other way around.

On Mai Influence, the brief lives inside the platform. Both sides see the same fields. The creator can counter, reject, or accept inside the same screen they're reading the brief. That mechanical part — brief, counter, accept, deposit, deliver, pay — we built to be invisible. Your job is to write a brief worth saying yes to.

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