PROTECTING YOUR CONCEPTS IN COMMERCIAL AND FILM PRODUCTION

As any creative or department head in commercial or film production, where you utilize a team to sell a product or tell a story effectively, your concepts are the starting point for all the decisions that will be made during production and through post. 

Whether you've come up with what you believe is a strong concept from scratch or you've been given a basic idea that you've then developed into something you feel is robust and powerful, one of your jobs now will be to shepherd and “sell” that concept up the chain to the agency, client, director, or executive producers. As it moves up the chain, your concept will most likely be scrutinized and picked apart by a slew of individuals, all with their own points of view, desires, and agendas.

Often times, concepts by committee are a recipe for disaster… or better yet, they’re a recipe for the boring, trite, and inane. Edits to a strong concept by too many individuals along a chain of command are where robust, edgy, funny, and powerful concepts go to die. The best commercials, for example, are singularly focused. When you see one of these spots, you can feel the clear concept and identify everything that was done along the way to support and add to the central idea of the concept.

This isn’t to say that great concepts can’t be improved by outside input. They can, and it’s often essential to have strong team members who will push your concept deeper and who will see opportunities to polish various facets of your concept that you may have missed, but improving a concept and changing fundamental parts of a concept are very different things.

So how do we protect our concepts from being watered down or Frankensteined into something that no longer has the punch of the original?

The first step is to have a well-rounded and complete concept. A solid concept works as a whole, with each part being necessary and supporting each other part. If you present an incomplete concept or a concept with large holes that you’ve overlooked, you can be sure that someone else up the chain will have an idea to pop in there (usually one they came up with on the spot). As soon as that happens, you are back on your heels, having not only that original hole to patch but having to work against someone else’s idea.

A concept should be clear, easy to express, and “sell” to the higher-ups. The concept should stress a singular vision that encompasses the whole. Think about everything with regards to the concept and write them down—locations, wardrobe, colors, casting—don’t leave anything out. It can be tempting to leave some wiggle room so you come across as a team player when presenting concepts to an agency, director, or client, but when presenting a concept, this only makes you seem unprepared and unsure. It’s best if you don’t have to fake any of this, so hopefully, you believe in your ideas and are prepared to voice every detail.

Most importantly, you should believe fully in your concept. This can be difficult because the truth is we can’t know if a bold concept will actually work when put into practice. Will the prop or storyline work? Will the potential customer find it funny? Will it bring out the emotions in the viewer you intend? The concept might fail, but on the other hand it might be a huge success. While projects with strong concepts at their center tend to have a higher success rate, at the very least, they are generally not part of the vast amount of boring, forgettable, and “safe” media that is displayed to us every day.

The fear of going “too far” or possibly offending some people can be the hardest part of selling a strong concept to an agency, director, or client. It’s often in the concept feedback phase that the client or agency pulls back out of fear, opting for safer (watered-down) options. Believing fully in your concept and being excited about it is a good antidote to this fear. Excitement is contagious, so you better be amped.

If a client, agency, or director starts to pull back, you should always stay positive. Don’t take it personally. Maintain your excitement while explaining how what they are suggesting may diminish the viewer experience. If they insist on changes that will diminish the concept, see if you can shoot it both ways, offering them options—everyone likes options.

In the end, you may not be able to win all of these battles. Go to bat for your idea, try and work out a solution, but if you can’t, then just let it go. You can’t win them all, and it’s better to maintain a good working relationship than to die on any single hill.

If you happen to be the client, agency, director, or department head that’s being presented with a concept, be sure to take some time to truly consider what’s being presented. You’ve been tasked with putting this project together, and the pressure is on, it needs to be good. It’s been on your mind, and you probably have a lot of ideas about how it should look and feel. When a director, agency, or department head puts a concept in front of you that looks nothing like what you’ve been thinking, it’s important to sit on it for a while and really consider the fresh approach. In the end, you may very well tell them to go back to the drawing board, but if you give it some time, you may find that you’ve been presented with a stronger concept. However it works out, the most important thing is to foster a “yes, and” attitude. Help steer the creative process in a positive and exciting way. When people are accepted and feel heard, the strongest concepts are born.