Writing a content brief a writer can work from

Why briefs decide the quality of content

Most weak articles are not caused by weak writers. They are caused by weak briefs. A writer given a title and a word count will produce something that matches the title and the word count. They cannot know the business's customers, its services, the claims it can and cannot make, or which page the article is meant to support, unless someone tells them.

A good brief does that work once, before writing starts. It costs perhaps half an hour. It saves rounds of revision, prevents claims that should never have been published, and produces pieces that actually do a job for the business. Our blog writing work starts every piece with one.

The parts of a useful brief

A brief does not need to be long. It needs to answer the questions a writer would otherwise have to ask. These are the parts we include.

The reader

Describe the person who will read the piece, in one or two sentences. Not a demographic, but a situation: "a landlord with one rental property whose tenant has just given notice" is far more useful than "landlords aged 35 to 55". The writer should be able to picture what that person already knows and what they are worried about.

The question

Write the single question the piece answers, in the words the reader would use. If the brief contains two different questions, it is two pieces. This line also decides the title, which should match the question closely.

The searches

List the searches the piece is meant to appear for, and note what currently ranks for them. A quick look at those pages tells the writer what readers expect to find, what is already well covered and where there is room to do better.

What must be true

Give the facts the writer needs and the limits they must respect. For a regulated service this is the most important section: which claims are allowed, which sources are authoritative, and what must never be promised. For any business, it should include the real details: services, areas, prices if they are published, and anything that makes the business different.

The links

Name the page the piece supports, usually a service page, and say how the article should lead the reader there. List two or three other pages on the site it should link to. This is how articles strengthen the site instead of floating free of it.

What done looks like

State the length range, the format (a quick answer or a full guide), who reviews the draft, and what checks it must pass before publishing. If there is a style guide, link to it here.

A template you can copy

A brief can fit on one page. This is the order we use:

1. Working title, matching the reader's question
2. The reader, in one or two sentences
3. The question, in the reader's words
4. Target searches and what currently ranks
5. Facts to include and claims to avoid, with sources
6. The page it supports and the other pages to link
7. Format, length range and the next step for the reader
8. Reviewer and publishing date

Fill it in before any writing starts, and keep it attached to the draft through review and publication.

Common mistakes

Briefs go wrong in predictable ways:

• The title is the brief. Nothing else is given, so the writer guesses.
• The brief lists keywords, not a question. The writer forces phrases into sentences and the piece reads badly.
• No sources are named. The writer finds their own, which may be out of date or from the wrong country.
• The supporting page is missing. The article goes live with no link to the service it was meant to sell.
• Nobody owns the review. The draft sits unread, or is published unchecked.

Each of these is fixed by a line or two in the brief, written before the writer starts.

Briefs for a series

When a business plans many pieces at once, each still needs its own brief, but the shared parts can be written once. Keep a short standing document with the business facts, the claims to avoid, the authoritative sources and the style rules. Each individual brief then only needs the reader, the question, the searches, the links and the dates.

A series also needs a check against itself. Before briefs go to writers, read the list of questions side by side. If two briefs answer the same question in different words, merge them or give each a clearly different angle. This is the cheapest point to prevent two articles competing for the same search, which is much harder to untangle after both are live.

How long a brief should take

For a quick answer, a brief can be written in ten or fifteen minutes once the standing document exists. For a full guide, allow longer, because the searches and the existing results deserve a proper look. If briefs are taking hours, the standing document is probably missing something that keeps being looked up again. Add it once and every later brief gets faster.

The time is well spent. A writer who starts with a clear brief usually needs one round of edits. A writer who starts with a title often needs three, and the piece still misses its purpose.

A worked example

A property management company wants an article for landlords whose tenant has stopped paying rent. The working title is "What to do when a tenant stops paying rent". The reader is a landlord with one or two properties who manages them alone and has never been in this position.

The brief notes the searches, shows that the top results are general legal sites, and asks the writer to focus on the first fortnight: the conversation, the records to keep and when to get professional help. It names the official source for the rules in the business's area, and says the article must not give legal advice or predict outcomes. It names the property management service page as the next step, and two existing articles to link. A named manager reviews the draft for accuracy before it is scheduled.

The writer can now produce a piece that is useful, safe and connected to the business without a single follow-up call.

What to check first

Before sending any brief, read it as if you were the writer and knew nothing about the business. If you would need to ask a question to start, the answer belongs in the brief. Our guide to how a publishing cadence stays organized covers how briefs fit into a whole calendar of work.