How I get to a core idea

Getting there isn’t a mystical process. It’s a discipline.

What I’m looking for.

A core idea isn’t a tagline. It isn’t a tone of voice or a visual direction. It’s the single thought that makes everything else make sense. The test I use is simple: can I write it in one sentence? Not a sentence that *explains* the idea. A sentence that *is* the idea.

Guinness didn’t say “we should do something around the pour time.” The found an insight that they transformed into a brilliant core idea. Waiting is proof of worth. “Good things come to those who wait”. This ownable thought can transfer downstream to all collateral.

When I’m working through a brief, I’m looking for the tension. What does the audience believe that the brand can usefully challenge, confirm, or reframe? That tension is usually where the idea lives. The gap between what people think and what the brand can genuinely say.

The other thing I’m looking for is ownability. If any competitor could say it, it isn’t the idea. It’s a direction. Directions are useful starting points, but they’re not what you build a campaign on.

The one-sentence test

Once I think I’ve found something, I say it out loud to someone outside the room. This is non-negotiable. If they get it immediately, without context, without me explaining what I mean, then I probably have an idea. If they need the backstory, I don’t.

The one-sentence test is brutal, which is exactly why it works. Most briefs produce directions, not ideas.

“We want to feel more premium.”

“We want to be seen as the human choice in a category full of corporate brands.”

These are starting points.

They become ideas when you find the specific, surprising, ownable expression of them.

Building territories from a single idea

Once the core idea is in place, the real creative work starts: how does this idea express itself across different contexts, audiences, and ambitions?

This is where I use territories. Not to have three different ideas, but to explore three different ways into the same idea. The distinction matters. If your territories feel like separate campaigns, you haven’t found the idea yet. You’ve found three briefs.

I think about territories along a few different axes depending on what the brief is asking.

If the question is about creative ambition, I’ll work through evolution, mid-ground, and revolution. Evolution refines what exists. Mid-ground keeps the equity but changes the expression. Revolution starts from the brief, not from what already exists. All three are built on the same idea; they just ask for different levels of change.

If the question is about audience, I’ll use territories to explore how the same idea lands differently for different people. The same thought expressed for a Gen Z audience looks completely different from the same thought expressed for someone in their forties with a family and a mortgage. The idea doesn’t change. The execution does.

If the question is about tone, the territories let me show a client what their brand could sound like if it went premium, or playful, or educational. Same idea, three different personalities.

Why this matters

The brief never ends at the idea. But nothing good starts without one.

When the core idea is clear, every subsequent decision gets easier. Creative teams know what they’re building towards. Account teams can hold the idea in client conversations. The work stays coherent across formats, channels, and time because it’s all pulling from the same source.

When the idea is absent, or vague, the opposite happens. Teams pull in different directions. Clients sense the incoherence even when they can’t name it. The work gets good at the edges but hollow in the middle.

Getting to a core idea takes longer than most people expect and less time than most people fear. It takes one good question, asked honestly, about what only this brand can say to this audience at this moment.

Everything else is execution.