Working in fields like marketing or digital PR, where you need to balance analytical, strategic, and creative thinking, can sometimes lead to creative ruts. You may feel uninspired, unmotivated, and find it difficult to get excited about your latest campaign ideas, fearing they just aren’t quite right.
Creative blocks are frustrating, especially when deadlines are looming and expectations are high. These blocks often stem from stress, lack of motivation, or being “too close” to a project, making it difficult to view it with a fresh perspective. Considering that 80% of marketers regard creative quality as a key factor in marketing effectiveness, it highlights just how vital it is to get creative campaigns right. But sometimes, this very pressure can add to the stress! It’s a challenge we all face. In fact, about 65% of creative professionals experience creative block at some point in their careers. Managing digital PR campaigns across multiple clients can sometimes feel overwhelming – but the good news is, there are plenty of resources out there to help.
Overcoming a block takes patience and an open mind. Forcing creativity rarely helps. In fact, it can make things worse. Stepping back, taking a short break, and seeking inspiration often leads to breakthroughs. Don’t underestimate the power of communication. Collaborating with colleagues and asking for feedback, thoughts, and ideas can provide the clarity you need. Sometimes, just sharing your ideas can help you see them in a new light. Staying curious and exploring new sources of inspiration can reignite your creative spark and get you back on track with your campaigns.
In this blog, we’ll discuss the importance of injecting fresh creative concepts into your digital PR campaigns, what successful creativity looks like, and the best resources to help lift you out of a creative rut.
What’s in this article:
- Why are creative campaign ideas important for PR?
- Five resources to spark creative ideas
- AnswerThePublic
- Newsletters
- Brilliant Maps
- Social media
- Key takeaways
Why are creative campaign ideas important for PR?
Creative PR campaigns are designed to capture attention, engage audiences and generate interest in a brand or product. They are usually out of the box, a bit ‘unusual’ or unexpected - but they are always memorable.
Think campaigns like Always’s ‘Like a Girl’ – memorable for the emotional response it created in audiences – or Specsavers’s viral ‘Should’ve Gone to Specsavers’ campaign which has worked across many platforms and has become a consistent part of their marketing message. This campaign is catchy, visually impactful and has the power to stick in people’s minds.
What sets these campaigns apart is their ability to cut through the noisy media landscape and land coverage – a task which is becoming increasingly tricky. Social and traditional media is over-saturated with content and holding the attention of both journalists and audiences is harder than ever. Customers are constantly bombarded with adverts, social media content and news stories, so creative campaigns have the opportunity to make your brand or product stand out.
These sort of campaigns often encourage interaction, which could help to boost online traffic and social media engagement. Creativity and out-of-the-box ideas tap into the audience’s desire to participate in and share what they have seen.
Creative campaigns also have the potential to go viral, opening up your brand to hundreds of thousands of potential new customers. This sort of campaign can also build a strong brand identity, and display your brand’s values, personality and sense of humour in a digestible way for the audience.
When no longer relying on traditional advertising methods, it's important for brands to be more adaptable. You may have to juggle plans and revisit ideas based on moving trends, platforms or emerging opportunities. Having your eye on the ball can really help here.
The goal with any campaign is to spark conversations, encourage shares and generate organic reach. Which is exactly what the team at Heinz did when they took inspiration from the social media storm created by Hailey Bieber with her Rhode lip balm phone case. The viral sensation led to Heinz creating their very own ketchup sachet phone case.
Combining the brand’s iconic bright red colouring and Rhode’s iconic phone case design, Heinz landed coverage on high authority sites like Indy100, generating thousands of social media interactions and impressions.
You can read about some more of our favourite creative PR and marketing campaigns of 2024 here.
A unique approach can really help to get the best outcome here – but this requires some clever thinking which isn’t always possible for those in a creative rut! Read on to find inspiration for your next creative campaign.
Five resources to spark creative ideas:
Answer the Public
Many great campaigns start with a question. As PR professionals, we’re often tasked with answering key questions from our clients’ audiences. This not only helps position clients as thought leaders and industry authorities but also attracts valuable media opportunities.
This is why exploring industry trends or customer concerns related to your brand can be a great starting point for ideation. While the first resource we’re highlighting doesn’t specifically focus on creative campaigns, it’s still a valuable place to begin!
AnswerThePublic is an innovative tool that provides unique insight into the questions audiences are asking. It analyses real-time search data to reveal the queries people are searching for online. Essentially, it’s a goldmine for identifying key topics and trends, helping you target specific audiences by exploring keywords related to your brand and understanding what your customers may need from your next campaign.
The site generates a visual map of search engines that people are entering into search engines. Based on the keyword or topic you input, the site generates a series of questions and statements related to those keywords. The results are then organised into categories like ‘who’, ‘what’, ‘where’ and ‘why’.
The tool also allows you to stay ahead of emerging trends as it shows how questions evolve over time – and the search volume. This gives a super powerful advantage to users and helps marketers and PRs understand the interests and concerns of their audience. It’s essentially a goldmine for discovering what users want to know about specific topics. These concerns and interests could then inform content strategy and creative campaigns.
Newsletters
So many brilliant PR professionals share weekly, bi-weekly or monthly PR newsletters.
These are a key resource for those working in marketing and PR, as they provide regular updates on trends, strategies, case studies and industry-wide news. They are an excellent way to stay informed while also sparking ideas for your own creative campaigns!
Typically delivered via email, some of the best PR newsletters streamline a month’s worth of best-in-practice campaigns into a digestible format. So, no need to spend hours sifting through blogs, social media or countless news publications to try and find some inspiring content.
Not only can these newsletters help spark new ideas to get you out of that creative rut, but they also help you to stay on the ball and keep a close eye on your competitors.
Some of the best examples of PR newsletters include The PR Insider and The Grapevine, each tailored to the needs of digital PR pros and those looking for a source of inspiration at the click of a button.
Other newsletters to follow – that aren’t necessarily digital PR themed – include Visual Capitalist and Buzzstream’s weekly newsletter.
Brilliant Maps
Brilliant Maps is an online resource that highlights creative campaigns centred around maps. Map based campaigns are a popular approach in digital PR, using striking visuals to showcase differences or similarities between cities, regions, or countries. This tool is particularly useful for generating ideas for clients aiming to reach international audiences in Europe or America.
There are endless examples on their site, but you can use search tools to help find campaigns similar to your brand. For example if you searched ‘food’ you may find a map showcasing the top-rated fast food chains in each US state or the largest food chains in the US.
Visually creative campaign ideas like this can spark new areas of interest and bring new ideas you may not have thought of.
At Motive, we created and managed a creative map-based campaign for Online Bedrooms, highlighting the best cities for sleeping in Europe. The goal was to secure links from new domains in European countries, and the campaign achieved strong results, earning coverage in high-authority European news outlets, including The Dubrovnik Times. A re-worked version of the campaign for the US press even landed in the US Express.
Social media
Following social media accounts is a great way to keep your finger on the pulse of the industry and stay up to date with new data sets, ideas and trends.
There are pages dedicated to sharing data and ideas, just like @Worldofstatistics. The account covers a diverse range of topics from economics to health and environment, working to present data in a digestible way.
The account is widely appreciated by digital PRs for sparking conversations, ideas and new campaigns. It can be something as simple as reading a great data set which could set off your next great idea.
Reddit is a super useful, and often underused, resource for digital PRs looking for new ideas. Reddit offers users the opportunity to explore niches and topics and tap into real-time conversations. Through this, the platform offers constant inspiration.
You can join a subreddit relevant to your brand’s niche and see what people are discussing within those communities. By observing what people are talking about within your very own niche, you can uncover emerging trends, popular debates, industry-wide concerns or issues and kinds of stories that may resonate with your very own audience.
This information can then inform creative campaigns, content strategies and overall marketing plans.
Subreddits like r/marketing, r/digitalmarketing, and r/PublicRelations are rich with discussions on the latest industry trends, best practices, and case studies. These spaces often feature expert advice, success stories, and discussions about digital PR challenges, which can provide valuable lessons and creative ideas.
Key takeaways
- Creative PR campaigns are integral to digital PR. They are designed to capture attention, engage audiences and generate interest in a brand or product, and they are always memorable.
- Creative ruts are a completely normal part of any job which requires you to tap into new ideas. But, don’t struggle through your next creative rut – you can use resources to open your eyes to new ideas, thoughts and themes.
- There are plenty of great online resources to help dig you out of a creative rut. Use tools like AnswerThePublic, digital PR newsletters and Brilliant Maps ahead of your next ideation and see what you can come up with.
To see how we can help you come up with creative campaign ideas for your brand, please get in touch.
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