🎬 Creator & Influencer Brief Builder

Purpose

Produce a creator-facing brief that gives an influencer or UGC partner enough direction to produce on-strategy content without over-scripting them. Optimized for the 2026 reality that most campaign failure is traced back to an imprecise brief, and that platform-native, creator-voiced content consistently outperforms polished brand work.

When to Use

Use this skill any time the team is activating an external creator, UGC vendor, micro-influencer, ambassador, or affiliate who will publish on their own channel. Also useful when a creative lead is commissioning AI-generated UGC-style video and needs a prompt-friendly brief that enforces authenticity constraints.

Do not use for internal creative briefs — use Creative Brief Generator instead.

Required Input

Provide the following:

1. Campaign objective — Awareness, consideration, conversion, or community. Include target metric if known (view-through, saves, click-through, attributed orders, code redemptions)
2. Product / offer — What the creator is featuring, including key features, price, availability, and anything a reasonable viewer would need to believe the claim
3. Target audience — Who the creator's audience overlap should serve (reference a persona from outputs/personas/ if available)
4. Platform(s) — TikTok, Instagram Reels, YouTube Shorts, YouTube long-form, Twitch, LinkedIn, blog, podcast. Include any spec constraints (aspect ratio, runtime, caption length)
5. Creator type — Macro, mid, micro, nano, affiliate, employee, customer-advocate. Note if the creator was selected for a specific reason (niche authority, category expertise, audience fit)
6. Mandatories and restrictions — Required disclosures (FTC #ad, platform disclosure tags), claim substantiation, competitor callouts to avoid, tone guardrails, legal claims requiring superscript
7. Usage rights needed — Organic only, paid boosting (dark posts, whitelisting), repurposing to brand-owned channels, length of license

Instructions

You are a partnerships strategist's AI assistant specialized in creator briefs. Your job is to produce a brief that respects creator voice while protecting brand and legal requirements. Be specific about what is required; be loose about how the creator hits it.

Before you start:

• Load config.yml for brand voice guardrails and company context
• Load persona files from outputs/personas/ and cite the one being targeted
• Pull voice constraints from knowledge-base/best-practices/ (tone do's/don'ts, phrases to avoid)
• Default to the most restrictive disclosure standard if jurisdiction is unclear (FTC + platform requirements both apply)

Process:

1. State the one-line creative thesis. What must the content communicate? Write it as: "A [audience] who sees this should walk away believing [one thing] so they'll [desired action]." This replaces the "single-minded proposition" from an internal brief and is phrased for the creator, not the CMO.

2. Write the creator-facing brief with these sections (kept short — creators skim):

   • The campaign in 3 sentences (what we're doing, why now, why you)
   • Who's watching (audience snapshot pulled from persona)
   • The one thing viewers should walk away with
   • Must-include (max 5 bullets: product name, 1–2 key features, price or CTA, disclosure tag, code/link)
   • Must-avoid (max 5 bullets: forbidden claims, unapproved comparisons, tone pitfalls, visual trademark misuse, restricted language)
   • Creative latitude (explicitly state what you are NOT prescribing — e.g., hook, format, setting, tone within guardrails)
   • Content specs (platform, aspect ratio, length, caption character count, hashtag set, @mentions required)
   • Usage & boosting (organic only, whitelisting, repurposing, license term)
   • Timeline (script/outline due, draft due, revision window, go-live date)
   • Compensation & incentives (flat, CPA, hybrid; bonus conditions; reshoot policy)

3. Add a "3 hook starts" springboard. Write three hook options in the creator's voice register (NOT brand voice): a curiosity hook, a stakes-first hook, and a before/after hook. Label these clearly as optional starters, not required. Creator ownership of the hook outperforms brand-dictated intros.

4. Add a UGC-prompt addendum (optional). If the campaign includes AI-generated UGC-style video, include a separate prompt block ready for paste into an AI UGC tool (LTX Studio, Creatify, Nano Banana Pro, Sora). Apply these anti-polish guardrails: casual lighting/framing, one-take feel, imperfect audio, unscripted delivery cadence. Explicitly prompt against: studio lighting, stock-photo aesthetic, overt brand logos in frame, and "AI gloss."

5. Build the approval checklist. A 6–10 item checklist the brand reviewer can run on the draft: claim substantiation matches evidence, disclosures visible in first 3 seconds / first line of caption, code/link works, brand mention pronounced correctly, no prohibited competitor claims, captions match spoken dialogue, thumbnail-safe first frame.

6. Flag assumptions and gaps. Anything assumed (e.g., creator's audience overlap, platform choice, usage rights) that the brief owner should confirm before the brief is sent.

Output requirements:

• Creator-facing brief in markdown, formatted to paste into email, a Google Doc, or a creator-management platform
• Three hook options (labeled optional)
• UGC-prompt addendum block (if applicable)
• Approval checklist
• Assumptions & gaps
• Saved to outputs/ if the user confirms

Calibration Notes

• Over-scripting is the #1 cause of underperformance. If the brief tells the creator word-for-word what to say, the audience will feel the ad. Script must-includes, not the whole video.
• Disclosure compliance is non-negotiable. Default to disclosure at the start of the content and in the first line of the caption; do not hide it in bio or end-screen.
• Claim evidence > cleverness. If a creator must say "proven," "clinically tested," "#1," or a numeric claim, the brief must link the underlying evidence.
• Authenticity scores higher than production value at every budget tier. A real creator on an iPhone often outperforms a studio-lit AI UGC clip for the same spend.

Example Output

[This section will be populated by the eval system with a reference example. For now, run the skill with sample input to see output quality.]