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The marketing brief template that stops budgets becoming donations
Why most marketing money is wasted before any work starts
Here's the pattern I see over and over: a business decides to "do marketing", hands over a budget (to an agency, a freelancer, or their own evenings), and only months later discovers that nobody ever agreed what the job actually was. Whose attention are we buying? What are they supposed to do when they see us? What number tells us it's working? Nobody wrote it down, so everybody guessed.
If you can't finish the sentence "we help [specific someone] get [specific outcome]", your marketing budget isn't a budget yet. It's a donation. The brief is how you finish that sentence before the money moves, and it takes fifteen honest minutes.
What's in the template
- The one-line job: the sentence that stops budgets becoming donations.
- Who exactly you're for, and the harder half: who you're not. Specialists get chosen; generalists get compared on price.
- The offer and the proof: what they buy, what it costs, and the evidence you're good.
- The single goal, as a number someone can be judged against.
- Budget and runway: a budget you can only fund for eight weeks buys a setup phase and an exit call.
- What already exists: amplify what works before inventing new things.
- What must change in 90 days, in leading indicators, agreed BEFORE work starts.
- Who owns this: one name, or the work drifts toward whatever is easiest to report.
How it works
It's a fillable page, not a PDF you'll lose. Type straight into the boxes (your answers save in your own browser as you go, and never leave your device), then hit Print for a copy to hand to whoever you're briefing. A section you can't fill in isn't a failure: it's the template finding the thinking you need to do before you spend.
And if you're using AI for your marketing, this doubles as your context document: paste it into any AI chat and every draft it gives you gets sharper. It pairs with the free AI Prompt Pack for exactly that.
Yours for an email
Get the Marketing Brief Template
Drop your email and the template unlocks instantly (and lands in your inbox too, so you can find it again). No card, no trial, no upsell waiting behind it: there's nothing for sale on this whole site.
- All eight sections, with plain-English hints
- Fills in on the page, autosaves in your browser
- Print or save as PDF to hand over
- Doubles as your AI context document
Where should the template go?
You'll also get G's Marketing Letters: one short, useful letter every weekday, nothing for sale. Unsubscribe any time. Privacy.
Fair questions
Is the marketing brief template really free?
Yes. The whole template for an email address. You also get G’s Marketing Letters (one short marketing letter every weekday, nothing for sale) and you can unsubscribe any time without losing the template.
What is a marketing brief?
A marketing brief is a short document that tells whoever does your marketing (an agency, a freelancer, or you) exactly what the job is: who you’re selling to, what you’re selling them, what a good result looks like as a number, and what the budget is. One honest page beats a 20-page strategy deck nobody reads.
What should a marketing brief include?
Eight things: the one-line job, exactly who you’re for (and who you’re not), the offer and the proof, the single goal as a number, budget and runway, what already exists, what must change in 90 days, and who owns the work. That’s the template, section by section.
Do I need a brief if I’m not hiring an agency?
Especially then. If you’re doing your own marketing, the brief is you briefing yourself: it’s the difference between an hour a week spent on a plan and an hour a week spent on whatever felt urgent. It’s also the context document that makes AI tools dramatically more useful.
How long does it take to fill in?
Fifteen honest minutes if you know your business well. If a section takes longer, that’s the template working: it’s found the thinking you needed to do before spending money.
Doing the bigger thinking? The brief pairs with what marketing help actually costs (and when to hire nobody), and the Pipeline Calculator will tell you what a good month needs to look like in numbers.