Contractual
A contractual brief is a contract or brief made between the client and the employee. The brief includes the media company's requirements and their organisation of work. It also highlights the expectations of their client, price agreement, and payment terms.
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Advantages
Contractual briefs can ensure that the client can work toward deadlines and deliver projects for when the client needs it. Also, contractual briefs are very specific and detailed ensuring that there is no confusion upon working towards the brief. It is also non-negotiable.
Disadvantages
A contractual brief is a binding contract meaning that once the contract has been signed, then you will be legally bound to the term and conditions. Failure to meet the client's expectations would result in legal action being taken towards the company which will result in the company's reputation being questioned.
Negotiated
As the name implies, the client and the employer will come to an agreement which will finalise the ideas of both the client and the employer. Both parties have to come to an agreement in order to seal the deal otherwise it will lead to disagreement which would cause problems.
Advantages
An advantage of this brief is that the client and the employer are free to express their ideas which is then combined so that it forms a brief that satisfies both the client and the employer. This ensures that there is no disagreement between both parties.
Disadvantages
Negotiations don't always go as planned as there will be some disagreements between both the employee and the client which will result in the loss of potential projects that the employer could have gained. The dissatisfied client will have to negotiate with another employer.
Formal
A formal brief is a document regarding detailed and concise information on what the client wants the company to achieve.
Advantages
An advantage of a formal brief is that it regards information about the task that the company need in order to complete and deliver.
Disadvantages
These types of brief do not legally bind the client. Therefore, if there are alterations that do not correspond to the brief then it will lead to negotiations being made between the company and the client
Informal
An informal brief is a brief that involves no signed agreement. Informal briefs usually consists of a verbal discussion between the client and the company about what the client wants the company to do.
Advantages
Seeing as to how there are no boundaries such as the time taken to complete and the deadline for when it needs to be delivered, it allows the client and the company to come up with more creative ideas and more time to finalize their choice on which idea would be more imaginative to follow up on.
Disadvantages
There is no written agreement stating the fee nor the deadline for when the project has to be delivered which would affect the outcome because though the ideas may be more creative given that there are no boundaries, the company and the client will keep changing their creative ideas and they will end up with nothing being produced.
Commission
A commission brief involves the hiring of an indie media company by a major media company to create the product for the major media company. In other words the indie media company is being commissioned to create the product by the major media company.
Advantages
The indie company will receive payment for the creation of the project and most likely receive a portion from the major media company's profit.
Disadvantages
The brief doesn't involve negotiations with only the client and the company. Instead, it is a negotiation between two companies meaning that a lot of ideas can be discussed and not all of them can be agreed upon between two parties, this will incite conflict between the two parties.
Tender
A tender brief consists or briefs containing the proposal about the project and the budget being produced and pitched by production companies to the client in need of the brief.
Advantages
The client would have a variety of briefs from production companies to select. This allows the client time to decide which brief would be suitable for him/her.
Disadvantages
One disadvantage is that so much time and decision making is taken towards the making of the brief and it is probable that it might not be chosen by the client.
Cooperative
A co-operative brief involves the completion of a task between a minimum of two companies hired by the client.
Advantages
This allows both companies to cooperate and discuss innovative ideas. In addition the two companies will be able to complete and the deliver the project before the deadline.
Disadvantages
There will most likely be disagreements between the two companies meaning that a negotiated brief will have to be distributed to both companies in for the purpose of appealing to both companies.
Competition
A competition brief is open to more than one company which gives the media company an opportunity to participate for the purpose of creating the best product, then the winner will be chosen by the client and will be rewarded prize money.
Advantages
Only the winning company gets the amount of money stated on the competition brief.
Disadvantages
After spending the companies budget and time towards the making of your project such as a film, you may not get chosen by the client.
