Prospective client asking to see briefs from other clients

Question

As a freelance copywriter, I often take on freelance jobs for advertising agencies.

I contacted one recently to offer my services (a small local agency) and we had a Skype call to discuss further.

He asked if he could see the kinds of briefs I'd been working to, so that he could see how I'd interpreted them (e.g. briefs that had been sent to me by other advertising agencies).

I can see where he's coming from, but I feel it would be a little disrespectful for me to send over briefs from my other clients, seeing as they are basically all in competition with each other.

Am I right in thinking I should avoid doing this?

Answer 1

I would say this is more a battle with your own conscience than anything else. As a programmer, I can easily share some samples of my work, but it’s much different for a copywriter. However legally, if you didn’t sign a non-disclosure with your customer you’re free to share with your client. Best of luck!

Answer 2

It sounds to me that the client is merely unfamiliar with how to express their desires in a form you can ingest and use. They don't understand how to write a brief that you will find useful.

To this end, you may not need to share an actual client brief with them. Simply sending an outline of the items you need to be aware of may be sufficient. A bulleted list of information you need to formulate any writing.

This can often be accomplished by searching the internet for some template of a client brief you feel is sufficient.

A quick search leads me to a few things that may be helpful to the client:

• https://www.articulatemarketing.com/blog/better-briefs-for-writers
• https://www.workflowmax.com/blog/creatives/how-to-an-effective-creative-brief
• https://www.workamajig.com/blog/creative-brief

These are just random search results, I'm not a writer and don't intend any direct endorsement regarding any of the above links.

You may be able to use these results to simply formulate a basic template for the client to fill out.

Answer 3

You are right in thinking this.

Sharing information from one employer to another is a violation of GDPR.

Unless you have explicit permission to show the briefs to another company, you would be committing an offence.

Of course, you could try to anonymise or redact the briefs so that the original customer is hidden. It depends on what information the briefs contain and how it is presented.