How do you get creative ad ideas?

Do you have a pattern of behavior that works reliably - such as immersing yourself in info, thumbing through awards annuals, then brainstorming with a partner?

Or do you find your best ideas come unexpectedly? Like when you are alone - in the shower, driving or about to fall asleep? Or something else?

I've invited the best creative minds on AdGabber to share how they create ad, design or campaign concepts.

Tags: advertising, brainstorming, concepts, creativity, psychology

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Gernot Lauboeck on July 11, 2010 at 5:36am

Reviewing this thread I saw, that a lot of my responsing colleagues try to get a pause , some time off the topic, they need an idea for.

I recently read an article about our brains in the german issue of scientific american. In short it says, our brain is rather more active during times we suspect it to be "idle" than in times we concentrate on certain problems. Then other regions besides the needed special ones slow down working. Just like someone having said "Stop that buzz - he tries to think!" ;))

I think, this correlates rather fine to our remarks: "leaving the problem confidently to our brains" - pausing, reading, doing sthg. else - mostly works out fine. Maybe more active synapses give more combinations of ideas ... all in all unconscious to us, and one of these is suddenly filtered out. A kind of inner (inert) brainstorming, possibly.