Create Concepts

Generate data-driven creative concepts that bridge analysis to action. Every concept is grounded in performance data, informed by competitor intelligence, and specific enough to brief. Uses the creative-strategist skill methodology and concept quality standards.

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Phase 0: Orient

1. Acknowledge: "I'll generate ad concepts grounded in what's actually performing in your account."
2. Ask direction: "Any specific focus — hook-focused, format-focused, audience-focused? Or should I find the gaps and fill them?"
3. Connected workflow: After concepts, you can brief one (/build-brief), write hooks for it (/write-hooks), or go deeper on a specific angle.

If the user already specified the direction (e.g., "give me 3 UGC concepts focused on hooks"), skip questions and deliver.

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Phase 1: Setup

1a. Parse Arguments

• --count: Number of concepts to generate. Default: 3. Range: 2-5.
• --focus: Optional weight for concept generation:
  • hook — emphasize hook innovation (new opening approaches)
  • format — emphasize format experimentation (new visual structures)
  • audience — emphasize audience expansion (new segments to target)

If no focus is specified, balance across all dimensions.

1b. Load Settings & Auth

1. Read ${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT}/motion-creative.config.md for org-specific configuration. If the file does not exist, use these defaults and suggest the user run /customize:
   • primary_kpi: use goalMetric from first get_creative_insights response
   • default_date_preset: LAST_30_DAYS
   • default_creative_limit: 10
   • production_capabilities: all formats
   • max_production_difficulty: High
   • priority_glossary_categories: use all
   • Brand guidelines + competitors: pull from Motion API
2. Call get_auth_context() + get_workspace_brand(workspaceId) in parallel.
3. Use default_date_preset from settings as the datePreset for all calls unless the user specified a date range. Use default_creative_limit from settings as the limit unless the user specified otherwise.
4. If settings specify priority_glossary_categories, prioritize those categories in pattern extraction and gap analysis.

Settings influence:

• Use production_capabilities and max_production_difficulty to constrain concept formats — don't propose full video production if the team only does UGC and static.
• Use team_size to calibrate production difficulty ratings.
• Use brand guidelines (voice, positioning, do's/don'ts, target audience) as hard constraints on concept generation.
• Use primary_kpi to weight which performance patterns matter most when grounding concepts.
• Brand settings supplement (not replace) get_workspace_brand results. If both exist, merge them — settings often has more specific creative rules.

1c. Load Methodology

Read the creative-strategist skill, references/concept-standards.md, and references/insight-quality.md.

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Phase 2: Data Collection (Parallel)

The SPEND call must come first (it returns goalMetric and spendThreshold). Then dispatch remaining calls in parallel.

Own performance:

1. get_creative_insights(workspaceId, "SPEND", datePreset="LAST_30_DAYS", limit=10, withAggregatedInsights=true) — spend leaders + account-level aggregates

→ Extract goalMetric and spendThreshold from the response. Use goalMetric for all efficiency-sorted calls.

2. get_creative_insights(workspaceId, insightType=goalMetric, datePreset="LAST_30_DAYS", limit=10) — efficiency leaders by workspace goal metric
3. get_creative_insights(workspaceId, "SCALING", datePreset="LAST_30_DAYS", limit=10) — what's growing
4. For hook rate leaders: filter SPEND results (call #1) to video creatives and sort by thumbstop_ratio descending. Do NOT use insightType="HOOK" — it returns the same ranking as SCALING.
5. get_glossary_values(workspaceId, includeCreativeIds=true) — creative taxonomy with creative mappings

Competitor reference: 6. get_workspace_competitors(workspaceId) — tracked competitors

After competitors return, pick the top 3 most active and dispatch per-competitor calls: 7. get_inspo_creatives(brandId, workspaceId, limit=5, sort="NEWEST", launchDate="LAST_30_DAYS", status="ACTIVE") — for each competitor 8. get_inspo_brand_context(brandId, workspaceId) — for the most relevant competitor

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Phase 3: Deep Dive

3a. Pull Transcripts

For the most interesting creatives (max 5-8 total transcript pulls):

• Top 2-3 own performers (by goalMetric or SCALING) that are video
• Top 2-3 competitor creatives that represent different approaches

Use get_creative_transcript(creativeEntityId, creativeOrigin). Prioritize variety — don't pull transcripts for similar-looking creatives.

3b. Analyze Winning Patterns

From own performance data + glossary:

• Which glossary categories (format, hook type, asset type) correlate with top goalMetric?
• Which hooks appear in scaling creatives? What do they have in common?
• What messaging patterns do top performers share?
• What combinations haven't been tried? (coverage gaps in the taxonomy)

From competitor data:

• What approaches are competitors running that your account doesn't show?
• What formats or hooks are converging across the industry?
• Where are competitors leaving white space?

3c. Identify Audience Tensions

From brand context and performance patterns, derive 2-3 specific audience tensions — human lived experiences, not product features:

• What specific moment does your audience struggle with?
• What belief or assumption does your audience hold that your product challenges?
• What emotional state is your audience in when they'd be most receptive?

These tensions anchor the concepts. If --focus audience, generate more tensions and weight concepts toward untested segments from demographic data.

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Phase 4: Generate Concepts

For each concept, follow the structure in references/concept-standards.md:

Concept Card

Title: Short, memorable name (2-5 words). Strategic essence, not execution description.

Format: Asset type (UGC, studio, hybrid) + visual format (testimonial, demo, problem-agitation, before-and-after, POV, etc.). Chosen intentionally — explain why this format serves this concept.

Messaging Angle: The consumer motivation being communicated. Specific to this brand, not category-generic.

Intended Audience: Specific enough to guide casting, tone, and message. Anchored to a tension from Phase 3.

Hook: The tactic (question, confession, bold claim, warning, curiosity, contrast) AND the verbatim opening line. For video: conversational, spoken aloud naturally. For static: scannable headline, 5-8 words.

Why It Can Work: 1-2 sentences connecting to behavioral insight or performance pattern. Not a sales pitch — a testable hypothesis. Must reference specific data: "Problem-agitation hooks drove 40% higher thumbstop in your account" or "No competitor is running this angle, creating white space."

Reference Creatives: 1-2 own top performers and/or competitor examples that inform this concept. Note what to learn from each.

Production Difficulty: Low / Medium / High.

Generation Rules

• Every concept must be grounded in at least one data point from Phase 2-3
• At least 2 elements must vary across concepts (audience, angle, format, or hook tactic)
• No concept should replicate an existing ad from the account — cross-reference against performance data
• Each concept must pass the quality bar in references/concept-standards.md
• If --focus is specified, at least 2 concepts should emphasize that dimension
• Lead with the strongest or most differentiated concept

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Quality Gate

Before presenting concepts, verify each against the quality bar in ../creative-strategist/references/concept-standards.md. Every concept must pass: pain point specificity, strategic coherence, differentiation, format ambition, persuasive sharpness, testable hypothesis, producible. Revise or discard any concept that fails. Fewer strong concepts beat many weak ones.

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Phase 5: Output

Open by reflecting what inputs shaped the concepts: brand context, performance patterns used, competitor signals incorporated. 2-3 sentences, conversational.

Present each concept as a numbered card with all fields from Phase 4.

Close with a recommendation: Which 2-3 concepts to brief first, based on:

• Expected impact (grounded in performance data)
• Production effort (lower effort = faster to market)
• Portfolio diversity (don't brief 3 versions of the same thing)

Format: "I'd brief [Concept 1] and [Concept 3] first — [one sentence rationale for each]."

If the user wants to turn a concept into a production brief, they can run /build-brief with the concept.

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Error Handling

Read ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/../creative-strategist/references/error-handling.md for degraded mode and error handling guidance.