Is your creativity hitting a brick wall?

How do you spark your creativity when you think you’ve run out of ideas? In this era of regular social media updates, heaps of competition and a desire to stand out from the crowd, it can be not only challenging but stressful to dream up something new to keep your audience interested. Whether you’re an online lifestyle shop, a bricks and mortar business or a marketer helping your clients, at some point we all feel like we’re scraping the bottom of the creative barrel. And we all know what’s at the bottom of barrels. Sludge. So how can we find some inspiration and kick start the creativity wheels spinning?

Can Old be New again?

Not a bad place to start as you can look back on what was successful and see if there’s a way to update it. There’s absolutely no shame in doing this; Hollywood is a master of reprising decades old movies, characters and plots. Just like decorating trends come and go and come back again, you can revisit images, a campaign or a draw on the history of what’s around you for content. Nostalgia is also a great way to connect with your audience. Most people look at the past with romantic rose-coloured glasses, so you’re already overcoming an emotional barrier by connecting to what can be seen as a ‘happier time’. Because there’s such a wealth of visual content online now, you can easily find something to tie to your current objectives. And a bonus is that for younger audiences this is a bit of a history lesson, letting you capitalise on their voyage of discovery.

Change your Angle.

Is there a new perspective you can bring to your work? Could creativity come from literally going high or low, from the other side or underneath? There are dramatic opportunities to spark interest and curiosity from your audience if you restrict how they first see your content. Again, cinema does this all the time to produce tension, drama and surprise. Good composition of photos or videos can deliver impact and emotional response, so how can your next project benefit from this approach? Build your story around a reveal, Don’t give it all away in one shot, one post or one blog. Drip feeding is common in advertising to reinforce not just the brand, but the message. As the story unfolds your audience is eager for the next edition.

Get up and Move Around.

I don’t mean that (sometimes) annoying reminder from your watch to stand up; rather get away from the environment that’s making you stuck in the first place. The ‘noise’ of the office can become a negative distraction. Seek out inspiration from other creatives. Pop into a business similar to yours for a bit of a secret shopper, dive into an art gallery or a museum and put your mind into a different headspace. How others interpret the world not only challenges us, but can start your brain thinking in new directions. If you don’t live close to inspiring opportunities like galleries, museums or a hipster café scene, is the natural world an option? Staring at a vista, listening to the birds or the breeze can clear your head

Ultimately the inspiration comes from relaxing your mind and letting it wander a bit and often you’ll experience a burst of creativity with many ideas flowing at once. Write them all down so you can go back to them later. They may not all work immediately but like any artist, there’s a need to give yourself the freedom to experiment because the results can be unexpected.

Vitamin Media is a video production house, but first and foremost we’re storytellers. Finding the emotional hook, the connection between you and your audience and putting that on creativity screen is what we love to do.