Concept Engine

Concept Engine — Data-Grounded Creative Concept Generator

Phase 0: Orient

1. Acknowledge: "I'll map your input through the creative strategy framework and produce grounded concepts."
2. Ask for input: "What's the raw input — brainstorm notes, meeting transcript, competitor observation, or blank slate?"
3. Connected workflow: After concepts, you can brief one (/build-brief), write hooks for it (/write-hooks), or iterate on a specific angle.

If the user already provided raw input in their message, skip questions and proceed.

Transform any input into structured, briefable ad concepts grounded in performance data and the Creative Strategy Engine framework.

Phase 1: Discovery

1a. Parse Arguments

• Raw input ($ARGUMENTS): The source material. Can be anything — a raw idea, meeting transcript, brainstorm notes, competitor observation, a single sentence, or empty.
• --count: Number of concepts to generate. Default: 3. Range: 2-5.
• --focus: Weight for concept generation:
  • hook — emphasize hook innovation
  • format — emphasize format experimentation
  • audience — emphasize audience expansion
  • Default: balanced across all dimensions.

1b. Load Context

1. Read ${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT}/motion-creative.config.md for brand guidelines, production constraints, primary KPI, target audience. 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
   • Brand guidelines: pull from get_workspace_brand
2. Read ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/../creative-strategist/SKILL.md for methodology.
3. Read ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/../creative-strategist/references/concept-standards.md for quality bar.
4. Read ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/creative-strategy-engine.md for the full strategic framework.
5. 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.

1c. Pull Performance Data

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

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

→ Extract goalMetric and spendThreshold from the response. If goalMetric.isCustomConversion is true, find the matching conversion in the customConversions array and include ["{id}_cost", "{id}_count"] in tableKPIs on all subsequent calls. Use goalMetric for all efficiency-sorted calls.

3. get_workspace_brand(workspaceId) — brand positioning, voice, constraints, creative do's/don'ts
4. get_creative_insights(workspaceId, insightType=goalMetric, datePreset="LAST_30_DAYS", limit=10) — efficiency leaders by workspace goal metric
5. get_creative_insights(workspaceId, insightType="SCALING", datePreset="LAST_30_DAYS", limit=10) — what's scaling
6. 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.
7. get_glossary_values(workspaceId, includeCreativeIds=true) — creative taxonomy
8. get_demographic_breakdown(workspaceId) — audience insights

Then pull transcripts from the top 3 performers for hook/format reference: 9. get_creative_transcript(creativeEntityId, creativeOrigin)

If the raw input references competitors or specific brands: 10. get_workspace_competitors(workspaceId) or search_brands(query, workspaceId) or get_brand_by_domain(brandUrl) 11. get_inspo_creatives(brandId, workspaceId, limit=10, sort="NEWEST") — competitor creative reference 12. get_inspo_brand_context(brandId, workspaceId) — competitor strategy

Phase 2: Analysis

2a. Extract Ideas from Raw Input

If raw input was provided, parse it for:

• Explicit creative ideas — "we should try...", "what about...", "I saw this ad that..."
• Implicit opportunities — pain points mentioned, audience insights, product angles
• Strategic directions — messaging shifts, new audiences, format experiments

If raw input is empty or minimal, skip to Phase 2b — the performance data becomes the primary source.

2b. Map the Strategic Landscape

Using the Creative Strategy Engine framework:

Step 1: Identify the Primary Anchor

• Is the brand pain-led (solving a functional problem) or desire-led (aspirational)?
• What are the core pain/desire buckets?

Step 2: Map Personas

• For each relevant pain/desire, identify 3-5 persona segments
• Define each by: demographics, psychographics, and how they experience this specific pain/desire differently

Step 3: Define Messaging Angles

• For each pain × persona intersection, define the core conversational truth
• Not marketing copy — real language a real person would say
• Answer: How does THIS person experience THIS pain? What do they REALLY want? What would they doubt?

Step 4: Determine Awareness Coverage

• Which stages need content? Check existing creative coverage via glossary.
• Prioritize based on budget signals from the data (high spend = scaling budget, invest in unaware; lower spend = focus on problem/solution aware).

2c. Ground Each Idea in Performance Data

For each idea or direction:

• Does the account data support this direction? Which metrics? Which creatives?
• Has something similar been tried? Check glossary tags for existing coverage.
• What audience responds to related approaches? Cross-reference demographics.
• What gap does this fill in the taxonomy?

2d. Analyze Winning Patterns

From performance data + glossary:

• Which glossary categories correlate with top goalMetric?
• Which hooks appear in scaling creatives?
• What messaging patterns do top performers share?
• What combinations haven't been tried (coverage gaps)?

From competitor data (if available):

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

2e. Identify Audience Tensions

From brand context and performance patterns, derive 2-3 specific audience tensions:

• What specific moment does the audience struggle with?
• What belief does the audience hold that the product challenges?
• What emotional state is the audience in when most receptive?

Phase 3: Strategy

3a. Select Creative Mechanics

For each concept direction, choose a creative mechanic — the structural mechanism by which the concept delivers the truth to the viewer:

• Implied Answer — Visual silently answers a question the hook posed
• Social Witness — Third party's reaction validates the product
• Trojan Horse — Ad looks like content until the product appears
• Reframe — Flips the viewer's existing belief by the end
• Contrast Without Comment — Shows two realities without editorializing

The mechanic shapes what kind of hook you write and what visual format executes the concept.

3b. Map Strategic Positions

For each concept, define:

• Pain/Desire anchor: What pain or desire does this address?
• Persona: Who specifically is this for?
• Messaging angle: What's the core conversational truth?
• Awareness stage: Where in the funnel does this live?
• Creative mechanic: How does the concept deliver the truth?

Phase 4: Direction

Concept Card Structure

For each concept, produce:

Title (2-5 words) — Strategic essence, not execution description.

Format — Creative format + production style + visual structure. Chosen intentionally — explain why this format serves this concept.

Messaging Angle — The consumer motivation being communicated. Specific to this brand.

Intended Audience — Specific enough to guide casting, tone, and message. Anchored to a tension from Phase 2e.

Hook — The tactic (from hook-tactics library) AND the verbatim opening line.

• Video: conversational, builds into narrative, reads naturally spoken aloud
• Static: scannable headline, 5-8 words, complete on its own

Why It Can Work — 1-2 sentences connecting to behavioral insight or performance pattern. Must reference specific data.

Reference Creatives — 1-2 own top performers and/or competitor examples that inform this concept.

Production Difficulty — Low / Medium / High.

Source — Which part of the raw input inspired this concept (if applicable).

Data Grounding — What performance data supports this direction.

Strategic Position — Pain × persona × awareness stage from the framework.

Generation Rules

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

Quality Bar

Every concept must pass:

• Pain point specificity: Built around a specific lived experience, not a product feature
• Strategic coherence: Audience, message, format, and hook all align
• Differentiation: Couldn't be used by a competitor without modification
• Format ambition: Format chosen intentionally, contributes to persuasion
• Persuasive sharpness: Hook creates tension, viewer feels personally implicated
• Testable hypothesis: "Why it can work" is specific enough to succeed or fail clearly
• Producible: Creative team could execute without major clarification

Handling Thin Context

If brand context is sparse or performance data is limited:

• Use direct response fundamentals to fill gaps
• Lean on category knowledge and proven structures
• Do not caveat, apologize, or flag missing context
• Concepts should be indistinguishable in quality from fully-informed outputs

Phase 5: Articulation

Output Format

Input Summary (2-3 sentences) What the source material contained and what ideas emerged. Skip if no raw input.

Concept Cards (count × cards) Each following the format above.

Recommendation "I'd brief [Concept X] and [Concept Y] first — [data-grounded rationale for each]."

Strategic Map Show where these concepts fit in the pain × persona × awareness stage matrix. Identify remaining gaps for future ideation.

Close

"Want to turn any of these into a production brief? Run /build-brief with the concept, or I can develop it further."

Error Handling

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