Boomn’s Cory Dobbin on avoiding “gut-feelings” when it comes to creative

Last week, we sat down with Cory Dobbin, the VP of Brand Strategy with Boomn. Beyond just running paid social, Boomn works with brands to help them develop all ends of their marketing funnel - all of which is supported by creative.

One note stood out in particular during the conversation: the importance of data in Boomn's creative process.

The media buyer is the one that has access to the data on the creative. If you don’t have the media buyer and their data involved, you are probably making creative decisions based on gut feeling - this is a mistake.

This data-driven approach is not only critical to Boomn's creative strategy, but also in how they've interpreted the importance of creatives. Over the last little bit, Cory's come to identify creative as the truest face of the brand. Looking at heat maps of how audiences interact with a brand, it is nearly always visual first and then copy second.

Key takeaways from the interview

We learned a lot about Cory and Boomn's creative process. Highlights include:

• Brainstorming as the heart of creatives. The creative process usually starts with brainstorming about an idea. The Boomn team walks through different scripts and angles; then make decisions on format and approach. By the end of the session there are ten or more variations to pass along to the production team.
• Resolving differences of opinion. Creative is a passionate art, but differences in opinion can be quickly resolved by removing the emotional element. For Boomn, this is done by holding data as the main source of truth. Boomn uses Motion to visualize their creative data with the right metrics across the team.
• Look at multiple data points. While ROAS is the gold standard, it doesn't always tell the full story. Knowing your metrics and what they mean allows you to get a more comprehensive understanding of when and why your creative is working.

Be sure to tune into the entire video above to discover more of Boomn's creative process and learnings!