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Concepts: the shared vocabulary
The shared vocabulary gives the descriptions in BrandTrackers consistent meanings. The rules below explain approved meaning. They do not certify every stored term or a working classification pipeline. Examples illustrate the rules rather than claim newly inspected library records.
What the vocabulary is for
Someone researching a product launch might look for the campaign, an animation studio, a product feature or a short logo animation. Those are useful ways to reach related work. They do not require separate copies of each piece or one folder tree that everyone must follow.
Our shared vocabulary gives descriptions consistent meanings. A concept is the meaning we classify by; its label is the name we display or search. Animation, an audience description and a content type answer different questions. The vocabulary explains each one and how it connects to other descriptions.
Here, Concepts means this shared vocabulary. The separate creative-idea list called Concept describes ideas used in work, such as a visual metaphor. It is one descriptive list, not the home of every company, product, campaign or classification. Their similar names must not make them interchangeable.
How descriptions connect
Read these as different statements. A piece can be an Interview, belong to a particular campaign and be found under a useful heading. The type describes the piece. The campaign connects particular pieces. The heading offers a way to browse meanings. None establishes the others by itself.
Start with the question a description answers
| Question | Example | What stays separate |
|---|---|---|
| What kind of complete piece is this? | Interview or Annual Report. | Its media, publication and campaign membership. |
| What media does it use? | Image, text, video, audio or interactive. | How it was made and where it appeared. |
| What happens in this part of a video? | A logo animation or product interaction. | Descriptions of the complete video. |
| What creative work does this involve? | Animation and Character Animation. | Which contributor performed that work. |
| Who is it for? | An enterprise audience. | What the piece wants that audience to think, feel or do. |
| Where was it presented? | An image used in an article. | The image's own form and the article as a complete piece. |
A particular company, product or campaign has its own identity. Saying a piece is an Interview classifies it. Saying a particular studio made it identifies a contributor. Saying it belongs to a particular campaign connects it to a body of work. These relationships can all help discovery, but one does not prove the others.
Several types can describe a complete piece, with one leading, when each applies to the piece as a whole. Several other descriptions can coexist too. A close-up can show a reaction during an interview: camera framing, activity and story context remain different questions.
Describe the right subject and the right extent
Consider a longer product video containing a brief logo animation. The animation describes that moment. A search can find the moment and lead to its parent video, showing why it matched. The brief animation alone does not make the complete video a Logo Animation.
The same care applies beyond video. A report can contain a useful chart. A photograph can document an installation. A studio case study can include both that photograph and the original screen animation. Preserve the relationships among those things. The photograph's visual appearance does not by itself establish who designed the installation or produced its animation.
A classification needs to be understandable in context: what it describes, which part it covers and what evidence supports it. An audience associated with a company does not automatically describe every product, feature or piece linked to that company. A credit on a complete video does not establish a credit on every particular moment.
Names help people find a meaning
Keep the source's wording even when our preferred name differs. Alternative names can lead to the same meaning when their definitions agree. Similar wording alone is insufficient.
Brand Book, Style Guide and Digital Guidelines can lead to Brand Guidelines when their contents qualify. A programming style guide does not qualify just because its title contains the same words. Likewise, an Investor Report is not automatically an Annual Report: it may concern another period or subject.
When a meaning changes, record the decision and preserve the relationship to earlier wording and classifications. A clearer sentence is not approval of a first-pass definition. Nor does removing a broad content-type name remove the useful information it once mixed together. Campaign membership, subject, role, advertising evidence and original wording must remain understandable separately.
Service, Discipline and Craft
Creative Production is a service, Animation is a discipline and Character Animation is a craft. These names help explain the work people offer and research. They do not make company type, creative work and a contributor's credit the same fact.
A craft can have several supported parents. Character Animation can be reached under 2D and 3D Animation while keeping one meaning. One primary parent controls its main display position. A piece's own 2D or 3D description remains separate from how those craft names are organized. Reaching Character Animation through either parent does not classify every matching piece as both 2D and 3D.
A treatment can change the appearance of work without becoming the craft that produced it. An AI-generated stop-motion look does not prove physical stop-motion production. A video format alone does not prove a cinematography credit. Definitions and evidence must preserve these distinctions.
The named levels do not approve every existing entry or its parent relationships. The individual definitions need useful inclusion and exclusion examples, and unclear boundaries remain visible for review.
Browsing entrances are useful views of the same information
A heading helps someone choose a research path. It is not automatically another type, a campaign, a compulsory parent or an instruction for the pipeline.
Interactive Kiosk has a main home under Interactive & Digital Experience and another entrance under Retail & Commerce. Both use the same type. A non-retail kiosk remains distinguishable; appearing under a heading does not supply evidence of retail use.
A moment can belong to several relevant shelves with one main shelf. Shots also has a visible entrance for production-shot research. A logo animation keeps its own shelf instead of being forced into a shot type. Featured selection remains separate from whether a moment qualifies for a research path.
A campaign gathers particular pieces. A heading gathers meanings for browsing. An alias supplies another name for a meaning. A broader craft relationship connects meanings. Keeping those jobs distinct lets the library offer several entrances without copying content or inventing relationships.
Preserve what makes a reference useful
Maintained filter choices have definitions. Rich descriptions preserve details that those choices cannot yet express. A new descriptive term can enter review before becoming a maintained filter. Its presence in an analysis result does not, by itself, approve it.
Review should preserve what someone actually said or what the evidence shows. A brand's stated voice differs from an observed tone. A stated strategy differs from a conclusion drawn by an analyst. A requested action, a price and a benefit can coexist without becoming one Offer type. They may occur on a page or image, as well as inside a video.
A supported discipline can remain broad when its narrower craft is unknown. Do not invent a General label to fill that gap. An unresolved required main classification, or a classification below its applicable confidence threshold, goes to human review. This does not require every descriptive list to have a primary value or set a numerical threshold.
The moments vocabulary stays stable between planned versions. A vocabulary change identifies which existing classifications need review or reanalysis. Verify replacement behavior and preserve human corrections before processing affected work. This is not an instruction to rerun the whole library after every edit.
Human corrections must survive retry and reanalysis. Classification instructions use the shared vocabulary and examples, and classifications retain who supplied them and the vocabulary version used. These are requirements of the model; implementation and result quality need separate verification.
Where this connects
The entity and product explanations identify the people, organizations, products and features being described. Groupings explain which bodies of work gather pieces together. Content and Moments explain the complete piece and the useful parts within it. This vocabulary explains the descriptions used to find and compare them.
Recorded decisions preserve approved meanings and their history. Vocabulary references show stored terms and dated measurements, with draft wording visibly distinguished. The pipeline evidence explains which paths currently support the model and which still need work. Reading a definition does not establish that its classification, filter or research journey already works.
Where to look next
- Recorded decisions preserve the approved meanings and their reasons.
- Vocabulary reference lists stored terms and their stated review status. A stored or drafted term is not automatically approved.
- State of the data and conformance reference contain dated observations and checks. Their stated scope and age limit what they establish.
- Open questions and the program audit track unresolved meanings, missing evidence and implementation gaps.
Last reviewed 6 October 2026.