advergirl

Advice for starting out at an advertising agency

I find that I don't have a lot of general advice for the world. Sure, I go on here with my critiques and proclamations. All in good fun. But, when it comes to one-size-fits-all advice, I have a mere three tenets:

1. When planning a wedding reception, always ask the caterer to include a doggie-bag for the bride and groom. 95%* of newlyweds leave the reception smeared with lipstick kiss marks and starving (*actual made-up statistic)


2. If you're buying a house in the Columbus, OH area, call Ric DeVore. He and Molly will take care of everything


3. When gossiping (come on, we all do it), try not to

But, as those of you who are following the series may have noticed, I do have seemingly endless advice for young ad folks. These are my top two that agency newbies seem to universally miss on:

1. Find a mentor. Seriously, it makes all the difference in the world. You need someone who can share advice, encouragement and a good example. You need an advocate. And, in the fast-paced world of agency life, you can't assume that you're going to be taken under a wing by chance. A good mentor is the difference between frustrations eating at you and improving you.
   


2. It does matter what you wear. Sure, it's exciting to hear that there's no dress code. You can keep schlepping about in the same duds you donned in college. The unspoken caveat is: you'll be thought of like someone wandering about campus instead of like the ladder climber you might really be. You've heard the cliche dress for the job you want. How about just leaving the shredded jeans and stretched-out sweaters at home and dressing like you have a job. Any job.
3. And one to grow on: Read this fantastic post called 'What I Wish My New Employee Knew' by Todd Defren over at PR-squared.

Eight most awkward ways to get the good news -

Hey, you got a new account. Well done. You generated 150 pages of RFP response. You sweated through the big pitch and then the three consecutive re-pitches. You even gave in and did a little spec work. Now, you're face-to-face with the bearer of good news. And, trying to contort your facial muscles to look genuinely happy in the face of these tough setups:

1. The spare change: We all loved the presentation. The motion media, the interactivity, the deep content, but, here's the thing - we just can't pay close to that much. Can you create the same basic thing for 25% of your proposed budget?


2. Too much truth: Look, I'll be honest with you, I'm the only one who liked you guys. My boss wanted the NY firm with more experience; my team wanted the agency that seemed to understand us more, but this is my call and I like you.


3. The Ghost of Christmas future: Hey, hey, sorry for calling so late in the day but congratulations! Look, good news is that you got the business - we all loved you. Bad news is that I have a brochure that needs to be written and designed tonight and ready for the printer by lunch tomorrow. Can you do it?


4. Strange bed-fellows: Great news, we've made a decision. We loved your brand experience and we'd like to have you go ahead and do that part of our account. We've retained Arch Enemy, Inc. as our AOR - you'll be working through them to us. It should be a great partnership.


5. Doer of doom:  We're so looking forward to working with you guys. Your capabilities, attitudes, work - all just incredible. Here's the only thing ... things are so uncomfortable with our old agency that we really don't want to extend the relationship any more than is absolutely necessary. Can you get with them directly to handle the transition and handoff?


6. The Handpicker: Super pitch, team. We're ready to get started. All I need to do is make sure I have the ideal day-to-day contact to really best communicate our input at the agency. This will only work if I communicate exclusively with the president of the agency.


7. The Favor factory: Before we start work on the first project, could I just ask a quick favor? I know your team is super ensconced with all the big media in town. Any chance you could get me, my daughter and her 6 friends tickets to Monday's sold-out Bowl game and maybe a quick ride on a private jet and some hotel vouchers?


8. The premature pairing: Thank you, thank you, thank you. Yours is the team I absolutely want to work with. And, this spec work you provided gives me great ammunition to go to my Board and convince them that we need to hire an agency.

Four Rules for Career Success

I'm of that age. I'm a boss. A friend of other bosses.

I hear both sides now. The employees (like me) who are struggling for direction, recognition, growth. And, the bosses (also like me) wanting to feel confident in their staff, hoping for always-improving performance.

But, somehow, the two sides rarely seem to clearly communicate. To define, mentor, move forward.

So, for all you fellow white-collar employees out there, I share with you four lessons - learned on both sides of the fence - that represent the traits of an indispensable employee:

• Never be silent in a meeting. You're there for a reason. Participate. Add value. Take notes.
• Always build trust. Demonstrate that you understand the business - the entire business, not just your department - and your boss's painpoints. Take actions that show you're a responsive steward of the business, the brand and your boss's sanity.
• Keep generating ideas. New ideas. Fresh perspectives. Not just words/pictures/projects/research or whatever the details of your job description mandate.
• Learn to read a room. Nothing will get you farther in business than empathy. Stop talking when eyes glaze. Offer solutions when brows crease. Pay attention to all the nonverbal feedback coming your way and act on it.

Cover letters and Google searches

Ad newbie and job searcher Dan Culhane recently asked for advice on cover letters - to pen or not to pen? What to say?

Short answer: Absolutely write a cover letter.

If you're lucky your resume hits the inbox of someone who needs help. Who is short on time. Who needs the services of, well, you. So, don't expect her to do the work of reading your resume and applying it to her needs. Just tell her who you are and how you can help...

Advergirl's five rules for effective cover letters:

• Stay brief: We're an email-addled industry. We want bullets and conversational style and an ability to get to the point. Don't feel compelled to write a page. Or even print on a page. Just write brief and smart.
• Be relevant: If you have a cover letter template, you're doing it wrong. Drag it to the trash can and empty. If you really want the job, check out the agency. Write - I just saw the amazing work you did for Lowe's and I want to be a part of it. Understand the agency's position in the marketplace. Know their work. Tell them how you can add value in the year ahead.
• Think personal: To whom it may concern concerns me. You have Google. Find a contact. If the agency's Web site doesn't list staff members, use the URL to find them. For example, say you want to work at SBC Advertising. URL-sbcadvertising.com. Google @sbcadvertising.com until you find someone who used their work email in a chat room on a blog on their resume and talk to her.
• Worry the details: Even as a diva of typos (I occasionally cringe when I read old posts), I'm still completely turned off by cover letters and resumes with horrible punctuation, blatant misspellings and 'your' instead of 'you're.'
• Go accessible: Send an email attachment. Send a link. Show your Web site address. Make it easy to pass on and easy to learn more about you. Speaking of which - please check out this manifesto on your personal online brand. Lots to know.

And, then get out there and get a job, people, you can't just sit around reading pedantic blogs all day.

Quiz: Are you a brand marketer, a sales guru or an inventor / entrepreneur?

I'm sure you've been in this meeting.

The one where one of the smartest guys you've ever met talks about his big idea. And, 15 minutes in, you still don't get it.

The one where the guy next to him talks about his contacts and untapped demand and where to take this mystery product to market. And, then they both turn to the agency and say - so, how can you help us?

From there, you enter into the even-more-treacherous territory of explaining the role of an agency, why branding is important, why they need your perspective. All while looking into quizzical eyes, clearly asking: aren't I already doing that?

To save you from the fuzzy land of role confusion, I give you this simple quiz that will uncover your role in launching the new biz...once you figure out what they're selling, that is:

1. When you meet someone for the first time, you wonder:

A. What makes them tick
B. What they worry about
C. What they dream about

2. You like to explain your product by how:

A. It stands out / is different from other products
B. Is similar to products you know and trust
C. Is a possibility you've never even considered

3. When thinking about your product or service, you consider:

A. Its value to others
B. Its revenue potential
C. How it might change the game

4. When first telling someone about your product, you use the word 'and':

A. Not at all
B. 3 - 5 times
C. 10+ times

5. You are most likely to write:

A. Key messages
B. PowerPoint decks
C. Patent applications

6. You are most likely to take notes on:

A. A white board
B. A blackberry
C. A bar napkin

7. You never head to a meeting without:

A. A sharpie
B. A laser pointer
C. A jump drive

8. In a meeting, you are most likely to draw:

A. Comparisons
B. Emphasis circles
C. Diagrams

9. You most value:

A. Insights
B. Relationships
C. Ideas

10. An elevator ride is for:

A. Measuring the length of time you have to communicate your message
B. Checking your phone messages
C. Syncing your multimedia device

Mostly As: Greetings, Brand Marketer. Welcome to a tireless career cycle of defining and refining. Of owning Red. Of hugging stakeholders and kicking sacred cows. Make it relevant and credible and ownable. And, obsess about the details. It's your gig.

Mostly Bs: High five, Sales Guru. It's time to activate your contact list. To reunite with fraternity brothers and talk old times and business. You know the features and benefits. You know the ROI. Give us the runway we need to get out of BETA and into the big time.

Mostly Cs: Type on, Inventor - Entrepreneur. Power up your Linux server, snag a little shareware and take on that silly beast called Google. You dazzled us with your passion and your ingenuity. Your charisma landed years of sweat labor from those equally driven. Time to lay 0s to 1s before someone else gets there first.

Three basic rules of political advertising

1. Get paid in advance.
   (If they lose, they'll claim to have never heard of you)
2. Pick a winner the first time
   (Or everyone will claim to have never heard of you)
3. Find a VO guy who can say the opponent's name with so much oily, dripping disgust that you'd think he just picked up a can of SpaghettiOs and found a family of flamboyant rat babies inside

Ah, it's campaign season again. That glorious time of year when we are confronted with how truly dire the situation is and meet all the 'one guys who can save us' from disaster. Glory be.

I first started blogging in the last presidential election. One of the many political ranters falling off screen left. This year, I'll be happy to just snark at the ads from a distance. Maybe I'll just snark at the snarkers. I'm planning on getting all of my political ad updates from Comedy Central's Indecision 2008. It's the most reality I can handle.

I waded in with this historical look at political spots long-lost enough to be unable to hurt anyone anymore:

And, stayed for this probative Colbert bit on the House Elf's full pockets...

Yeah, this feels right...

Why blogs? Ask, Stella Artois

Full disclosure: I recently received a press kit from Stella Artois about the upcoming unveiling of their cinematic Web site ‘La Bouteille':

I’m super excited about this for two reasons:

As a blogger: A cinematic Web site? I love to play with shiny new Web things. Of course, I’m going to go check out the launch later this month and if it’s even mildly engaging, chatter about it like crazy in this space.

As a marketer / advertiser: I love to see traditional marketing organizations and agencies really “getting” what bloggers can bring to the table. Yeah, sure, Sony and BK have been doing it forever, but broader strategic adoption seemed to be stalled until this year.

Apropos of budgeting season, I’ll write a full business case for investing in blogging next month, but, until then, here are my top 5:

1. SEO: There is no cheaper, faster way to get solid organic search engine optimization than riding the coattails of the mega-servers at the top of the blogging service pyramid.
   
   
2. Low-hanging fruit: So, you want to talk to the advertising reporter at the New York Times. It will cost you and he’s got a lot of heavy hitters on his tail - but, yeah, you can do that.
   
   Or, you can invest half the money and talk to a couple of hundred bloggers – who by-and-large are pre-disposed to early adoption, curiosity about new products and general buzziness.


3. Share of voice: You’ve likely seen this Yahoo! Pyramid, representing "phases of value creation" at Yahoo! Groups as outlined a year ago by the company's head of technology development.
   
   Short-story: A very few people online are creating content. A larger number are aggregating it into ‘did you see’ posts. And the rest are, well, checking it out.
   
   Pair that with the recent report about the number of technology reporters who CITE BLOGGERS AS SOURCES. Not as man-on-the-street interviews, but as credible industry sources. It’s 67% of technology reporters. 67%.
   
   And, you start to see what we’re looking at: A small, vocal group of ProAms has been awarded a lot of authority – through Web behavior, RSS feeds, media attention and SEO - with little more than an interest in publishing.
   
   
4. On-demand delivery: Why wait for someone to find your Web site or read a review about your new product? Talk them into signing up for your feed once and deliver the content wherever they dine on feeds.


5. Changes in consumer behavior: Online ‘pre-shopping’ behavior and the emerging credibility and impact of user-generated consumer reviews has changed the offline game. Having people – real people, like bloggers, commenters, etc. – talk about your product / service / etc. has become hugely important as consumers go online in droves to ‘try on’ brands before going offline to buy.

Top 5 mistakes traditional marketers make online

Time Magazine opened their Top 50 Web site list to public comment with the call to action: rank 'em.

You're looking at the poll's top 5.

How many - oh, savvy bloggers and feeders - do you actually use?

For me, it's zero.

Here's why I bring this up. I'm an online junkie working in a traditional - if evolving - ad agency. Today, there's still a pretty noticeable divide between the "interactive" group and, well, everybody else. And, as those TV and print veterans start to get excited about more and more integrated plans, there's one objection that rings through the halls: I've never heard of it; so, it must not have really caught on...

Growing pains.

Happily I have my own blog to grouse on. So, with no further ado - here are my top 5 picks for "mistakes" traditional marketers make in online planning:

1. Apply "I've never heard of it" TV wisdom. In the world of prime time TV, marketshare is akin to WOMshare. Even if you include the cable channels with non-syndicated programming, there are what - maybe 50 choices for the 9 o'clock veg hour? Compare that to the online world - let's see, how many blogs can you surf? I think the current number is 60 million. And, even the really popular ones don't have the name recognition of Friends.


2. Underestimate the size of niches: Yeah, it's ugly and your husband may never have heard of it, but little homespun LiveJournal has 13 million members. And, that's just the creators.
   
   The one essential truth about the Web that makes it different from every medium you think you know is that it's cluster driven. You play with the sites your friends recommend. And, the destinations that are shorthand in your group are completely unknown two groups down the chain. There are very few universals (maybe weather.com, CNN, etc.). The way to reach people is in their niches.
   
   
3. Misjudge ubiquity of community behavior: That may be better stated this way: We misjudge what "old" is. YES, you can reach 35+ women with high incomes online. Of course you can. They're reading and talking and shopping just like you are. The fastest growing community site on the Web, Facebookers? It's CafeMoms.
   
   
4. Want to make it too easy or too hard: People want to interact. But, they don't all want to create and edit a video or make a mashup. There's a happy medium there where I do a little something and feel involved in your brand without doing your advertising for you...


5. Think advertising is enough: If your interactive planning is done out of the media department, you're probably coming up short. All those surveys you see that say that the Web has as much or more eyeshare as TV that leave you thinking - why don't I notice as much advertising online??? Because it cannot end with advertising. Online marketing has to include destinations, community involvement, outreach, content, etc... a banner just ain't gonna do it.

The ads we were raised to create

Brands of our childhoods.

Nostalgic.

Harkening simple memories of good times.

Or, at least uncomplicated times.

How glorious to sit in a workstart meeting, charged with boldly exploiting them to sell a completely unrelated product.

No, really. That sounds fantastic.

Like the Transformers.

The (cranky, snotty) boy my mom babysat growing up would hunker down in my dad's tan cordoroy La-Z-Boy at 3 every day to watch the warring robots. And, of course, we all watched, too ... biding time through the machines & GI Joe for whatever we were really waiting to watch.

Despite the luke-warm reviews, I'm still looking forward to the movie. And, although the too-obvious GM spots barely held me for the full 30-seconds, congratulations to the new Mountain Dew spot for hitting all the key tones for successfully playing a nostalgia brand:

• Fresh element added (not a direct lift from the story)
• Priveleged view (as with all great childhood stories, it's important that not everyone in the room can really see the magic going on)
• Unexpected environment (bring the icon into the brand's real audience / location / etc.)
• Playful (even if it was scary growing up, all kid brands should be fun looking back)
• Remembers the re-runners (even if you didn't see it the first time around, you still get it)

Now we know!

And knowing is half the battle.

Anyway, top five brands I cannot wait to have a movie made of ... a movie that I will parlay into advertisements for hams and 800-thread count sheet sets:

1. Smurfs. (Gargamel obviously needed softer sheets. And, Bigmouth could have been easily distracted by a nice ham)
2. Fraggle Rock. (Sing it with me ... down at Fraggle Rock)
3. Punky Brewster. (It could happen. Headbands are hot right now)
4. The Snorks. (I wonder if Al Gore will make them part of his movie ... in a post-Global Warming world, when we all live under water...)
5. Strawberry Shortcake. (It's only a matter of time until we're all trading scratch-n-sniff stickers again)