What are
/r/advertising's
favorite Products & Services?
From 3.5 billion Reddit comments
The most popular Products mentioned in /r/advertising:
The most popular Services mentioned in /r/advertising:
Mashable
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Vimeo
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The most popular reviews in /r/advertising:
That blows.
Here's my recommendation: Spin up some quick landing pages using modern software, like Shopify (for e-commerce), Instapage (for lead forms, coupon entry, etc.), Wyng.com (for promotions, quizzes, sweepstakes, etc.). You can get a lot done in a couple of days. Use Zapier.com if you need to connect things to your existing CRMs, systems from these sites - it's also easy for a non-dev to use.
Here's why:
1) You can control all aspects of these things in marketing, barely needing IT.
2) You can have less stress knowing you have at least something to drive traffic to.
3) Even if you're maybe going to have something formal ready for the date, building these out will teach you what you want and don't want from landing pages.
Oh boy! I have an enormous collection of them which I can't talk about to any of my friends or they'll think I have a serious problem. These are my favourites:
Books about creative advertising
Hegarty on Advertising - John hegarty Hey Whipple Squeeze This - Luke Sullivan How To Do Better Creative Work - Steve Henry The Advertising Concept Book - Pete Barry Advertising Today Creative Mischief - Dave Trott Predatory Thinking - Dave Trott A User's Guide to the Creative Mind - Dave Birss Ideas: a History from Fire to Freud - Peter Watson
Books about strategy
Positioning - Al Ries Spent - Geoffrey Miller Made to Stick The Wiki Man - Rory Sutherland The Tipping Point - Malcolm Gladwell Truth, Lies and Advertising - Jon steel Influence: the Psychology of Persuasion - Chris andreson Predictably irrational: the Hidden Forces that Shape our decisions
For me Dave Trott, a copywriter in the UK, speaks a lot of sense. He writes for Campaign and tells incredible stories. Most of which refers to his disdain for the advertising world as it is at the moment.
His books are also incredibly well written, filled with humour, precious nuggets of information, and killer insights. I recommend them to any young copywriter/creative trying to get into the game.
I am reading a book right now called "Managing Oneself" by Peter F. Drucker. It's super short (60 pages with huge margins and large font). I think it might be worth your while to read. In it he talks about people exactly in your situation. He would postulate that maybe you're much better in a sub-management position than a management position. He would also postulate that it's not so much about "advancing your career" as it is figuring out where you fit in and how/what you contribute. In other words, perhaps you took this current job because you felt like you needed to advance your career because that's what people do. But the advancement of a career does not necessarily correlate with happiness.
I hope I don't sound like I am telling you this is the way it is. That's not my intention. Your situation just reminded me of the book I am reading and thought it might provide some alternative perspective and insight for you.
Good luck!
Good Strategy/Bad Strategy - conceptual
Made to Stick - A little creative focused
Everything is Obvious - some good foundational stuff
Some behavioral economics and sociology/psychology books are good too... Thinking Fast and Slow, Nudge, Predictably Irrational (& other Dan Ariely books)
I'll have to respectfully disagree. This ad is based off of Spritz speed reading technology, which has made the front page of Reddit several times, is default setting on Huffington Post, as well as been featured in numerous publications. Someone saw the idea and linked it to Honda. I really think that it has a pretty wide appeal.
Whipple's the gold standard.
After that, I got a lot out of Mario Pricken's Creative Advertising. It just gave me a lot of great inspiration of how to think differently when looking at a problem. I actually carried this fairly sizable book around my first year in ad school referencing it during any concept session.
The Advertising Concept Book answered a lot of technical questions for me. There might be better resources these days, and really on the job training will clear things up real quick. But, this was helpful for me when I didn't know the difference between a headline and a tagline.
Stephen King's On Writing had a big impact on my writing and work ethic. His prolific body of work, attention to craft, and love of writing is inspiring.
He probably means it differently. Everyone views advertising differently.
NordVPN guy probably think about strategy, creative and brand people, why you mean PPC and hard sell, immediate return advertising focused on conversion rates and not the brand itself.
Seven Habits of Highly Effective People - Stephen Covey
Type and Layout - Colin Wheildon
The Elements of Style - Strunk and White
Purple Cow - Seth Godin
Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
Not mentioned: what strategy is compared to planning. Filling out a creative brief is not strategy.
"...rest assured that no one else is any the wiser..." Whilst this is often true (which is why I left the awesome world of marketing agencies), this is the most harmful attitude possible. Don't know what you're doing? FUCKING LEARN SOMETHING. I don't care if all you've read is The Art of War, but have some fucking background in strategy, what it is and how to make it more than just a PowerPoint deck designed to feed meaningless KPIs into your agency machine.
Strategy is the single most overused word in marketing and almost nobody really knows their stuff. I have met a phenomenal amount of people with strategy in their title who couldn't plan their way out of a paper bag.
Source: I am a strategist and I used to be an agency planning director.
- Truth, Lies, and Advertising – mandatory reading for planning.
- Hey Whipple, Squeeze This – best book on understanding the creative process. It’ll make your briefs 10x better, and let you concept better with the creative team.
- The Advertising Concept Book – this is focused towards art directors, but planners should read it too. You’ll be able to articulate and present work significantly better after reading, and also potentially give you the tools to help the creative team when they hit hurdles.
- The Idea Writers – this one is focused towards copywriting, but again has some great takeaways, stories, and approaches that you’ll use time and time again.
- The Art of Client Service – this is written for account managers, but everything in this book applies to planners as well – especially planners who are the lead on the account or who are pitching.
- Positioning – it’s kind of dry, but if you do any branding you should read it and know it.
- Made to Stick – good book around ideas, messaging, and consumer behavior.
- Small Data and Buyology – Martin is a smart guy, and a lot of his thinking comes through in these 2 books. Buyology is an interesting insight into consumer buying behavior, and Small Data is basically a love affair with ethnographies – but it’ll open your eyes to some things you may not realize. Read that one when you get a client that’s just a hard nut to crack and you aren’t sure where the insight will come from.
All of the above are very focused on advertising, consumer insights, and consumer behavior - and most speak from an agency or consultant perspective.
Once you get through that list, hit the classics (Ogilvy, Scientific Advertising, etc.) and hit the ones your clients are reading (the CMO-focused ones, the start-up focused ones, the ones about behavioral economics, the ones profiled on Fast Company, etc.).
A few of the best blogs to follow for digital advertising are Ad exchanger, digiday, mediapost, allthingsd, exchangewire, advertising age, ad week, venture beat, marketing week, campaign, etc.
I actually track a lot of news from digital advertising blogs for work, and since im aggregating it anyway I'm starting to put it into a daily paper.li post: http://paper.li/3Jon/1347465206
Sorry for the god awful formatting. Writing from my phone.
I read. Lots. Everything from books on advertising (Oglivy etc) and writing (can never be too familiar with The Elements of Style) to blogs and even fiction books (yes, in the office). It's all research. You can't be a great writer without reading, reading, reading.
Here is a link to Google's Visual assets guidelines.
It's a great reference for color use, product icons and typography. And will really help you nail the google look.
We used to have a client based in the States and always used this: https://join.me/. Works nicely and you can share your screen while speaking on the call etc?
Haven't used Skype in a while though.
For Design, get The Non-Designer's Design Book, 4th Edition by Robin Williams (not the deceased comedian, but the writer).
For Art Direction, you already know it. The only difference between a CW and an AD is how the idea comes out. As an exercise, take a headline and visual, and swap them so that the headline is the visual, and the visual turns into a headline. Try making ads with no headline at all. Etc.
Agreed, but this is especially egregious.
Claiming to help save refugee's lives with a non-functioning app isn't "scam print ad that ran once in a local paper". They're trying to use things like the death of this five-year-old to win a shiny piece of metal and further their careers.
While he did ask you to "rip apart" his portfolio, you offer most of your comments with no justification. Especially regarding the game concept and the portraits. Who cares if they are loose thoughts or not ads? They are part of the creative and who he is. What he is interested in and passionate about is far more important than spec work he has done.
Not only is this my own experience, but I can remember many Creative Directors saying they want to see personality in a portfolio. The most direct example I can give is an interview with Dave Bell, a creative director from KesselsKramer Outlet in London (I believe he is now the head of KK Los Angeles).
I've always wanted to do a sabbatical/creative journey. I've met quite a few who have. The most inspiring has been Heidi Hackamer (BBH NYC – lead planning for Google). She quit, bought herself a truck and traveled the nation in search of "The American Dream."
When you're back in Chicago, hit me up and let's grab coffee. I'd like to just chat about the experience.
For strategist roles specifically, I would reference the “Planner Survey” that Heather LeFevre started: https://www.slideshare.net/mobile/hklefevre/the-20152016-strategist-survey-report
It’s a couple years old, but still helpful. Also I believe Siftly is picking the survey up again this year.
If you’re still confused, shoot me a DM. I can help you out.
Source: I’m a senior strategist.
A lot of people say don't read Ogilvy on Advertising early in your career, because it can make you cynical about raw creativity.
Because of that, I read it only after I left the industry, and I read it for the first time last week. I wish I hadn't taken so long; it will teach you a different angle to Hey Whipple (one I think makes you a better creative).
Also recommend The War of Art by Steven Pressfield
Hey Whipple as everyone has stated is the go to.
I also got something out of:
D&ADs The Copy Book hard to find, but definitely worth picking up. Great examples of work and advice directly from the creatives who made it.
Mario Pricken's Creative Advertising, it's really just a book filled with good examples of work, and some brainstorming tips.
Pete Barry's Advertising Concept Book, it's pretty textbook but it's good for learning some of the vocabulary used in the industry.
Stephen King's On Writing, it's not about advertising but if you want to be a copywriter this should be required reading.
Tom Lennon & Robert Garant's Writing movies for ~~fun and~~ profit: how we made a billion at the box office and you can too again not advertising, but this is probably the closest account to being a hired writer that I've found. Great advice on taking notes, and responding to client feedback, and it'll give you an idea of how quickly a meeting can get derailed.
So you think you can write - although more focused on online writing Helped me a lot.
Thanks for the criticism. I really appreciate it! It's nice to hear it, and actually having it written down, rather than hearing it, because you really can't twist it round to your favour. I understand and actually agree with some of it. Redbull and Ben & Jerry's are kind of fillers (also RedBull was third in a competition, making it a hard choice to leave out) I know, I know, my mind has been corrupted by the fame and glory and awards and whatnot, but I think it could still maybe impress some people in the business? As for the Heineken one, it's for the beertender product, a beer tap for at home, maybe the product isn't available in your country? http://gizmodo.com/heineken-beertender/ But thanks a million again for taking the time to write this up and give a total stranger some feedback! I'll be sure to pass the favour. Today you, Tomorrow me!
This. Specifically this.
But, understand that just because they're a CD, doesn't mean that they can hire you. That's HR/Talent Management's role. A CD is an insider who can figure out where positions are open, but there still has to be an opening for anything to continue. As much as they like to, they can't just magically make up a position for you just because they like your work.
Sooo question - the media kit doesn't really talk about how you can reach their audience, I assume you have to talk to their sales people for that? Is the media kit then for you just the pitch of 'who we are' and 'why buy our inventory'?
link for the lazy http://mashable.com/assets/BrandKit.May.2014.pdf
Most people start by placing adsense ads on their site to get uses used to the idea of seeing ads on the site. Then you need to create some kind of media kit or page that explains to potential clients what they can buy. Mashable has a good example: http://mashable.com/advertise/
The elephant in the room is that you need to take a good hard look at your traffic stats. If you have say, less than 500 page views a day, you probably won't be able to pay yourself minimum wage.
Here's mine. I'm still working on translations/cleanup of some other pieces I have.
Edit, updated link
1-Via ComScore: Hulu ad metrics compared to other video sites
Know it's not directly related to the CPM, but may be useful in showing how it might be priced compared to other online advertising methods (much, much higher). Hope it helps.
I went for it ! Well it was actually a lot of fun ,I learned a lot about pitching a product.
I don't have a lot of hopes about winning or anything but the testing was conducted in one room for around 15 teams (out of like a 100) and were top three in that room .
They asked us to pitch about a health drink .
They gave us 30 mins we took around 45 .
We decided on a name and made a very basic logo on ps.
We made the Prezi and just went for it.The Judges said that we were great at the presentation(my part!)but needed to work on our ps with the bottle ,lol.(none of us knew ps that well ). Here is the link to the prezi :https://prezi.com/o585iyy4iqjf/styx/ What you see on the presentation is just a part of what we did , I elaborated the information a lot.Especially the comparison with"the perfect" product part.
PS:AED=Arab Emirate Dirhams. Zoom out a lot before you start to see the bottle.
Alex White advertising design and typography for tons of great visual campaign examples. As always, "Hey Whipple". "Made to Stick" is good if you want to see some case studies on "sticky" campaign ideas but it's not from a creative perspective.
Being an art director is not "making the ads look pretty." That's being a graphic designer. "Type, sizing logos, fonts, etc" are all designer's skills. For learning design in the shortest amount of time, get these two books: <em>The Mac Is Not a Typewriter</em> and <em>The Non-Designer's Design Book</em>. The Typewriter book in particular is, page-for-page, the most efficient primer on typography I've ever read.
If you're going to work in advertising, it's important you that know what your art director partner actually does. Yes, an AD has to know all the designer stuff as well, but an AD's job goes far beyond fonts and layouts.
On a conceptual level, an art director is the same as a copywriter, the difference is that he tends to communicate ideas without words.
On an executional level, an art director has a solid grasp of what it means to visually be "on brand," which is analogous to a copywriter writing with a brand "voice."
An art director also doubles as a film director. He has to know how to tell a story. Is there a 30-second spot with no copy? Guess who writes that part of the script. That's right, the AD.
The visual storytelling skill carries over into photography. A good shot isn't simply a posed composition. A good shot tells an entire story — a story that propels the conceptual idea. This goes beyond good lighting and knowing how cameras work, this is why the AD works with a photographer to get a shot, as the photographer is executional, akin to a graphic designer.
At some point in your career, a know-nothing will start to spout out about branding. Arm yourself in advance by reading The 60 Minute Brand Strategist, The Brand Bible by Debbie Millman and Designing Brand Identity. Cheers!
I just bought Hey Whipple Squeeze This as a parting gift for our intern, and The War of Art for myself.
I started working as a Junior Strategist about a month ago. It seems like everyone in my department came on a different path. I started in ad sales, another in media buying, another in media planning, etc. Many who work in strategy also suggest starting in account management at an agency and showing a strong interest in account planning.
If you're in a big city, I recommend joining professional ad organizations in the area and attending their networking events. I got my inspiration to make the switch after "winning" a meeting with a high level exec in strategy through one of the organizations I'm in.
What really helped me nail the interviews I had was reading up a TON on strategic planning: Eating the Big Fish, Truth, Lies, and Advertising, and Made to Stick are highly recommended.
Trying to win an AE position on a huge account. Submitted my CV, formal cover, website [GetToknowJohn.com] and this video: https://vimeo.com/92589765 Hopefully all this hard work pays off... this is a dream job. Let me know your thoughts Reddit ad-fam. Think it'll work? Any Critiques?
> Also /u/theirisnetwork I would love to see your portfolio - you seem to have a real breathe of knowledge and I admire your tenacity and blunt honesty. Obviously I'm not here to rip people off or 'look for inspiration' - I need to figure that all out for myself. But to associate you to your work would be great. I guess that ask applies to anyone who commented. Please don't read that as some passive way I can quietly, in my own time, tear down your own work to justify my own feelings - because it's not.
So then, if you don't mind me asking then, why do you need to see our portfolios? Because if you want to see professional work, there's always Behance and numerous other sources.
While I don't care about you judging my work (I'm way past that point, I'm happy and secure enough with my work and capabilities that if someone thinks my work sucks, good for them), I do find a red flag that you're asking this but not being transparent as to why it's needed. Not only for me, but every user here?
Is it because we need to be qualified to your version of quality standards before you take our critiques to heart? Is it because you want to see how our portfolios are, and continue to iterate them to be the perfect portfolio? (Because at least level with me here, why does your site look and feel the way it does? It honestly looks like you actually went on a bunch of agency and design shop sites and borrowed a lot of them elements).
To answer your next question, could you explain that again? My apologies, I didn't understand. And in addition, could you go further into the problem with spec work? A big trend I'm starting to see here is that you're not seeming as eloquent and flavorful with your language that you are on your site. Which is a relief, but what you're saying still has me lost a bit.
>Isn't student work can also be considered as spec work? I get you, but it's not really a problem since I got rid of all the works I did in school and created spec works (some for competitions) instead.
I think the way I think about it is that student work is a project, and spec work is something I view more as self-initiated.
So if someone is doing a spec work, that's a project where they choose to do this on their own, instead of being prompted by an outside entity. Like, this person on dribbble has a combination of spec work and their own personal work. So this wasn't necessarily made for profit or for a project.
While student work has a structure behind it and some backing. A student project probably has a brief, and has a professor making the framework for the project. There's also systems of critiques and constructive feedback which makes the project better.
>So I figured I really need an internship if I'm keen to pursuing a career there.
Oh yeah portfolio schools for international students is the go-to route if you have the time and funds to pursue it.
>I think I won't be considered as a recent international grad candidate but more of an international freelance AD, which I hope is a positive thing.
Just a sanity check here. If you're saying that you've only been out of school for a couple months, even if you have some work under your belt I'm still considering you a recent graduate. At best I'd take you on for a freelance Jr. Art Director role, but then we get into the bigger discussion that most places don't hire freelancers at Jr. levels because that's what interns are for (which we discussed you're smart enough to figure out already).
Throwing this out there because bear in mind where you stand and set some realistic expectations for what you can land.
Try looking through journal articles. There's a lot of academic research in the advertising field that could be useful. Most other studies are not scientific (unless they come from a reputable source like Forrester).
Here's a google search I entered: http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=advertising+effectiveness+using+multiple+media&btnG=&hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C31&as_ylo=2011
Give it a shot.
Hey, by using my referral coinbase, you earn 10 Dollars immediately after watching a 1 minute video. Then you can also refer friends and earn other 40 Dollar! https://coinbase.com/earn/xlm/invite/58dbytzm
I think that everyone would tell you that you shouldn't "start a business" if you're extremely poor, you should probably just try to get a stable job instead.
Starting a business is an incredibly risky business, and if you're trying to do an online D2C play (which is what it seems like given your post history), you need capital to do it. People aren't just going to magically find your website via osmosis. It take a big investment into something in order to do that, whether it's advertising, social media, SEO, PR, or whatever. Most ad campaigns will run at a loss at first while they get going because to be successful you need to collect data, understand what's working and what's not working, and give yourself a runway before you start being profitable. If it was as easy as dropping a dollar into an ad campaign, literally everyone would be doing it.
Here's what you can get out of your ad with that budget: nothing.
If you're dead set on doing this, I would completely abandon any kind of ad campaign that requires you to spend $1 a day and research SEO (search engine optimization) where the only cost is your time. Here's a start: https://moz.com/beginners-guide-to-seo.
I have Taschen's 50s and 60s ad books. Great conversation starters.
Economically, this makes sense, as many companies have dedicated a certain % of their revenue to ad spending, which in a number of cases manages to coincide to some degree with the overall GDP of the country.
However, this article doesn't take into account the advances in technology and the new types of advertising that companies are utilizing to put their message out there.
For two of the more well known examples, the OOH execution by British Airways that tracks flights that are going overhead and the UTEC billboard that creates water from condensation are some of the most amazing things I've seen in a long time.
The title of this article is assuredly misleading unless they were to put "economically as static and boring as they come".
Do you need a laptop? I get that they're sexy, but you can get a more powerful computer for less money if you don't pay for the "miniaturization" of a laptop. Not to mention a much larger and higher resolution screen.
I do think brands should focus on not acting or try to be like humans. But instead focus how to help people. Add value to what people are passionate about - that is aligned with the brand story. Have a look at someone who I think nails the issue: https://medium.com/@garethk/the-human-paradox-d4ef55a8de79
Thanx for feedback - also in regards to length.
Hi, I'm Franz and here's mine. It's blank for now because I'm still working on my strategist portfolio. BTW, I'm a social media manager so I'm creating my own strat plans as of the moments. Let me know what you think!
https://www.notion.so/franzranas/Portfolio-3f85ee4b1f61478595e73d3b419d5dc1
In my opinion, the best, easiest to follow resource for learning about SEO is MOZ, particularly here: https://moz.com/learn/seo
There are a ton of modules. It's one of he most reliable sources for SEO. Once you get all the basic stuff, go through their blog and whiteboard presentations. It's awesome.
As a CW you should care how your copy reads and looks. Your copy is currently really hard to read, which makes it look and read like shit. The tracking/kerning/leading is horrific and super easy to fix. Learn to care a bit more.
https://creativemarket.com/blog/whats-the-difference-between-leading-kerning-and-tracking
I took a look at the desktop and these are my findings. Hope you find them helpful: Just based on the price of the products, you really need to invest more into a far better color scheme and template. Invest in either time, money or knowledge.
- not enough colors, everything has the same priority. I took the green in the logo and add it Adobe Color Wheel And now you have 2 shades of green and 2 extra colors.
- When I open the website I see 4 instances of promo/discount: 2 on top, one header, and one small popup right-bottom corner. It's too much.
- I see a collection first, then a bag, then features. The collection is the biggest, featured is the smallest. Turn it around, featured bigger, collection smaller.
- Try this, squeeze your eyes and see if you can actually make up which design element stands out. (I don't think any because everything has priority which means nothing has priority)
- https://conversionxl.com/blog/universal-web-design-principles/
- get rid of zotabox, first have a solid, fast-loading, good looking website, then worry about leads and shares ;)
Don't get bogged down too much by the fact. I mean, it wouldn't hurt to get decent photographs, maybe even develop this skill for the future, but look on sites for photos you can use on https://pixabay.com/ and the like. Others will multiple sites for this purpose if you ask around.
If your ideas are strong enough, and your copywriter is decent, your aptitude will be communicated. Get working on those ideas, create great campaigns and make sure they work in all mediums.
You don't need to know how design, use canva.com, choose a niche that you like, make a FB page around it, create some ADs.
Do visit some companies Fb pages around you beloved niche, you will begin to see their sponsored ads on your timeline, you will then begin to see how others are formulating their ads....
Not sure, but this article might direct you towards the answer hopefully!
I would do as many tutorials on https://tutsplus.com/ as you can. This helped me more than anything. It allowed me to see what design elements worked with certain things and not with others. It also allows you to do things as you would like as opposed to a guide book with common headline placement, etc.
DrumUp - https://drumup.io/ easily one of the best tools I've used. It's a social media manager and content marketing app that mines web content in real time to recommend to your audience, reducing your Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter management time.
Suzanne is the director of talent development at the ICA. Have worked with her before, she'd be someone to reach out to.
LOL. I wrote a similar argument about 6 months ago inspired by an article I found in Variety that said that the musical industry just realized that editing albums didn't make sense anymore and that singles are the way to go because they are (guess what) lean, nimble and agile.
I seriously can't believe the advertising industry is just realizing people don't care about massive advertising efforts.
https://medium.com/ideas-de-mercadotecnia-y-negocios/4a6c2d549a7d
Get data to Excel tables and use www.powerbi.com online service to build and publish reports and dashboards. Reports can get refreshed daily when using the free version. My two day "Introduction to Power BI" course in India sees a lot of excited Excel users, and it's very easy to learn - https://powerbi.microsoft.com/en-us/guided-learning/ - even without a course.
Depending on how strategic you want to be, these slides from BBH NY are a great start. https://www.slideshare.net/juliancole/the-planners-template
In addition to what other people have said here, try to think of each slide as a point. What is the one point you're making with each slide? If you're making the same point in another slide (that's not a summary), ditch it. If you've got a garbled slide, split it out (but avoid death by PowerPoint).
They probably have to sell this idea internally, or at the very least quickly explain why it's a great idea. If they have to start introducing new concepts to colleagues, it's a harder sell. If they can say 'well, we're the guys who say/believe/do X, so this is X+Y'. Ground your idea in their language and concepts. Give them a simple one liner.
Some time ago we actually also was not so ready to utilize advantages of prioritizing tasks together with rescheduling algorithm and used Asana (https://asana.com/ ), which was a wonderful to start task management and collaboration tool. In a while we got tired of ever-growing to-do lists and ever-ending juggling urgent unplanned tasks and decided to implement something more complex for priority-based project planning and effective resource utilization - here we came to Comindware Project. I'd suggest to check both Asana and CP.
Check out Rick Webb’s book on starting and running an agency: https://www.amazon.com/Agency-Starting-Creative-Marketing-Advertising/dp/1137279869
It’s based on his experience w Barbarian Group, so perhaps a little bit out of date, but I think it can give you a better sense of the business and operational side.
I’m a planner too and read it for that reason. Even if you’ve been around a while it’s easy for planners to be ignorant of how agencies actually run their business.
It depends on the kind of agency or clients you want to work for, but personally i would emphasize the stuff you want to do more of.
When I started, my portfolio contained two pieces that stood out (was told the rest sucked). I had the most fun working on the one's that did make the cut anyway, so put in the writing that makes you tick. If that’s a long sales piece, go for it. It can also be some clever lines, a tv script, social ads, or a well thought-out description for an experiential campaign or product idea. Anything that shows you can bring your concept to life with words.
If you want to learn more about what (and what not) to include I recommend this book by copywriter William Burks Spencer: https://www.amazon.com/BREAKING-Advertising-Insiders-Reveal-Portfolio/dp/061541219X
He has interviewed 130 creative directors at top agencies to find out what they are looking for in a portfolio. Interesting read.
I'd recommend a B2B copywriting book called "The B2B Marketer's Journey." I wrote this in 2018 so the content is current. The first 5 chapters on on copywriting strategy, the last 5 chapters are on copywriting tactics
Here it is on Amazon.
The B2B Marketer's Journey: How to Generate More Leads with High-Performance B2B Copywriting
https://www.amazon.com/Freelance-Manifesto-Modern-Motion-Designer-ebook/dp/B071JRYMSG
This will be your best friend. Joey, who is a super awesome very friendly dude, goes over all the ways you can set up pricing.
TLDR version is it depends on the client. Day rates are most common in work for hire situations. Remote work is often hourly or lump some. The rate can vary depending on client type (direct, agency, studio) starting right out of school don't do anything for less than 400-500/day assuming you are in the US and that is generally for a 10 hour workday.
No problem! I totally know what you mean. I think there is a lot of value in showing you can tell a story in an extremely short (10-15 seconds) time frame. Every time I have to cut something down at work, after a few watches the 20 or 30 second version feels long. It's amazing, but the experienced people in my agency can always tell when it's just too long.
Also, if you haven't read The 30-Second Storyteller I highly recommend it. Some of the info is dated (a lot of info on editing on film) but there's some fantastic lessons in it!
From a creative perspective, these all helped me in different ways.
Hey Whipple Squeeze This - The must-read background on advertising.
Hoopla - Case Studies and behind the campaign thinking on the work that made CP+B a major player.
The Advertising Concept Book - how to make ads primer
The Houdini Solution - Kind of schlocky, but it's basically a big list of different ways to think when you're concepting which can be super helpful.
The Copy Book - Tips on writing from a ton of great writers and a collection of really good headlines.
The War of Art - psych up book on making art
On Writing - Great reminder from Steven King to put in the work not talk about the work.
Creativity Inc Organizational stuff that you'll find at great agencies and need to help create if you're not at a great agency.
Paul Arden's books are great when you need a pick me up
Inventing Desire - Kind of all over the place background of an agency at its height.
Made to Stick - I don't remember anything specific from this book, but it brought a bunch of different things together for me.
The Work: 25 Years of Fallon - Great collection of Fallon's best work.
The Idea Writers - Helpful look at concepting bigger than print ads
You dont really read about strategy to become a better strategist. Best to go for behavioural sciences / economics / evolutionary psychology
The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg is a good start
The simplest way to describe strategy to people (without going into day to day details) is just about making things effective and showing your work. That and pretending to be smarter than everyone else so they pay you for being smarter than everyone else.
Made to Stick and Perfect Pitch are two books about presentations/selling that I've found particularly helpful.
Learn basic Photoshop, InDesign, etc. so you can make minor tweaks and text changes without having to bother them. Get a college textbook on the basic principles of graphic design. Read design classics such as Thinking with Type.
Thanks for the feedback! this helps. I made the connection from this excerpt, 'Women make roughly 70% of household purchases, putting them in a great position to benefit from the strategy that once made Peter Lynch the best-known mutual fund manager on the planet. Lynch, who ran Fidelity Magellan (symbol FMAGX) from 1977 through 1990, said in his book One Up on Wall Street that investors’ best research tools are their own eyes and ears; he got many of his best investment ideas while walking around shopping malls and talking with his friends and family. In fact, Lynch wrote, his wife was responsible for turning him on to what turned out to be one of his best picks ever, Hanes Co., when she told him how much she liked L’eggs panty hose, which Hanes makes".
Thinking with Type was a book we used for our typography class. The website seems to have a majority (if not all) of the content from that book. The book is reasonably priced on amazon if you'd like to have a physical copy of it laying around.
Made to Stick - a book that attempts to analyze what makes ideas stick with people. May help you with writing.
There's a great blog, Makin Ads that you should follow and read through the archives. I actually recommend buying the guy's book, "The Best of Makin' Ads" that is a curated collection of some of the best posts from the blog, organized into sections based on different points in your career.
Hey Whipple as everyone else has said.
Just keep trying. Eventually some idea will click and you'll have momentum.
As far as dealing with rejection, allow me to get zen on you, motherfucker. Rejection is not something you need to deal with. Any idea you come up with could be called creative and has come out of the collective imagination. You are not your ideas. They exist outside of all of us. Speak to any creative person and they will tell you that at times their ideas seem to come from outside themselves. This is true all the time. Therefore because an idea is not yours and can come only from the collective imagination of the universe you can not identify yourself with it. Ideas, as everything else, are ephemeral. An idea may come and be quickly thrown aside; the way you deal with this is that the idea was never yours and there will always be more.
Try reading Steven Pressfield's The War of Art
Getting to Yes. It's a book about negotiation, and it's seriously changed the way I handle myself in every work occasion involving other people.
you're right, a single ad doesn't have that much power. but there's a collective power to advertising. to quote from another one of your posts and respond:
>Society has a lot of negative things to say about the aging process, so women want foundation anyway.
well, ads reiterate a lot of the negative things that society says about women's bodies to sell stuff. advertisers are savvy, working from briefs, and if they think that fear or insecurity will be the best way to push product, they'll go with it.
and like, this isn't about "blame" per se, I'm not implying that anybody is being brainwashed to buy stuff, and I'm not emphatic about nefarious businessmen scheming to manipulate people.
this is some "banality of evil" stuff, where honest, well-meaning people are working in a system that does some horrible stuff. there's the lie that cigarettes are healthy. and then there's the white lie that anybody needs a prescription drug to thicken eyelashes. and I think it can be helpful, as an advertiser, to recognize this stuff without beating yourself up too much about it. just try another perspective.
and finally, re: "taking responsibility for choices" -- check out Ariely's Predictably Irrational and Wansink's Mindless Eating perceptions of "value" and portion size has a direct impact on the choices that consumers make. it really does go both ways.
Here are 2 that I found to be really inspiring.
Grouped by Paul Adams
Running Lean by Ash Maurya
The Art of War by Sun Tsui - it's not directly advertising related, but he was one of best strategic minds and the book has a lot of very helpful information which can be applied to your own way of thinking.
Wow, thank you for the thoughtful and amazing answer! :)
I've definitely thought about focusing on tech savy people, especially by tackling online mediums like facebook and youtube.
I'm developed a wide range of apps because I'm not quite sure where the market is going yet, but right now I'm mainly focusing on children's game, mostly educational. I'd like to advertise more towards the educational tech center if possible for certain apps, but I'm also working on ones that aren't centered around that. For example, I've currently published a spoken word game, Ghost, which is more like a puzzle game, and a Marco Polo game that is clearly focused towards kids. I also have some fun math games that teach addition/subtraction and things like modulus (more for computer science).
I really like the social media with video idea you suggested, I think that's what I'll look towards more! I also think the SEM is going to be important like you said, since it seems like a new market that isn't flooded yet, so the keywords could be big.
As I've linked, two of my apps are on the marketplace, and I'm hoping to have another 3-5 out in the next week. I don't have a brand website yet, do you think that would be the next marketing step? I thought maybe organically growing subscribers to a youtube channel might be a good way to then decide how I should brand an official website. But I'm not sure if it's better to just make one now, or wait to see how people react?
Made to Stick and Perfect Pitch are two books about presentations/selling that I've found particularly helpful.
> Most of Coke's sales are from one target. And this target is people who prefer drinking cola.
Actually they don't.
Most of Coke's sales come from people who might buy one or two cans of coke a year. Do they "prefer drinking cola"? Probably not. They prefer drinking lots of different types of drinks.
>Few of Coke's sales are from people who like drinking fruit-flavored citrus soda.
The vast majority of Coke's sales will come from people who also like drinking fruit flavoured citrus soda.
>Schweppes is also Coca-Cola. Yet another brand, specifically tuned for another target for people who would never touch cola or citrus drinks.
I'm afraid this is also completely wrong. The vast majority of Schweppes drinkers will happily touch cola and citrus drinks.
>Just curious — where are you getting your data about broad targets from?
https://www.amazon.com/How-Brands-Grow-What-Marketers/dp/1511383933
This is a great book.
https://www.amazon.com/Marketing-Era-Accountability-Binet/dp/1841161985
This is similarly good.
There are other studies but these sum them up the best.
Category after category, product after product, campaign after campaign. The campaigns that have been most commercially successful are the ones that try to grow market share and penetration by targeting very large groups of people.
Twenty Ads that Shook the World by James B. Twitchell. I'm reading it for my advertising class, and it's really great! It goes through twenty advertisements that changed the game, and the creatives/agencies behind them.
https://www.amazon.ca/Twenty-That-Shook-World-Groundbreaking/dp/0609807234
u/LetsGetNice makes a lot of great points. We're all encouraged to go see someone, but rarely do those same advocates explain how lengthy the process can be.
Luckily I had a therapist that set my expectations from day one. She told me it would take months or even a year of self care and discipline to make real change. You need to buy in to the process and let it happen. Don't be afraid of the long haul.
I'd also recommend grabbing "The Depression Cure" from amazon as as a starting point down the road to wellness (my therapist had me read this and discuss the book point by point with my wife).
https://www.amazon.com/Depression-Cure-6-Step-Program-without/dp/0738213888
This book helps teach you about a holistic approach to wellness, that goes beyond therapy.
Good luck and you can always PM if you have questions.
This book isn't powerpoint-specific, but depending on where you're starting from, a few fundamentals could make a world of difference in visual presentations.
While not free, I will say that there are these two relatively cheap books which offer a good start on copywriting and creative advertising.
David Ogilvy on Advertising is a good primer for what the industry is and how to understand the creative process and how that's married to business/marketing.
Hey Whipple, Squeeze This is a great book for anyone who wants to be a creative. Specifically, it does a high level breakdown of the history of advertising, followed by what your day to day work will be like if you work at an agency. So you'll learning how to do things like radio and TV scripts, and how to concept for websites and other deliverables.
It's available on the Indian Amazon for around 13 pounds. If you got a friend or someone there, they can ship it to you. Shipping shouldn't be more than 5 pounds. 10 tops.
Edit: It might take a while to get to you though.
Your pitchee will not want to waste time. Be organized and ready to answer these questions quickly and concisely:
1) What do you want me to do/decide?
2) What will I / my company gain from this decision.
3) How does it work in its most simple form (high level)
4) What will it cost
5) What is your timeline
See What I mean is a good book for this: https://www.amazon.ca/See-What-Mean-Kevin-Cheng/dp/1933820276
check out http://www.amazon.com/The-Art-Pitch-Persuasion-Presentation/dp/0230120512 - i've gone through his training. unique guy and has lots of stories about being the small agency suddenly pitching (and winning) the big brands.
read this book, about Helmut Krone, one of the greatest art directors of all time.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Helmut-Krone-The-Book-Advertisings/dp/0954893107
And this book
CP+P used to really pump me up, this book had a big part in that.
I also really dig W&K and Droga5. There are more, but those are the only ones I can think of at a moment's notice.
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