my own ad school

After catching the advertising bug, it’s given me this mad obsession about learning anything and everything I can about advertising. And one of the things I was dying to know: how can I make a living working in advertising? (aka what are some of the job titles one can have working in the advertising industry?)

mybigfuture lists 6 different positions where you can read each one and see if any fits your skills and personality. The information here is great because it tells you what you would be doing in that position and which characteristics would be ideal for the job. The only thing is that the six they’ve listed there aren’t as specific. For example, under “Creative”, it won’t describe what it’s like being an Art Director or a Copywriter.

For a better description on specific disciplines such as Account Planning, Art Direction and Copywriting, websites of portfolio schools can help you out with that. Here’s summary of what I gathered from a few of the p-schools I checked out:

Art Direction

• For those who are “intrigued by colors , typography and technology” and who work with a visual mind. (VCU Adcenter)
• You’ll come up with a visual image for various types of media (posters, billboards, commercials, etc.) to persuade consumers to buy a product or service. (Miami Ad School)
• You’ll “oversee every detail that timpacts the visual presentation of your work – from photography and illustration to typograph, production, and talent.” (Portfolio Center)

Copywriting

• You’re a “wizard of wit” and a “book-reading, story-making, note-passing, joke-telling, encyclopedia of useless trivia and crazy ideas” (Miami Ad School)
• Copywriters are great writers that can “communicate marketing ideas effectively” (Portfolio Center)
• “You use words like artists use pictures … You think big and have the ability to take that big thought and make it simple” (VCU Adcenter)

Account Planning

• You’re the type that relies on your intuition and you’re a great people person. Gut feelings are important with this job and you have to “instinctively ‘know things’”. You also help the creative team in coming up with that big idea of persuading the customers to buy that one brand over the rest of them. (Miami Ad School)

For a brief moment, I was on the fence between art direction and copywriting. Writing has always been a passion of mine, but I’m also intrigued with colours and typography. But after giving it some thought, I asked myself which I’d enjoy doing more of, and my answer was writing. Writing has both been my escape and my solution to almost everything in my life and I can’t picture myself pursuing a career without it. (Hmmm, that kinda sounded a little cheesy…)

Ok, here’s my final answer on why I’d choose copywriting over art direction: the writing is what I almost-always pay more attention to when I see an ad, watch a tv commercial, or listen to the radio. If it had great writing, I’d always go “Man, I wish I thought of that!” or “Whoever came up with that is a genius!” and so on, and so on. Yea, the art direction grabs my attention too, but I’ve always had this habit of paying more attention to the words of an ad.

Now that I’ve found which shoe fits, I hope that this entry can somewhat help you find/choose a shoe. And for those of you who are already in the industry, feel free to let me know how you made the decision of which career in advertising you chose to get into.

This entry was posted on Monday, April 23rd, 2007 at 2:45 pm and is filed under Advertising, Tips. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.