Advertising and Public Relations (Ferguson Career Launcher)

Career Launcher

Advertising and

Public Relations

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Career Launcher series

Advertising and Public Relations

Computers and Programming

Education

Energy

Fashion

Film

Finance

Food Services

Health Care Management

Health Care Providers

Hospitality

Internet

Law

Law Enforcement and Public Safety

Manufacturing

Nonprofi t Organizations

Performing Arts

Professional Sports Organizations

Real Estate

Recording Industry

Television

Video Games

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Career Launcher

Advertising and

Public Relations

Stan Tymorek

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Career Launcher: Advertising and Public Relations

Copyright © 2010 by Infobase Publishing, Inc.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in

any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying,

recording, or by any information storage or retrieval systems, without

permission in writing from the publisher. For information contact:

Ferguson

An imprint of Infobase Publishing

132 West 31st Street

New York NY 10001

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Tymorek, Stan.

Advertising and public relations / by Stan Tymorek.

p. cm. — (Career launcher)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN-13: 978-0-8160-7961-2 (hardcover : alk. paper)

ISBN-10: 0-8160-7961-7 (hardcover : alk. paper)

ISBN: 978-1-4381-3204-4 (e-book)

1. Advertising—Vocationa l guidance. 2. Public relations—Vocational

guidance. I. Title.

HF5828.4.T96 2009

659.023—dc22

2009024196

Ferguson books are available at special discounts when purchased in bulk

quantities for businesses, associations, institutions, or sales promotions.

Please call our Special Sales Department in New York at (212) 967-8800 or

(800) 322-8755.

You can find Ferguson on the World Wide Web at http://www.fergpubco.com

Produced by Print Matters, Inc.

Text design by A Good Thing, Inc.

Cover design by Takeshi Takahashi

Cover printed by Art Print Company, Taylor, PA

Book printed and bound by Maple Press, York, PA

Date printed: May 2010

Printed in the United States of America

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

This book is printed on acid-free paper.

v

Foreword / vii

Acknowledgments / xi

Introduction / xiii

1

Industry History / 1

2

State of the Industry / 28

3

On the Job / 57

4

Tips for Success / 85

5

Talk Like a Pro / 109

6

Resources / 134

Index / 151

Contents

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vii

Why does advertising matter? Advertising matters for any number of

reasons. For one thing, it helps keep our economy moving forward

by fueling consumption. This “fueling of consumption” is also what

makes advertising controversial, too. Many believe that advertising

causes us to buy more “stuff” than we need. That may be true, but I

tend to believe we’d buy a lot of that stuff anyway—what advertis￾ing does is point us toward certain brands and types of products.

We were probably going to buy a car whether we saw advertising or

not (what’s the alternative, hitchhiking?). But the ads infl uence our

choice of one car over another.

They help us make sense of all the consumer choices before us—

and not necessarily in a purely logical way. Ads can help to create an

emotional, slightly irrational bond with a brand. The ad—its tone, its

style, its subtext—signals to us, “this is the brand for me.” This is not

such a bad thing, because it brings some clarity to what would oth￾erwise be a chaotic experience of trying to decide among so many

similar products and choices. Without advertising, we’d probably

have to fl ip a coin to decide what to spend that coin on.

Advertising also matters because it’s a mirror of the culture in

which we live. In fact, Marshall McLuhan once described advertise￾ments as “the richest and most faithful daily refl ections that any

society ever made of its entire range of activities.” This means we

can learn a lot about ourselves by studying advertising. Advertis￾ing is often accused of telling us what to think, manipulating atti￾tudes and behavior—which it sometimes does. But more often, it

tries to refl ect and reinforce attitudes and behavioral trends that

have already begun to take hold in the culture. During boom years,

ads tend to show us living the high life; during recessionary times,

the ads become more sober and serious. If historians doing research

on any particular time period wish to know what people at that

time were doing—what they were dreaming, lusting after, worrying

about, arguing over—those historians could learn an awful lot just

by studying the ads of that period.

For those getting into the business now, it is a very different ad

world than it was 10 years ago. Back then, the Internet was still new

and most ad creators only needed to know how to do two things—

make a TV commercial or create a print ad. (Okay, once in a while

Foreword

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viii Foreword

they might get stuck doing a radio ad or a billboard too). Today,

ad creators must be versatile enough to work in countless media

formats—everything from the short Web fi lm to guerrilla advertis￾ing that might take the form of something stenciled on the side￾walk. This can be seen as both scary and exhilarating; scary because

there’s so much to be learned every day, and exhilarating for the

same reason.

One thing is certain: There has never been a better time to be

young in advertising. In a way, young people rule advertising now to

an extent they never have before. The business is being completely

reinvented with an emphasis on new media and fresh approaches.

If you’re new to the ad business, this is good news for you. Change

is your friend, while it is the enemy of old, grizzled veterans. You’re

not weighed down by the old conventions; you’re freer to experi￾ment and make up the rules as you go. That said, you should prob￾ably make sure you have a very good understanding and knowledge

of the old rules before setting out to break them.

Even as everything in the business seems to be changing, there

are certain constants. The value of a good story has not dimin￾ished. The ability to tell a story well—whether it is humorous or

heartbreaking—is still what separates the heroes from the hacks. A

few other things that will never go out of style: Empathy. Original￾ity. And maybe most important, resiliency. Advertising is a busi￾ness where ideas get killed every day. Some of those will be your

ideas. You will love them and swear they are brilliant. They will get

killed anyway, sometimes with good reason and sometimes not. It

doesn’t matter—all that matters is that you sit down and come up

with another idea that is even better. The people who can do that

tend to do well in advertising.

Here’s another tip: Don’t spend too much time trying to emu￾late or imitate other people’s award-winning ads. What will tend

to make you stand out as an ad person is your unique view of the

world, your own slightly skewed perspective. Great ad people do an

interesting balancing act: They always tell the story of a brand, but

at the same time they’re somehow telling a little bit of their own

stories as people, too.

Don’t be afraid of making ads that are too weird or idiosyncratic.

Those are the best kinds of ads, because they reveal the quirkiness

of the individual. I refer to strange ads as “oddvertising.” And it’s the

kind of advertising I most enjoy watching, because you never know

what’s going to happen next.

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Foreword ix

The world is at a place now where we have to do a lot of reinvent￾ing and rebuilding; we need to clean up a lot of the messes that have

been created in recent years. I believe advertising can be part of the

rebuilding process (just as it was part of creating the mess). It can

spread optimistic messages. It can tell inspiring stories that are going

on all around us. It can rally public support behind worthy efforts

and programs and innovations. But it can only do this if the ads are

created with a sense of honesty, authenticity, and imagination. We

don’t need more propaganda; we don’t need a lot of empty, insin￾cere hype. We need people who can communicate the dreams and

aspirations of entrepreneurs, of product designers, of the people who

make and build. At its best, this is what advertising does—it tells us

the story behind a company or a brand or a group of people who

make things. It puts a human face on commerce.

—Warren Berger

JOURNALIST AND AUTHOR

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xi

The author wishes to thank: At Print Matters, Richard Rothschild for

the assignment and David Andrews for his encouragement, astute

editing, and suggestions; Warren Berger for his Foreword’s refresh￾ing perspective on the industry; and Barry Biederman, Jon Steel,

and Penelope Trunk for their insightful answers to my interview

questions.

Since the advertising and public relations industries are being

transformed by the Internet, it makes sense that two online resources

were especially useful: the Web site http://www.ihaveanidea.com,

and Penelope Trunk’s Brazen Careerist blog (http://blog.penelo￾petrunk.com). Trunk’s advice for people in any industry, at any

stage of their careers is both practical and inspiring.

As always, Jan Tymorek was an essential, creative partner.

Acknowledgments

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xiii

One thing you probably already know about advertising is that it

makes the most of imagination. In the world of advertising raisins

dance, babies talk about their investment strategy, and dough springs

to life. So it seems appropriate to begin a book about advertising and

public relations with a little fantasy.

Let’s say you’re an art director with a few years in the business

who has just started working at a new agency job. One day in the

break room you sit down next to two account planners who are dis￾cussing Jon Steel, who in 1996 wrote one of the seminal books on

getting customers’ input while creating ads. “I wonder what Steel

would think of planners reading blogs to get customer opinions,”

one planner says to the other. “Oh, I read an interview with him and

he cautioned that blogs are no substitute for talking directly with

customers,” you say. “But speaking of blogs, I also read that a career

advisor says they’re essential for professional growth.”

The situation may be fi ctitious, but the opinions the art director

referred to can be found right here in Career Launcher: Advertising and

Public Relations. This concise book will provide you with in-depth,

insider information about the industries that could have taken you

years to acquire on your own. You’ll appreciate that convenience,

because one thing you’ll fi nd out about the fast-paced ad world is

you have very little spare time.

The following are some of the main areas that this book addresses,

introduced with one of advertising’s favorite devices: the headline.

Like a Good Ad Campaign, This Book Has Goals

Your clients want to know what kind of results they will get from

your agency’s work. You should expect the same from this book, so

here are its intentions.

You’ll learn enough about the history of advertising and public

relations to understand how today’s practices came to be; become

familiar with the classic campaigns and achievements in both indus￾tries that are worth emulating (and imitating); get to know the leg￾endary leaders from the past and why they are revered (and to be

able to chime in at lunch when some veteran starts quoting one

of the greats); see the “big picture” of your industry to understand

Introduction

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xiv Introduction

where you fi t in now and where you’d like to go; appreciate the jobs

of colleagues in other departments and know whom to turn to with

specifi c questions; make signifi cant contributions to your company

and plan your career strategically; learn the lingo of your profession

(so staffers in different disciplines can talk to each other); and fi nd

other good sources of information (with books, remember to check

out their goals).

That’s what this book sets out to do. Ultimately, how well it does

its job will be determined by how much it helps you do yours.

Find Facts Fast!

This book is designed to make the information bite-sized and easy to

fi nd. Of course you can read it linearly from cover to cover (as you

did in college, at least with the short books), but you can also scan

the text and go directly to the sections you’re interested in (that

should make many art directors happy).

Probably the best approach is to go through the whole book so

you know all the topics that are covered. Then when you have a

question about a certain aspect of the business, you can go right to

the relevant section.

You’ll also fi nd a good number of boxed features sprinkled

throughout the book. They let you spot fast facts, best practices, and

other key information at a glance.

Most importantly, this book offers you practical information and

advice. So the best way to use it is to apply what you learn to your

job.

Advertising and Public Relations: Same Family,

Unique Functions

Both advertising and public relations make up one book because

they have a lot in common. Even the Bureau of Labor Statistics’

offi cial classifi cation of industries puts both of them in the same

category. And as you may discover in your career, some people in

other professions don’t know there is a difference between the two

industries.

Obviously there are many differences between selling with paid￾for advertising and the “softer” promoting of goods and services that

is PR’s specialty. As you’ll learn in the “Industry History” chapter,

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