Advertising Internships

Advertising Internship - Experience Insights From Ad Execs

This is another killer Q&A from the American Education Foundation: http://www.aef.com/industry/careers/career_advice/1416
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Career Advice from the Pros

What kinds of experience do you look for from college graduates? What would give us the edge?

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	Angel Rivera: An internship, some kind of experience, maybe like travel, if you've got an opportunity to travel to a foreign country. I would look for language skills, if you have a second language, if you have a third language, that's even better. I would look for key words. In fact, we were talking about scanning resumes and us sourcing candidates through these scanned resumes. How this works is the database is created and we look for key words. So, in other words, if I get a call from Foote, Cone & Belding, "we want somebody who has experience working with a beverage company." I would look for the word beverage on people's resumes and the computer would search for that keyword. I could search for other skills, like searching for resumes of candidates who speak Spanish. All the resumes that have those keywords would then be forwarded to the hiring managers. So, you want to look for and you want to prepare and know what those key terms are. Brand is a key term. You can read up on these things through Ad Age or Adweek, weekly magazines, and you'll see the words and the new terms and the new paradigm. Those things, all should be part of your cover letter and your resume, and you have to sort of think ahead. What is it that people are looking for and how can I get this on my resume?
	Patty Enright: I think the other thing that certainly I always look for is anything that's going to set you above or apart from someone else. Again, to the point that he made earlier, we do get lots of resumes, and we sit down and certainly I look at all of them. But we're looking at you today for the first job opportunity but what we're really looking to do is say, does this individual fit into my organization culturally and do we see -- hopefully we see all of you well beyond that first job. So, anything that can demonstrate a team, sports, leadership, because we don't work alone in this business. We work in teams. We're in a very collaborative environment. So, anything that can demonstrate your association with your university or schools, any sort of participative, competitive sports, debate, any type of cultural experiences which are going to have a broadening experience. My favorite resume is always, I scooped ice cream on Martha's Vineyard for the summer but I was responsible for the cash register. You talk to them and they did it for a week, and then the rest of the time they spent on the beach. Okay, fine. Yes, you had a summer job. But where are you really demonstrating responsibility, authority, did you have to go to work everyday at a certain time? They sound very basic but at the same time you'd be surprised. So, anything that's going to demonstrate your ability to be part of something and committed to something, whether it's a sorority or a fraternity. Maybe you were the secretary for your sorority or fraternity or whatever. Anything that's going to help you, certainly any job experience that you have had, volunteer activities. Were you a big brother, were you a big sister? Did you work as a candy striper in a hospital. Anything that's going to show commitment and sort of stick-to-it-iveness, and also rounding in terms of your experience. All school and no play, you know.
	Rene Bruce: Yeah, just to follow up on that. Don't be afraid to show your individuality. I think this is one industry -- I love working in this industry because I meet so many interesting people with various backgrounds and all these outside interests. So, we're not looking for people who are just tunnel vision, job related. But if you put it on your resume, be ready to talk about it.
	Steve Norcia: See, one of the other things that you can also do is you can read The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, as my class does every week, every day, and also read Ad Age and Adweek, and if you can't read them because you don't want to buy the newspapers, get on the web and get on there. One of my students emailed me and said, what do you mean by business-to-business? Well, go to the Ad Age web site, go to business-to-business, 100 leading business-to-business advertisers, and Microsoft at the top of the list. By the time you get finished with the list, you'll know what business-to-business means. There's a tremendous amount of due diligence and unraveling that you have to do on your own. This is not an easy business, and one of the reasons why the pay may not sound like what the Wharton guys are getting is because primarily that's the entry level. And if you prove your worth, your pay will go very, very quickly, probably quicker than any other business that you'll ever imagine. But the issue is you have to have some talent, and you have to have talent and perspiration. The key I think here is if you're thinking about how to write a resume or how to write a letter to an agency and how to get their attention, is just think about a wheat field out in Ohio somewhere. And think about every stalk, and figure out why one stalk is going to stick out from all the others. That's the way you kind of get an agency's attention. With some bit of thinking or some bit of experience or some bit of integrity or whatever it is, but you've got to communicate that you're a communicator. You've got to read books. You've got to go see movies. You've got to understand commercials. You have to listen to what the beat of the industry is telling you and you have to get it. If you don't get it, they'll figure it out in about a minute and a half. But if you get it, they'll also figure it out and they'll send a car for you.
	Rene Bruce: Please, this sounds really basic, but if you get to the interview point, be able to talk about ads. I always ask the question, tell me about some ads that you think are effective, and I'm constantly amazed at how many people can't talk about it. If you want a job in advertising, you need to be thinking about it.
	Anne Melanson: Let me throw out something, which might seem a little bit at odds with what we're talking about here, at the risk of sounding a little less Pollyannish, it isn't about just asking questions. That can make you stand out, but you've got to have the goods, too. You do need to know, there are a lot of people who are applying for jobs. We probably get 30 resumes for every job that we have, across all the disciplines. So, while it is a terrific market for people these days, particularly grads coming out, it is still a very competitive market. So, I think you do need to understand that there's a lot of competition. The people that you're competing against are people who, as Rene said, know, they've done their homework. They have a point of view. I have a particular interest in finding out what people's point of view is, not what they read in the trades. I want to know what they think about advertising. I want to know what they like about it, what they don't like about it? What's their beef about ads? What's their point of view on First Amendment rights. Somebody may think, well, what does that have to do with advertising? It has a lot to do with advertising. There are a lot of things. I was delighted to hear you say The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times, because I think people aren't reading enough of the general interest newspapers and publications. Because in advertising, we used to say we want renaissance people, which is a little clichéd, but you really do because the most successful advertising people are the ones who know about the world around them. It isn't just by reading the trade journals or by staying just in the marketing arena. If you really have a sense of what's going on in the world, you're going to be successful in advertising. Think about the internet entrepreneurs, they didn't get to where they are by just reading technical journals. They had the technical expertise but they also saw what was happening in the world and the need for a different kind of communication. Once having seen these things, they had the vision to say, this can work. Steve Case said, I'll bet I can connect all of these people in the world through an internet connection and keep it simple and people will come flocking, and they'll even pay money every month to do it. And, bang.

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Advertising Internship Creative Advice From Pros

Another great article from the American Education Foundation: http://www.aef.com/industry/careers/career_advice/1415

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Career Advice from the Pros

Are these qualities also the ones you look for in entry-level creatives?

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	Anne Melanson: Creative in the agency business is generally the copywriter and the art director. They generally work as a team, one doing the copy, what you would see as copy, and one doing the graphic or the visual. I think the best teams work together, probably know each other so well, that they're sort of interchangeable in that sense. A good copywriter will have a good sense of a visual, of what he or she wants to see, and a good art director will have the same sense of copy. So, that's just so we all understand what we're talking about. That's the basic definition. There are other jobs in creative, but they really all support the copywriter and the art director.
	Patty Enright: I think in terms of someone like yourself, sitting out there saying, "do I want to be an art director or copywriter or even go into an agency to apply for that kind of job", you have to be thinking about it really today. You can't graduate in June and then say, I think I'm going to go talk to one of the agencies represented as an art director candidate or a copywriter candidate. You have to come prepared typically with what we call a portfolio, which would include samples of your work. You could be sitting saying, but I haven't had a job yet, what kind of work would you be interesting in seeing? Typically a copywriter, for example, will have maybe worked for their school newspaper, published an article, written something, been in creative writing classes where some of their sample projects could be considered portfolio items. Same thing on the art side. Possibly even a class, an advertising class, where you had executed a campaign. It's really to show where you're level of creativity is coming from. In some cases basic skills but for a very junior person, you have to really be thinking about that a little early on and prepare yourself to go in with sort of "this is what I can do for you" kinds of work samples.
	Rene Bruce: That's the way our agency is. We have a creative manager, who hires all our creatives, and he really doesn't even look at people without a book. So, you need to get some work together, even if it means taking additional courses at another school where you can really get that experience. But that's the way we work. I think entry level positions in creative are pretty difficult, at least at Saatchi they're hard to come by.
	Anne Melanson: One of the things that you can do is do a speculative portfolio, too. Take an idea that you've had for a product or a service and put together what you would think would be a good ad. Let's say a print ad is usually easier to demonstrate. I guess I would make a couple of points about trying to get a job in the creative area. It is as you said, there are fewer jobs in creative. I think we all hope that that will change and that there will be more jobs. But right now entry level jobs are significantly fewer than in account management or media. Also, keep in mind that you will meet different people. If you bring your book in, you've put your book together, as Patty said, you bring it in to see somebody and you may get a point of view from that person that totally throws you and says, well, everything I've done is terrible. You have to keep heart and you have to plough ahead, because you'll meet other people, and other people will have a different point of view. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is the nature of creative. That's why agencies are different. That's why each of our agencies is very, very different in the way they look at creative and the way they look at clients and in the way they actually do creative. So, my words to you would be don't be discouraged because one person that you see says the book is terrible, a bunch of crap, go back and do it again.
	Patty Enright: That same person just got hired at my agency! It's true. It's absolutely true. The other thing you can do also, if you're particularly interested in creative, is go to a local restaurant, go to a local retailer in your neighborhood around school, and ask them. Ask them if they do any advertisements, if they do local newspaper advertisements, even your school paper. Look to do something around whatever the message is. Those are things that you can collect for your book and keep, and of course as you get more experience, and let's assume that you guys are juniors, get an internship if you can, even if it means being in place, in a creative department, to see what goes on. That's an enormous, enormous opportunity, not because you should be ever so ingratiated to carry boards or whatever, but to be around that sort of stimulus, to see what's going on, to see what's good and what's not, to be around the individuals when they're talking about what makes a good ad or what doesn't make an ad, or to simply hang around in a new business pitch, where you can see all kinds of thinking that goes into what ultimately makes the client presentation. That's all fantastic learning, particularly as it relates -- I mean, for any area -- but particularly creative. Because you'll know better what kinds of things to start in your portfolio and probably develop a little bit of a confidence about bringing your book in and, as Anne said, I think, taking the advice that you get and trying to learn from it.
	Anne Melanson: …you should be able to answer questions, because you are going to be getting questions from people that you talk to like, "That looks great but what does it say?" "Why did you do it?" "Why is it targeted to this audience? It wouldn't seem to work there." So, you need to be prepared to really answer those hard questions, not just think it's a great idea because I paid attention to it, and that's generally the mistake that I see. That's something that's easily corrected. Here I think is where you can get some guidance. If, as Patty said, when you're developing that book even now, if you could talk to some people in agencies as you're going along and get their point of view, get their words of advice and they can help guide you in this process, I think that would be very helpful.
	Angel Rivera: The two areas where you might be able to have some immediate impact as a young person out of school would be, I would say, in the direct advertising area and in internet marketing, and ways in which you can prepare yourself for that is maybe even building your own web site or helping others build their web site and using that as your portfolio. Of course, internships are another opportunity. So, I would say even banner ads, somehow getting involved in that through school. Going to Fordham, if you're a Fordham student, go the Fordham site and say, do you guys have a web site? If not, can I help you build one? Or can I help you with this kind of thing. That way you build up some of your skills and you have some experience. The direct and internet are two areas where a young person can come in and have immediate impact.

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Advertising Internship Career Advice

Very cool article put together by American Education Foundation: http://www.aef.com/industry/careers/career_advice/1414

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Career Advice from the Pros

What skill sets/experiences do you look for when hiring an entry-level employee?

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	Anne Melanson: I think, Steve, it might be helpful, and I don't know if you've covered this, but we were talking earlier in a conference call and I think it's important to know what kinds of jobs we're talking about, so maybe it'd be helpful if we qualified that. I think all of our agencies are involved in what we call total communications, which now includes internet and interactive agencies. So, when we talk about jobs in the business, we are talking about jobs in the advertising business or what you would traditionally call the advertising business, the direct response area, the sales promotion area, PR a little bit, and the interactive area. So, just for purposes of this discussion, those are going to be the areas that we're going to be talking about, and in each of those areas, there are generally four disciplines, the disciplines being account management, which is the client contact area; creative, which creates the product; media, which is buying the venue for the product that's been created; and research or account planning, in some instances. So, when we talk about skills -- your question about what skills are needed -- I think we'll probably each talk about those specific areas.
	Rene Bruce: Well, we hire in our agency entry level people at an assistant account executive level. Agencies do it differently. I think for an assistant account executive, just to give you an overview of what account management is. It's really the direct liaison with the client, and it's the person that represents the agency to the client and the client's needs to the agency, so they're really the go-between in a way. But they're also seen as sort of the center of the wheel in pulling together all those different functions that Angel's talked about. So, they need to help coordinate the team. For an assistant account executive, the skills you need, I think you need, first and foremost in any position in advertising, you need to be passionate about advertising. So, you need to get excited about what you just saw. You need to be looking at commercials. You know what I mean, you shouldn't be changing channels on commercials. You should be the type of person that's kind of looking at it, analyzing it, trying to figure out if it's effective or not, who the target audience is. Just really getting excited about it and talking about it. So, I think passion goes a long way. Its not really a skill, I guess, it's a quality. Communication skills are really important for account managers, both written and oral. You have a lot of contact with clients. You need to be able to handle difficult situations, difficult people. You need to be able to coordinate teams and make things happen. I'm trying to think. You need to be very organized. As an account person, you're juggling a lot of things, a lot of client requests, a lot of internal requests, and you're trying to stay on deadlines and make things happen, handling budgets. So, you need to be really organized. Do you want to add anything to that?
	Anne Melanson: No, that's pretty fair. Marketing skills. I think analytic skills, because the client and your bosses at the agency are really going to be looking to you, the account person, to be able to understand markets, to be able to understand what's happening in the marketplace, and that does require some marketing and analytic skills.
	Rene Bruce: And I think also a general awareness of culture and what's around you. I think you need to be a curious person and just well rounded in that way, not totally focused on work but have outside interests in movies and trends and in what's going on the world because that's what advertising is about.
	Steve Norcia: Account management is more than just being bushy-tailed and enthusiastic, although that's a great big part of it. The analytics and the thinking about the client's business and what you're really there for in the long term, to be creative, to be strategic, to be a marketing person, are all very, very key elements. So, sometimes an entry-level position with training programs and everything else rounds you out as a person but it's easy to get persuaded into the fact that if I do a good little Dooby kind of work here, I'm going to be fine. In actuality, it's a lot tougher than it seems. So, you know, if you think it's a lot easier to just get into it and just be enthusiastic. At least account management. Actually, account management's got the biggest problem in this area. The other ones start off being disciplined right off the bat. Would you agree with that?
	Angel Rivera: I think generally, and this is kind of across all these disciplines, is that for myself I'm looking for a very positive person, very enthusiastic person, a person who is going to fit in well with the culture. Each agency has a different culture. You have to learn what fits where. You have to be aggressive. You have to be assertive. You have to be able to think on your own. These are all really pretty much cross-discipline. But if I had to pick one thing, if a person -- I don't do the interviewing myself, I do sort of advising our recruiters on what to look for -- and I always say if a person comes in and says, well, I want to work for you because I hated my last job or I hated my job before that and I don't like what I do, I'm probably not going to hire that person because if that person hates something, they're probably going to hate wherever they go. Now, if they say to me, well, I love everything I've done and I want to work for you and I'm going to love working there. Now they got my attention. So, I look for positivity all the time.

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