Advertising Advertising is big business. The biggest advertisers spend billions of dollars each per year to market their products and services; General Motors and Procter & Gamble, for instance, each spend about $4 billion annually on advertising, direct mail, and promotions. That translates to lots of work for advertising agencies. In 2006, traditional advertising activities in the U.S.-the creation and dissemination of TV, print, and radio ads-generated $13.1 billion in revenue for advertising agencies, up 4.2 percent from the previous year, according to the 2007 Advertising Age Agency Report. Interactive advertising yielded another $3.6 billion in revenue during the year, while health care advertising-not considered a traditional field- brought in $2.1 billion. In broad terms, an advertising agency is a marketing consultant. It helps the client-for example, a consumer goods manufacturer like Nike or a service provider like Charles Schwab-with all aspects of marketing, from strategy and concept through execution. Strategy involves helping the client make high- level business decisions, such as determining which new products to develop, or how to brand or define itself to the world. Concept is where the agency takes the client's strategy and turns it into specific ideas for advertisements-such as a series of ads featuring "extreme sports" athletes for a soft-drink maker whose strategy is to enter the teen market. Execution is where the agency turns the concept into reality with the production of the actual ads: the print layout, the film shoot, the audio taping. Full-service agencies also handle the placement of ads in print and electronic media so that clients reach their intended audiences. "If you thrive on variety, you'll probably like advertising," one insider said. Sometimes the agency works in conjunction with the client's marketing department. In other instances-when the client doesn't have a marketing department-the agency takes on that role. Advertising isn't easy to get into. Most people start out at the entry level and jump agencies as they move up-insiders say that it may even be essential to move from agency to agency in order to get to work on new clients. Once you pick your area-creative, account management, media-it can be difficult to change, unless you want to go back to the entry level. Public relations agencies are more likely to hire somebody with several years of experience outside PR, but that depends on the experience. Proof that you can juggle lots of projects, write well, work under deadline, understand media, and serve a client will help you land a job. If you're interested in getting into this industry, keep these things in mind: ͻMany advertising agencies hire people only at entry level. If you're in college and you know you want to enter the industry, see if you can get some work experience. (Every year a huge number of internships in advertising and public relations are available.) If you've interned, you'll have a definite leg up on others trying to land a spot. ͻBefore an advertising interview, look at some magazines and watch television. Pick a couple of campaigns that you like and be able to explain why you think they're good. Think about how they target a particular audience and what they do well. ͻIn creative, you'll need to present your book, a portfolio of projects you've helped design or write copy for. If you don't have one, but want to break into the industry, then make one. Create some ads or concepts on your own ("on spec" in industry parlance). Your book must demonstrate your design or writing ability and your marketing sense. Creatives must take a different path into advertising. For them, it's less about whom they know, where they went to school, or what their grades were. Creatives must have a good book to get a job. As one insider puts it, "It's not about your resume; it's about your book." ͻAdvertising and PR are all about selling products. To get hired, you need to sell your abilities. If you can't communicate why you're better than all the other people who want the job, then you probably don't belong in the industry. Resources ͻAbout.com Public Relations GuideͻAdvertising AgeͻAdvertising Media Internet CenterͻAdweekͻPRWeekͻPublic Relations Society of AmericaͻTalent ZooFeedback Wanted: We're currently developing a Careers and Industries section with improved functionality and updated research. Please click on the "Feedback" tab to share your ideas about what you'd like to see here in the future. Your opinion matters! Quick Links Overview Love-Hate Major Players Job Descriptions and Tips Shopping Cart 0 Increasingly, though, definitions of advertising have had to take on board new communications opportunities. The explosion of media channel opportunities, and digital and web 2.0 technology in particular, have made the advertising environment much more complex. Different media channels and different communications opportunities require different approaches. Now agencies use a variety of different models of communication: - persuasion - engagement - participation - facilitation - conversation With the constant evolution of digital media channels and the rise of social media, these models will be developing rapidly, making advertising an exciting field to be a part of. Further details of these models and both the current and future communications landscape can be found in the IPA publications : The Future of Advertising and Agencies: A 10-year perspective and Social Media Futures: The future of advertising and agencies in a networked society. WHAT IS ADVERTISING? Every day when we watch TV or read the newspaper, we come across advertisements. Advertising persuades people to buy a certain product. It brings goods to the attention of consumers. People who are concerned with marketing deal with: 1. Market research 2. Product development 3. Promotion 1. MARKET RESEARCH The main idea of market research is, to find out whether a product is needed, whether people would buy it and what kind of people that are. These people are called TARGET GROUP. Market research is often carried out buy specialist organisations, they make market surveys and customer tests to find out preferences in design, quality, colour and taste. This information is used to decide whether to produce a product, how much it should cost and how it should be promoted. 2. PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT There are two ways of product development. On the one hand the product-oriented companies and on the other hand the market-oriented companies. Product-oriented companies invest a lot of money and time in finding new or im-proved goods to sell them on the market. This is a very risky form of product development, because companies might not sell the new goods. So they lost a lot of money. Market-oriented companies want to find out what is needed and then they try to develop new ways of production or new goods. 3. PROMOTION Promotion is very important because however good a product is, it will not find any buyers, if no one knows about it. If you want to sell a specialised product, all you have to do is to write to people or companies, which are known to be interested or place an advertisement in a trade magazine. If you are not able to do this yourself, you can instruct an advertising argency. They have the experts who can make a successful campaign. They know how, when and where the message should be transmitted to reach most people of the target group. At the beginning of production, advertising will inform you what a product is like, where you can get it and how much it costs. Later, it is necessary to persuade the people to keep on buying or attract new customers to buy. Modern advertising uses language, pictures, sound and colours to sell the products as well as possible. ADVERTISING MEDIA The best times for commercials are the times at which people wait for something special like the news or sports. At these times advertising can be very successful, but it is also very expensive. TV-COMMERCIALS TV is one of the most powerful advertising medium, because you can get very detailed information about a product. Depending on your target group you have to decide the time, when your spot shall be shown. It is not useful broadcasting an ad about cars in the children͛s programmes because this is not your target group, they cannot buy a car. In the afternoon there are many films on TV, which are interrupted regularly. At that time advertising can be very expensive. In fact, TV-adverts have a strange impact. You might have noticed how well you can remember slogans long after the spot is over. PRINTED ADVERTISING The prices for full-page-adverts in national newspapers are roughly the same as for TV spots, but you can also place smaller adverts in the print media. In local newspapers you only pay a few pounds. The problem of adverts in newspapers and magazines is, that they can attract the reader͛s eyes only. This problem can be solved by considering several factors: ͻ Only use right-hand pages for newspaper adverts, because you first look at the right side. ͻ The colour is an important fact. Red signals mean danger and colours of the dusk make us feel comfortable and save. ͻ The layout and the text are also very important parts of newspaper adverts. The layout may take the readers look at the main information, and the text is just to inform interested people. DIRECT MAILING Direct mailing is another form of advertising.