Account Management
As an Account Manager, you are involved in every step of the ad making process from the moment the client talks you through their business problem to the moment you see the finished ad on TV, in press, up on a billboard or online. You’re responsible for ensuring that everything runs smoothly, departments are talking to one another and that the client is up to speed with what's going on. No two days will ever be the same; you will be asked to analyse business problems and to present creative solutions to help build campaigns. As a result you will draw on all the skills you've ever developed, as well as some you never knew you had. To be great at this job you need strong business acumen as well as an appreciation and passion for ideas and creativity. The job is energetic, demanding, occasionally bizarre but intensely gratifying.
Some sites worth checking out:
www.brandrepublic.com
www.adweek.com
www.ft.com
www.ipa.co.uk
media.guardian.co.uk
Account Planning
Take something that’s complicated, make it simple and make it creative.
The planner is the person who must rigorously understand the Client’s marketplace, product and most importantly the consumer. Planners absorb pages of information and data, mix it with a healthy dose of common sense and intuition and then take what is often a fairly multi-layered business communication problem, and distil it into a single thought that provides a springboard for the creatives. Planners are most busy at the development and evaluation phases of campaigns. They decide the direction the campaign should take and then after it has run, they find out if it has worked.
If you look at things and ask who, how or why, then have a little think about planning.
Some sites worth checking out:
russelldavies.typepad.com/planning
ameliatorode.typepad.com/life_moves_pretty_fast
www.crackunit.com
academic.mintel.com
plannersphere.pbwiki.com
accountplan.ning.com
Creative
So where do ads come from? Well, usually from the twisted minds of a couple of people who’ve spent hours gazing into the middle distance occasionally saying things like – we could do it with real monkeys. We are the creative teams. The ones who listen to the brief, absorb all the info and then try and come up with ideas that communicate in a simple, relevant and surprising way. It’s a bit like controlled daydreaming, really. And what starts as a doodle on paper or a TV script might slowly become a real ad that people get to look at and think – how did they come up with that? What’s more, as a creative you oversee every stage of production. So if your ad happens to be set on a beach in Brazil . . . The best job in the world? Probably.
Some sites worth checking out:
www.contagiousmagazine.com
www.creativeclub.co.uk
www.nma.co.uk
www.thefwa.com