| Topic Name: |
Switching career to advertising - advice needed |
| Message Name: |
Ideas |
| Date Posted: |
09/10/2002 |
| In Reply To: |
I am currently working at an investment management firm. I want to switch to advertising because I believe I am a creative person and would like to start a career in this industry. Any tips or advice? What kind of employees are advertising companies looking for and with how much experience?
Thanks |
| Message: |
Are you still looking? Here's some general ideas:
1) you need to pick one area to focus on getting into - either account service, media, or creative. Agencies are split into these departments usually, or only offer one of two of these services rather than all three. It will be very difficult for you to market yourself if you can't clearly identify which of the three areas you want to work in.
2) Agencies value experience with the business categories into which their clients fall, so if you work in investment management or banking now, you might want to find out which agencies handle some of the bigger financial, banking or investment advertisers. Then you can contact those advertising agencies and sell yourself as being an insider who will understand the products their client is trying to push. Sometimes really good creatives, media or account people waste a lot of time just trying to figure out what their clients actually want, or what they are trying to say. You could provide a time savings by being a point of contact who can translate investment talk into something non-investment people understand. If you have experience working directly with clients, that is marketable in any of the three areas of emphasis - media, creative or account service, so talk it up.
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