Advertising and PR

Overview

Maybe you’re an English major whose friends are all receiving job offers
from consulting firms, banks, and the like, and you’re wondering just what
the heck the business world has to offer you. Maybe you’re a banker, but
frustrated because your job doesn’t let you express creativity or take
advantage of your abiding interest in popular culture and the media. Or
perhaps you’re a struggling writer or artist who’s tired of living on ramen
and happy-hour buffets, and you’ve come to the conclusion that a cell phone
and a steady paycheck don’t necessarily make a person a sellout. Then you
turn on the television or pick up a newspaper or magazine, and suddenly it
hits you: Why not work in advertising or public relations?

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.

PR

PR has long taken a backseat to advertising in terms of industry revenue and

prestige, but with the proliferation of media outlets and the increasing
complexity of the marketing landscape, it’s growing in size and importance.
In 2006, the PR industry generated $3.1 billion in revenue, according to the
2007 Advertising Age Agency Report. Unlike advertising, which is paid
media exposure, PR involves communicating the organization’s message
through the news media, whose supposed objectivity lends credibility to the
message and thus makes it more powerful. The goal in PR is to make your
client—or your company, if you work in-house in a corporate or marketing
communications position—look great. PR professionals work primarily with
members of the press to ensure that newspapers, magazines, and radio and
TV outlets run stories favorable to their clients.

In addition, they might speak on behalf of client organizations; arrange for

clients’ presence at appropriate industry events; help mitigate harmful
publicity when, for instance, the federal government sues a client for
antitrust violations; or help clients come up with an overall marketing
strategy for, say, a new product launch. PR professionals serve companies,
government agencies, charitable organizations, and famous individuals—in
short, just about anyone seeking to promote a public image, message, or
product.
Advertising Trends

An Industry in Transition

The old advertising model is dead. No longer can advertisers expect to reach
their target audiences by force-feeding ads to TV viewers and magazine and
newspaper readers. TV viewers are no longer limited to just a handful of
television networks; the spread of cable TV means that viewers now have a
seemingly limitless array of programming options. And no longer are
readers limited to the newspapers and magazines for sale at their local
newsstand; nowadays, they can readily access any publication that has a
presence online, as well as a host of other websites. Indeed, media markets
are fragmenting—breaking up into smaller chunks of viewers, readers, and
Net surfers with specific interests and demographic characteristics.

Multicultural Advertising

The U.S. Census Bureau reports that as of July 2005, 14 percent of the U.S.
population was Hispanic, 13 percent was black, and 5 percent was of Asian
descent. Hispanics account for half the nation’s annual population growth.

By 2050, Hispanics will make up 24 percent of the U.S. population—a

number that doesn’t include undocumented individuals. For multicultural
advertising agencies, the growing diversity of the country means increasing
business opportunities. In the U.S., advertisers already spend a pretty chunk
of change reaching multicultural markets. For example, Hispanic-focused
advertising spending totaled $3.3 billion in 2005.

Look for continued strong growth among multicultural agencies, as U.S.

demographics change and advertisers look to reach specific markets with
more tailored advertising.

Consolidation
Like so many other industries, advertising has experienced lots of
consolidation in recent years as companies join forces to lower costs and
stay competitive in the global marketplace. According to the 2007
Advertising Age Agency Report, in 2006, the top four marketing
organizations—Omnicom Group, WPP Group, Interpublic Group, and
Publicis Groupe, which together own 35 of the 50 largest U.S. advertising
agencies—accounted for 57.4 percent of the U.S. marketing communications
business. In advertising and PR, bigger size means more clout with media
outlets—hence, lower advertising costs and more PR pitch phone calls
answered by news editors. This trend is also a result of the fact that by
owning several different advertising or PR agencies, a single holding
company can control several competing accounts without conflict of interest.

Interactive Advertising
Just a decade ago, interactive or online advertising was brand-new. These
days, it’s become central to all kinds of advertisers’ strategies, and any
agency that wants to stay competitive now relies on its interactive efforts to
generate a growing percentage of its revenue. Indeed, many advertisers are
desperate to hire pros with significant experience in so-called integrated
marketing.

Nontraditional Advertising Channels

These days, most folks are jaded by the overload of ads in traditional media,
such as TV and newspapers, and often ignore them. As a result, advertisers
have been vying for attention through nontraditional means, such as product
placement in movies and on TV. Sponsorship is another major tactic for
companies looking to promote their brands. For instance, San Francisco’s
AT&T Park—previously known as SBC Park, and Pac Bell Park before that
—and the Fleet Center in Boston are two professional sports venues that
count sponsorship dollars among their revenue sources.
Municipalities have invited corporate sponsors to fund events while
allowing them to stock prominent locations with their products and feature
the city or town in their advertisements. And thanks to Channel One,
advertising has been a part of daily life at many U.S. schools.

PR Trends

Social Marketing
Amid increasing public concern about issues like human rights and the
environment, more and more companies see value in associating their brands
with social movements. For instance, microprocessor maker and Intel rival
AMD spearheaded a campaign in 2006 titled “Is Green, Saves Green.”
Saatchi’s print campaign for Tide detergent showed how much energy you
can save by doing laundry in cold water. Dow Chemical’s “The Human
Element” campaign, launched in the U.S. in 2006 and expanded
internationally in 2007, was designed to reinforce the company’s
commitment to engage challenges like affordable and adequate food supply
and personal health and safety. Many big PR firms have practice areas
devoted to social marketing.

Consolidation
Like the advertising industry, the PR sector has been marked by extensive
consolidation over the past decade or so. Bigger size means more clout with
media outlets, and a single holding company can control several competing
PR accounts without conflict of interest. In general, ad and PR agencies that
exist under mammoth holding companies such as Omnicom and WPP
operate as standalone businesses, but there are cases where business
synergies result from new ties between agencies. For instance, if you go into
PR, you may end up trying to place stories about an ad campaign created by
a subsidiary of the same holding company that owns your firm.

The Internet
The Internet has changed the face of PR. On the one hand, it offers a wealth
of opportunities to get the word out on behalf of your client. And PR
professionals can reach specific audiences as never before, by targeting (or
creating) industry- or interest-specific news sites, message boards, and
blogs.
The flip side of the coin is that it’s now harder than ever to manage the
release of information. And the interactive nature of the Internet means that
negative news about your client can pop up anytime, anywhere—from a
popular blog to a high-traffic message board. Many online news sites are
updated 24/7, so PR professionals with high-profile clients have to be
constantly vigilant.

Training
The PR industry has been notoriously lacking in terms of training for young
professionals. In many agencies, most new employees still suffer through a
sink-or-swim, learn-as-you-go period early in their careers. However, many
agencies are beginning to recognize the benefits of offering formal training
—to orient new employees, to ensure that valuable knowledge is available
across the agency, and to help retain valuable staffers.

How It Breaks Down

Though boutique agencies are growing in number and revenue, the big
names continue to handle most of the accounts—and earn most of the
dollars. They also are the primary source of employment opportunities. In
addition to the size of the firm, you'll need to think about its location, its
client list, and the kind of advertising it does: branding vs promotional,
general vs specific industries, all media vs specific media.

Big Global Networks

In the past decade, global has become the way to go. Several huge global
marketing and media conglomerates now dominate the advertising industry.
These include Omnicom, the WPP Group, Interpublic Group, Havas, and
Publicis Groupe. They are joined by advertising agencies that have expanded
their operations by opening offices around the world and by acquiring other
marketing and media companies. Together, these firms own many of the
major players in traditional and interactive advertising. Publicis Groupe, for
example, owns Publicis Worldwide, Saatchi & Saatchi, and Leo Burnett
Worldwide.

Smaller Shops
While a lot of hot shops have been snatched up by the big global holding
companies, there are still plenty of smaller shops—some with as few as five
employees. Often these are creative boutiques—agencies started by people
from bigger agencies who have hung out their own shingle to follow their
vision of what makes good advertising. Mad Dogs & Englishmen in New
York and Butler, Shine, Stern, and Partners in Sausalito, California, are two
of the hundreds of smaller shops.

Interactive Agencies
Interactive agencies specialize in online marketing and advertising. This
includes everything from conceiving, designing, and placing banner ads to
designing corporate websites to developing e-commerce solutions for
corporations. This segment of the industry was devastated in the early 2000s
when dotcoms, which spent a lot of money on online advertising, started
collapsing left and right. But the segment has undergone a healthy recovery,
as advertisers from a broad range of industries try out new online strategies
with a more realistic perspective on what Internet advertising can do.

Public Relations
Firms that specialize in providing PR services include Edelman, Ketchum
(owned by Omnicom), and Hill and Knowlton (owned by WPP). Internally,
one difference between PR and ad agencies is that PR firms tend to organize
themselves around practice areas, such as public affairs, investor relations,
labor relations, crisis management, entertainment, media relations, consumer
product marketing, and corporate reputation management. Smaller PR firms,
like ad agencies, may specialize in a particular field, such as the Internet,
health care, or telecommunications.

Nonagency Opportunities
Beyond the traditional ad and PR agencies, there are a number of other job
sources in this field. Research firms, such as IRI (Information Resources,
Inc.), Nielsen (of TV-ratings fame), Gallup, and J.D. Powers all measure the
success of agency campaigns. Other firms specialize in certain aspects of the
advertising world, such as direct marketing or promotions. Although some of
these are independent, others are owned by big players.

Also, large corporations usually have marketing communications (marcom)

departments that create and produce brochures, product sheets, and other
marketing collateral. Marcom departments also often write and distribute
press releases and perform other PR functions. And some large companies
even create and produce some or all of their own advertising. For example,
Charles Schwab and MasterCard both have in-house ad departments.

Job Prospects

The advertising and PR industries were hit hard by the decline of the
dotcoms, the tech downturn, and the overall recession. But things are
looking up as companies are starting to spend again, albeit not at the levels
of the late 1990s. As advertising and PR budgets increase, agencies add new
jobs. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics is optimistic, predicting
employment in advertising and PR to grow 22 percent by 2014. As the
industry continues to expand the ways it reaches the consumer, it will also
continue to seek out new, creative talent to launch its campaigns.

You'll face stiff competition if you want a career in advertising or PR. Still,
these industries remain sexy to many job seekers. In advertising, many
writers and artists are drawn to agencies' creative and production
departments because the salaries are much higher in the ad game than in the
starving artist game. For business types, advertising offers an exciting
proximity to the creative process, if not an actual role in that process. PR
offers liberal arts types jobs that can be steady and fairly lucrative while still
being creative. Pros in both industries often enjoy perks like dinners, plays,
and ball games with clients. And everyone in these industries gets to spend
their days with the hippest, most culturally aware coworkers around—and
play a role in creating the stories and advertisements that shape our culture.

Love-Hate

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What's Great

Variety Show
No matter where you work in advertising or PR, you'll have the opportunity
to experience quite a bit of variety as you progress in your career. You'll get
to work on different accounts, each with its own problems to solve. Over
time, you might work on everything from computer software to sporting
goods. One advertising account management insider says, "It's never dull.
You're always working on a bunch of different things. If you thrive on
variety, you'll probably like advertising."

"It's a Party Every Day."

One insider swears that he says just that to his wife every evening when she
asks how the office was that day. Of course he’s kidding, but he likes the
atmosphere. "It's light," he says. "There are a lot of young people." A
creative insider says, "For a corporate environment, it's the most relaxed you
can get. The dress is casual, you can joke around with people, there may be a
pool table or a Ping-Pong table or that kind of thing...." Another advertising
creative insider agrees: "Even when I have a bad day at work, I laugh really
hard several times during the day." A PR insider says, "We all go out
together all the time." An advertising account management insider sums it
up: "A lot of fun and interesting people work in the industry."

Shaping Minds One Slogan at a Time

You can change the way people think or speak with an effective ad
campaign. Imagine your work entering the consciousness of people across
the globe—just ask the people involved in the “Just Do It” ad campaign for
Nike.

What's To Hate

Changing the World? Not Quite.

No matter how much some people in the industry would like to believe good
advertising is the same thing as art, the fact is that it's not. "It's probably as
base a consumer-oriented thing as you can do," says an insider. In fact, in
advertising you may end up advertising a product you don't think much of.
And PR's no different in this regard. Someone's got to spin the story for the
oil company after the big spill at sea; someone's got to defend the chemical
company that doesn't want to pay damages to the third-world community
over which its facility released a cloud of noxious gas. That someone works
in PR.

Insecurity
Job security can be tenuous, due to the amount of money and work a single
client can bring to an agency. For example, an agency might lose a big
account, and 20 percent of the staff is suddenly laid off.

The Client Kowtow

Advertising creatives are unanimous in occasionally disliking aspects of the
agency's relationship with the client, and most people in the business have
been frustrated by their dealings with clients at some point. One insider says,
"We had a bagel client who insisted that we not have any punctuation in the
ad copy. It was the most absurd client demand I’d ever heard." Another says,
"You can spend six months working on a project that just suddenly dies
[because the client changes its mind]." Another complains about foreign
clients that don't "get it," like the Asian auto manufacturer that kills great
creative ads because it doesn't understand American humor. An account
management insider says, "I hate having to babysit the client." As another
insider notes, though, "You need the client. So you have to compromise your
integrity sometimes."

Major Players

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Top U.S. Advertising Agencies, by 2006 Traditional Advertising Revenue

Rank Agency(Parent Company) Headquarters 1-Yr.
Sales ($M) Change (%)
1 JWT* (WPP) 445 4.8
2 BBDO Worldwide* (Omnicom) 444 8
McCann Erickson Worldwide*
3 443 1.8
(Interpublic)
Leo Burnett Worldwide*
4 312 2.6
(Publicis)
Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide*
5 277 4.0
(WPP)
DDB Worldwide
6 1,023 8.4
Communications* (Omnicom)
7 Y&R* 250 4.2
8 Grey Worldwide* (WPP) 235 5.3
9 Saatchi & Saatchi* (Publicis) 212 2.4
10 DraftFCB Chicago/New York 210 5.0
*Figures are estimates.
Source: Advertising Age

Top Five U.S. PR Agencies, by 2006 Revenue

1-Yr. Change
Rank Agency Sales ($M)
(%)
Burson-Marsteller U.S.:100-200; Global:
1 NA
(WPP) 300-400
2 Edelman 354.5 21.8
3 Fleishman-Hillard Inc. 131.3* NA
Hill and Knowlton, Inc.
4 91.3* 29.0
(est.)
5 Ketchum 53.8 (est.) 16
*2007 figures.
Source: Hoover's, Advertising Age, WetFeet Analysis

Job descriptions and tips

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Key Jobs

A lot of people outside the industry think that advertising is all about
creative work. In fact, there are three primary career tracks: creative, account
management, and media. In each of these areas (and in PR as well), there is
a fairly standard hierarchy of positions. Generally, new hires start out as
account coordinators or assistant fill-in-the-blanks, then "assistant" is
dropped from the title (assistant copywriter becomes copywriter). Next, you
are promoted to senior fill-in-the-blank, vice president, and then senior vice
president.

Account management and media positions require a BA or BS, preferably in

communications, English, journalism, business, or economics. Jobs on the
creative side often only require a two-year degree and a strong portfolio,
although a BA won't hurt—especially for copywriters. For those without a
degree, the industry is full of administrative jobs.

Account Executive and Account Supervisor

These are the suits who manage the relationship with the client and develop
strategy. In advertising, account executives manage the creation of the pitch
and the ad campaign. In PR, the account executives generally take
responsibility for implementing the public relations program, working with
the client, drafting press releases, and pitching stories to the media. Salary
range in advertising: junior account executive, $40,000 to $62,000; senior
account executive, $70,000 to $89,000; account supervisor, $79,000 to
$96,000. In PR, the account executive range is $34,000 to $58,000; the
range for account supervisor is $66,000 to $93,000.

Copywriter
Working with the art director, you come up with the copy (words or script)
based on the strategy that's been defined for the ad campaigns. The ads you
create go into your portfolio, something you'll need if you want to switch
jobs. Salary range: junior copywriter, $34,000 to $45,000; senior copywriter,
$54,000 to $67,000; and really good ones make more.

Art Director
Art directors work with the copywriters to develop the story line, and they
are responsible for the visuals in an advertisement. They prepare layouts for
print ads and television storyboards and oversee filming of television
commercials. As with the copywriter position, advancement is based on the
strength of the portfolio. Salary range: junior art director, $49,000 to
$90,000; senior art director, $62,000 to $118,000.
Media Planner and Media Buyer
The media planner learns about people's viewing and media habits in order
to plan how and where to place ads based on the client's objectives and
budgets. This is very numbers-oriented work with little client contact. The
media buyer negotiates with media sales reps to buy and place ads for the
client, calculates rates and budgets, and makes sure that ads appear correctly.
In PR, the equivalent position is media relations; this person is responsible
for calling up members of the media and pitching story ideas in an effort to
get media coverage for a client. Salary range: assistant media planner or
media buyer, $33,000 to $45,000; media planner and media buyer, $50,000
to $76,000; media director, $95,000 to $125,000.

Communications Director or Public Relations Manager

This type of job is more specific to PR firms. Many companies hire media
spokespeople or communications experts to handle all media contact, event
publicity, and media requests. You can find these positions by working up
through a company's communications or public relations department, or by
transferring from an agency. Salary range: $85,000 to $126,000.

Other PR Jobs
Many PR agencies hire specialists to work in particular areas. Lots of
agencies have a speechwriter, often a former reporter, who ghostwrites op-
eds (opinion and editorial pieces) or speeches for clients in order to help
raise their visibility. A specialist in investor relations would help a client
enhance its image among investors or perhaps help it raise additional capital.
Labor relations, public affairs, media relations management, corporate
reputation management, consumer products marketing, and crisis
communications are other common specialties. Salary range: $50,000 to
$100,000 or more.

Getting Hired

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:

• Many 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.
• Before 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.
• In 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."
• Advertising 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.