“I’ve got 12 years on you … and I always will!!”

These words were emphatically spoken to a loud, mouthy, young radio salesgirl by her much wiser manager.

The mouthy sales girl was me. The manager was reminding me that she had more experience and I needed to listen. That woman has been my mentor ever since.

She found me tending bar and offered me a job in radio sales. I initially turned her down, but thankfully, she persisted. Six months later I was selling airtime and my career began. Her blunt observations, guidance, and belief in the abilities that I couldn’t see in myself made all the difference in my professional life.

No matter if you’re fresh out of school or you’ve been working for years, find someone with more experience, with a different perspective and a different approach, to be your mentor. This person doesn’t even have to be in your chosen field. They need to be someone you admire and can cultivate a relationship with.

Take them to coffee or lunch. Ask them for their insight. What did they do in their career that worked for them? What were their failures? Believe me, everyone wants to share what they know. They’ll be flattered as hell you asked and you’ll learn far more than you would have ever learned in a classroom or a book.

After selling radio, I went out on my own, started a little ad agency and spent 32 plus years doing what I loved. Through it all, my mentor has never been out of reach and I owe her more than I can ever repay. I’m still loud and mouthy, but at least I know I’m not the smartest person in the room … and my life is richer for it.

Thanks, Pam.

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The Mac Parody

If it isn’t obvious, I am a Mac. (My sweetheart is a PC….why we’re still together is another story.) Many cynical pot shots are taken at “God-Jobs”, Apple, and their success. I have many collegues who sniff in a haughty fashion about my love of all things Apple. The Mac/PC commercials with Justin and John are outstanding in their simple, witty approach while defining our personalities (unfairly at times). It was only a matter of time before this series came out. We’re all so cynical!

Small town media

Allow me a moment to rant about media. Especially here in Hooterville. Small town media, just like Fox and CNN, can pick and choose and decide the tone. It really pisses me off. So it goes with our slowly dissipating newspaper, The Daily Disappointment, who highlight their owners favorite causes and politics and give credit where none is due. Like the non-story about the newly hired marketing woman with thick ankles, bad hair and sensible shoes who declared an increase in numbers for a government agency with her strategic television efforts. EXCUSE ME?  We had them using television two years before she ever showed up. Along with a new web site, and a new positioning statement, and a new event catalog. Bottom line is she had nothing to do with it. So much for investigative, or relevant, journalism. (Maybe it’s because we buy very little local newspaper advertising.)

In Hooterville, there’s a LOT of mediocre media. The little community web sites that crop up under the guise of local news. They try to compete with the newspaper, TV and radio stations. Funded by small thinking Tea Partiers who are busy being righteous, God and Country conservatives, taking low level pot shots at the Mayor, county and state government.

There are VERY bad and WAY TOO MANY radio stations. Announcers with speech impediments. Dead air. Many are owned/funded by small thinking Tea Partiers who are busy being righteous, God and Country conservatives, taking low level pot shots at the Mayor, county and state government.

We have an active cable sales force and two aggressive networks (CBS and NBC) in Hooterville, with News Anchors who everyone knows too much about. The Old Drunk Guy at 6 o’clock. The young bimbo girls with coiffed curls and glossy lips who nod and gush knowingly and have nothing meaningful to say. And smug, self-assured, pushy gals selling 30 second spots when they should buy a gym membership. Every one is Number One.

And last but not least, there are Billboards, Yellow Pages, Area Wide Maps, Church Bulletins, Grocery Store Kiosks, Pharmacy Bags, Sides of Trash Cans Sponsored by the Rotary, Bus Benches, Sides of City Buses, Space on the Chamber Web Site, Flyers in the Chamber Newsletter, ads in the Charity Event Program, the Community Theater Program, the High School Sports Program, on the fence at Little League/High School/College Ball Field, the weekly farm town newspapers, ads on placemats at the local pizza/taco/fried chicken place, the side of a Race car….you get the idea.

Not one news outlet here can afford to deliver any unbiased delivery of factual information because they might piss off their friend/neighbor/customer. Because it’s a small town and  they all play golf at the same country club.        Gee, Happy Monday.

Designer versus Client

The timing on this is perfect because I’ve been fighting this battle with the cretins…I mean clients…for the the last two weeks.  Like the new client (a very nice one, though) who brought me some logo ideas for his his new place, saying “you know, my wife has a good eye and is very creative.” ARRGHH!  I love it when he says “Are  you going to do it in Microsoft Word?” HA! A big thank you to Robb for sharing this…it’s spot on.

Advertising Promises

In the factory we make cosmetics; in the drugstore we sell hope. Charles Revson

In advertising we’re hired to make promises.  To fill a void in people lives. If you buy XYZ, you’ll be smarter/faster/envied/ thinner/ better/ happier/prettier/whatever.  And so it goes with the ads we see for Thanksgiving…happy families together, sitting at a beautifully decorated table, the perfect turkey. LOOK! Buy THIS Turkey and your family/life/house will be just like this.

The reality is: You’re with your clan, most of whom have traded their booze and brains for a bible and Glenn Beck. A mother who fills every space with incessant chatter, Uncle “Pull my Finger” Paul, neurotic Aunt Opal, Grandmother who can’t hear and host of cousins who wear too much flannel. (You start frantically searching for the adoption papers because you’re certain these are not your people.) UGH.

I’ve always wondered what would happen if a company got REAL with its message for once and said what most of us are thinking. Maybe Southwest Airlines could offer the DFD: a Dysfunctional Family Discount. Wanna getaway? YES!

But advertising is about hope, isn’t it?  Maybe this year will be different. So if you’re fortunate enough to celebrate the holiday with a family who is least tolerable, then enjoy your feast and count your blessings. And the turkey? Here’s how to ensure a perfect result:

Mac hits the front page…again.

Forgive me as I gush about the cleverness.  It’s sickening, I know, but they’ve done it again. Another excellent use of cyber front page by Apple.

Oh, Harvey…you’re being harsh.

If we study vintage ads like this, we can get an idea of how we treated each other back then, the roles we played and the priorities we had. Thankfully, times change. And he didn’t even kiss her good-bye. Bastard.

Careful there, you’re not the client

He called, wanted a meeting immediately, then bulldozed his way into our office.  He insisted something needed to be done and right away. He was losing money.  No, he wasn’t the final decision maker, but  he was a damned important strategic partner and they would listen to him. He liked a spot we did for the sister company. He hated the current marketing director of the company.  She was slow, unresponsive to his requests and should be be put back into the secretarial pool or fired. He’ll put his own money in to straighten things up, by God. He’d get us a meeting with the powers that be. And on the way out he said, you might “wear a low cut top” next time we meet.

We were certainly intrigued by this prospect. What if “this” and what if “that” began to float around. It could be a nice piece of business, but I resisted the urge to do any spec work-it didn’t feel right. (It wasn’t the low cut top comment, trust me.)

Anyway, good thing we didn’t spend a lot of time prepping a pitch. After raising every kind of hell, this important “strategic partner” was told flat out by the real decision makers this was none of his concern. Yes, they loved what adchicks team did for their sister company, but they are quite satisfied with their current mediocrity.

The moral of this story:  Never count your chickens before they’re hatched.

That’s one…

Follow the money

I love the surprise/interesting/unexpected ending. Here, money travels and ends up in a happy place. Found at great ads.

Please note that this sort of thing is not tolerated in Hooterville. That’s why I want to move.

Turning on a dime

When you’re a small agency, you can do that. Turn on a dime. You can jump through a hoop and make it happen without inter-office bullshit, egos, protocols or hierarchy. So today when a client called and needed to change his commercial to push bananas at 39¢ a pound, we stopped everything else and did it.  In less than 3 hours, revision uploaded to the FTP. Boom. Done. I work with such cool people.

Dime turning.

It’s what we do.

It feels good.