Junior year @ Ringling

If I could go back in time and start my junior year over again, I would definitely prep more for jr. review. I would actually write down and SAVE the feedback I get from each project. The key word here is SAVE because yeah, I write it down, but along the way it gets lost or forgotten. I would also make all changes needed to all of my work as I went and get teachers' feedback along the way so it's less to worry about in the second half of the year. I would also make sure to save and organize every single one of my files because even if you hate the project at the time, you can always go back to it and make it into something really interesting. I also wish I didn't have to take any elective classes either so I could concentrate on my ad classes more but unfortunately, it is required.

In working with Morgana on the copy portion of the Phoenix Ink project, I learned that it takes about a million revisions to the copy to sound the way you want it to. We had so much information that we needed to include in our body copy so we really had to edit everything down to the simplest form and make it flow nicely so it didn't seem like so much. Sometimes, it's a struggle to come up with that last headline. You may have two really great ones but are lost for the third. I found myself running into this problem frequently and I learned to think more simply. I think I tend to over think that last headline because I'm concerned it won't be as great as the other two. However, if you have a great idea, stick to that main idea. Usually with strong ideas, the rest comes naturally as the campaign progresses.

I like coming up with big ideas and writing headlines, however, I usually overlook the importance of craft in my campaigns. I figure, if the idea is there then the look of the campaign doesn't matter. I have realized through jr. review that looks have everything to do with the campaign. It's the first thing people see so if it doesn't look well designed, they won't even read the copy and never know what the big idea was. You don't really get recognized or any credit on something if the design isn't as good as others. I also learned that it's a lot easier to take all of your own photos if you can. The end result is much cleaner and you can get the exact angle or lighting you want. I just wish we had the opportunity to collaborate with photo students. They have their own work to do so it's hard to get them to find time to help us.

Over the summer, I'm hoping to get an internship. I had the interview where I met with the copywriters and saw the working environment. If I were to get the internship, they would have me working with the copywriters or in marketing writing creative briefs. I think this would be a very good experience for me to see how things are done in the real world and work with professionals. I'm hoping this will also improve my writing skill and give me something for my portfolio. I'm also going to spend the summer looking back on the things I did for jr. review and make some changes to my campaigns. I will probably look at two or three projects that I know how to go about changing and then wait to fix the rest next year when I have teachers available to talk to.

Of course, I'm looking forward to graduating in my senior year. After all, that is the main goal. I'm also looking forward to new classes, new projects, and possibly a new teacher. I hope the new teacher we have can really spend time helping me prepare for the second jr. review. I heard that the projects are more open to the kinds of things we would want to do in our future so that sounds like a great experience. I would love to see some collaboration with other majors like illustration, film, and motion design. If classes are more open to new things next year, maybe this could be a possibility. Overall, I'm just looking forward to getting done and being able to get a job.

House ads?

"Adzookie is a mobile ad network that places local businesses' ads for free if they, in exchange, allow ads to be placed on their own mobile sites." Right now the company is quite small with only 8 people. With not much publicity, how could this small business expand in a unique way? Advertising on houses.

Adzookie is giving home owners up to a year of monthly mortgage payments in exchange for using their house as a giant billboard. So far, Adzookie received more than 1,000 applications for this deal, which is gaining them publicity before the big idea has even started. Houses must remain painted for a minimum of three months and a maximum of a year. After a year, Adzookie will repaint the house with no cost. The budget for the entire program is only $100,000 ($8,000 per house) so not every house on the block with be an ad.

I think this is a great idea. Economic times are tough right now so it's no surprise that people would apply for a brightly painted house. I think most people don't pay attention to ads because they already know where to expect them, like magazines and billboards. There's no way you can miss this house. People will stop and look at it. It's a genius project. However, I think it would be even cooler if the company had something to do with houses like paint, siding, or a place like Home Depot. Regardless, it's eye-catching and it works.

Found on Yahoo

An interesting twist

These are the three TV spots for the new Three Olives Vodka campaign. I think the reason I was drawn to them is the fact that it’s a simple concept. It starts off with the usual bar joke; three ___________ walk into a bar. Each one of the three spots showcases a different type of person: cowboys, sportscasters, and sugar daddies. They walk in the bar then do something stereotypical of that particular group in a comical way. I love the concept because it’s so expandable. The only real copy is the beginning of the joke so it’s very interchangeable. I also like the fact that it’s a cartoon because it’s different than what you normally see in alcohol ads. It’s typically people partying or elegant and simple. I thought about the color choice since all three of the TV spots were shades of blue. Would it be more interesting in slightly different colors? Maybe it would or maybe it wouldn’t portray the same feeling.

Here is a print ad of what Three Olives looked like before. It’s a clever campaign, just a different feel than the cartoon bar scene.



Found on Adweek and Youtube

The zen of social media marketing

In "The zen of social media marketing", Shama talks about how to make the web as useful as possible when promoting a company. I think the book is more for new businesses that have no idea how to do any social media strategies but I found it helpful as well. I think her Facebook chapter was extremely helpful. She goes into detail on how to set up your Facebook, which most of us already know, but she also added some helpful tips that we may not have thought about. For example, your status updates. Usually, we just write what we're doing or feeling in our updates but does anyone really care what we ate for dinner last night? She makes a good point. You can be yourself but add something inspiring as well. The same thing goes for Twitter. When she talked about Twitter, she explained how to work it which was helpful since I was clueless before. I still haven't gotten into Twitter but at least I can reference the book when I need to. She mentioned Linkedin (a more professional version of Facebook) and I've never heard of it before. It seems like a good way to connect with professionals. I just recently made a Linkedin account but until I get used to it, I'll stick to Facebook. Of course, in all of these social media strategies, you want a professional picture of yourself and you don't want to be friends with rude people. She also talks about websites. I don't remember too much about this chapter but I do remember her saying your website should be simple and clutter-free. If someone is confused the second they go to your website, they give up. It's a waste of their time to figure it out. For Youtube media, the best equipment to use is a flip camera. You don't want an overly expensive camera when it's just for the web and you won't make any money off the video itself. You also don't want a camera that's too low quality that you can't understand the video. A flip camera is perfect for web videos.

Shama mentioned a ton of little tips like this but these are the ones that stood out to me. I thought the book was easy to read and a great reference for the future. You don't have to sit down and read the entire thing. You can just flip to the part you need at that moment and get your answer right away. It's also in a language anyone can understand, not computer lingo which also makes it easy.

Help Japan: Toyota

In our advertising class we just finished up our posters to help Japan. The rising sun was shown in a lot of other posters that we looked at for inspiration so we wanted to do something from that. I think all of us did a good job with stepping away from the norm and creating unique pieces. As I was looking for something to blog about on Creativity, I came across this interactive website (that could also be turned into a poster) sponsored by Toyota. Click here to see the site.





Basically, it's a bunch of origami cranes. It's genius to use an aspect of Japanese culture other than the rising sun. Someone in class also had a crane idea and I thought it was great. Anyway, you have the option to send a message or read other messages. The message contain things like "good luck" or "we are always together with you". It's a good way to get people to interact and leave a message for Japan. I think it makes people feel like they are doing something to help even though they aren't actually there to help. I think it's a powerful campaign and works well.

Bad writing reflection

The documentary was about a writer who thought he was an amazing writer when he was young. He interviewed famous writers to find out what "good" writing was. In doing this, he found out that his work wasn't all that great. I think the message the filmmaker was trying to communicate is the fact that writing is so complex. When starting out, you will have bad work and that's normal. Your first piece will never be your best but you shouldn't give up. Sometimes you will hate what you do, other times you will love it. Still don't give up. Also, writing can't be taught. The style of writing can be taught but writing has to be personal and come within. Basically, the main point of the documentary was to show different writers perspectives on what they do and what advice they would give a writer starting out. The point of view was simply "what is writing". It was a broad point of view but that pretty much sums up the documentary.

If you read my live blog on the documentary, I listed the most important aspects to me. The fact that you may not love what you do 100% of the time was an important message to me. I feel like I don't love advertising all the time but now I know that's completely normal and as long as I really love it at least some of the time, I'll be happy with my career choice. Another thing that was important was how they mention how reading improves your writing. Now, this isn't the first time I've heard this but I thought it was more to improve your vocabulary. If you come up with interesting words, your writing will be good. Now I don't think this is true. It's more about you read what you like and you learn what's good and what's not. You get an insight to what people want to read as well as create your own style. I listed many other things in my live blog but these two really inspired me.

I think many of the tips and insight from the documentary directly relate to writing copy in the advertising world. Like I said previously, it's frustrating and we may not love it all the time. We talked about this in class as well. When first starting out in copywriting, we think of all the puns first and we think they're great. However, later we look back on these and realize they were terrible. Reading books will help up figure out our style. Even though writing an ad is way different than writing a novel, we still need to have a distinct style. This way we can be recognized. Copy is just as important in an ad as the visuals. The visuals way be great but if the copy sucks will people take the brand seriously? Probably not. One thing that I thought related most to the advertising world is the fact that bad writing is considered being stuck in the writers head and no one else understands. I feel like we do this a lot in advertising. We come up with these crazy ideas that only make sense to us and the client looks at us like we're crazy. That's why is nice to have an honest partner. There were several points in the documentary that apply to writing for ads. To me, writing for ads and writing a novel is the same thing, only different lengths of complexity.

Bad Writing Live