A few things I've learned along the way during my time as an account planner / strategist / copywriter / interactive hybrid of sorts -- presented to the smart advertising students at the University of North Carolina. Presenter notes not included so some slides may not have too much context. Feel free to reach out with any questions.

1. 10 THINGS TO KNOW
WHEN STARTING OUT IN
THE ADVERTISING INDUSTRY
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
March 5, 2014

2. ALTERNATIVE TITLE:
STUFF I LEARNED ALONG
THE WAY THAT MAY OR MAY
NOT MAKE THE NEXT FEW MONTHS
OF YOUR LIFE SLIGHTLY LESS BEWILDERING

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Hi.
* by the way, this is no longer my phone number. email, yes.

5. One day Alice came to a fork in the road and saw a Cheshire cat in a tree.
“Which way do I take,” she asked.
“Where do you want to go?” was his response.
“I don’t know,” Alice answered.
“Then,” said the cat, “it doesn’t matter.”

6. 1
YOU’LL ALWAYS BE A STUDENT.

8. HE ANTI-WIND TUNNEL MARKETING MOVEMENT. BRAND DARWINISM. METCALFE’S LAW
PRINCIPLE OF ALACRITY. DIVERGENT VS CONVERGENT THINKING. YELPIFICATION. DATA
PETE BLABER THREE MIND PHASES. VIPASSANA. EXAMPLES OF CULTURAL TENSION. DIX
MARA’S LAW. ANDREW EHRENBERG. THE BRAND MOTIVATION MANIFESTO. PARTICIPAT
5 PERCENT CREATIVITY CHALLENGE. SYMBOLIC SELF COMPLETION. RICHARD SEYMOU
BILL BUXTON’S LONG NOSE THEORY. THE BOOK OF GOSSAGE. TEMPORAL PLASTICITY.
WRITE YOUR OWN TEXTBOOK.
OHN BARTLE & POSITIVE PLANNING. AARON KOBLIN’S FLIGHT PATTERNS. KEEP WALKIN
OMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE BY MICHAEL PORTER. LATENT VALUES. WORDS TO STRATEGI
LONG NOSE THEORY. HERE COMES EVERYBODY. ACHIEVING CULTURAL STASIS. MEMEO
VIRAL SPREAD & ABSORPTION RATE. THE RATIONALITY PARADOX. 2010 ONE SHOW QU
MARKETING IN THE ERA OF ACCOUNTABILITY. SIX DEGREES OF SEPARATION. PAUL ADA
HE FLYNN EFFECT. HOMOPHILY. DON PEPPER’S ONE TO ONE MARKETING. LEE CLOW’S
POSITIVE EXTERNALITIES. GILMORE & PINE. MAO ZEDONG’S PEST CAMPAIGN. CHANGI
STEFAN SAGMEISTER’S HAPPINESS PROJECT. DAN WIEDEN’S GENERATION OF NEW CO
HOW TO WIN FRIENDS & INFLUENCE PEOPLE. MARSHALL MCLUHAN. ANCIENT CHINES
CRITICAL MASS CROSSOVER. DISNEY VS PIXAR STORYTELLING TECHNIQUES. HAWTHOR
STEPHEN KING ON WRITING. EMOTIONAL CONTAGION. ZUCKERBERG’S LAW. PATAGON
ST ELMO LEWIS. MYTHS ABOUT WHAT CONSUMERS WANT. CORPORATE ACCOUNTABIL
UX HIERARCHY OF NEEDS. THE NEGATIVE PATH TO HAPPINESS. BANKSY’S BRANDALISM
ALVIN TOFFLER & PROSUMERS. MIRABILE DICTU. BRIEFING FOR PARTICIPATION. PHASE
SEVEN ASSUMPTIONS OF TWITTER. THE SOCRATIC METHOD. PRODUCTION AS STRATEG
HEART BY GOOGLE. DAN ARIELY’S ECONOMIST SUBSCRIPTIONS. THE SHIRKY PRINCIPLE

9. CONNECT WITH THE COMMUNITY
THE PLANNERSPHERE
JUNIOR STRATEGY
PLANNING TOOLS &
HACKS
Junior Strategy
THE PLANNING
SALON

10. >
LEARN FROM LEADERS
Skillshare, Cousera, other online MOOCs
Account Planning School of the Web >

11. We discovered methane on Mars.
Methane is the byproduct… it’s part of the
gaseous effluences of anaerobic bacteria
which on earth operates deep in the
intestinal tracks of farm animals.
That’s a really scientific way of
saying, “there are Mars farts.”
41:10

12. 2
WATCH. THE. WORK.

13. THE BEST WAY TO MAKE GOOD MUSIC
IS TO LISTEN TO GOOD MUSIC.

14. "We are like dwarfs sitting on the shoulders of
giants. We see more, and things that are more
distant, than they did, not because our sight is
superior or because we are taller than they, but
because they raise us up, and by their great
stature add to ours.”
John of Salisbury, 1159

15. A GOOD PLACE TO START:
CREATIVITY-ONLINE
COMMUNICATION ARTS
THE ONE SHOW
ADFREAK
ADAGE
PSFK
CONTAGIOUS
TRENDWATCHING
ADS OF THE WORLD
LÜRZER’S ARCHIVE
COLORIBUS
AWARD ANNUALS
etc……

16. GO A STEP FURTHER. TRY TO DISSECT IDEAS.
WHAT CHALLENGE DID THIS PIECE OF COMMUNICATIONS SOLVE?
!
WHY DID THIS PARTICULAR MEDIA CHANNEL MAKE SENSE?
!
HOW DOES THIS IDEA DIFFER FROM CATEGORY CONVENTIONS?
!
WHAT MAKES THIS WORK PARTICULARLY MEMORABLE?
!
WHAT IS THE KEY INSIGHT?
!
HOW IS THIS RELEVANT TO CULTURE? IS IT?
!
WHAT DOES THIS WORK SAY ABOUT THE BRAND’S AUDIENCE?
!
HOW COULD THIS IDEA EXTEND ACROSS DIFFERENT CHANNELS?
!
HOW WOULD YOU ARTICULATE THIS IDEA IN ONE SENTENCE?
!
[ for example ]

17. ALIEN = “Jaws In Space”

18. 3
BECOME A “WONDER JUNKIE.”
* Carl Sagan’s “Contact” (1985)

19. THE PICASSO PRINCIPLE

20. “You are a mashup of everything you let into your life.”
- Paula Scher

22. “Planners have no responsibilities. Not really. Which
means you’ll never be that important. But it makes
you free to think about the right stuff, and gives
you the time to consider stuff. Everyone else in the
agency actually has to get stuff done and often
don’t have the time to think. You do. So you should.
!
- Russell Davies

23. 4
QUESTION EVERYTHING.

27. Your value to an agency or to a client or to this
industry lies in your ability to poke holes in the
world around you, to question things that nobody
else ever thought to question and to devote
yourself to making sense of stuff that others simply
aren’t willing to.

29. CHALLENGE CONVENTIONAL THOUGHT WHENEVER
CONVENTIONAL THOUGHT IS NOT BEING CHALLENGED

30. The interview:
You need to test an agency to see if it’s the right fit
just as much as the agency is testing you for the right fit.
!
(don’t let this be your job interview)

31. 5
PICK A BOSS, NOT AN AGENCY.*
* 88% sure this is not mine but I have no idea where it came from

32. TWO TYPES OF MINDSETS*:
1. Those who want to go work for a company to make it successful
2. Those who want to go work for a successful company
*Jamie Zawinski

35. 6
IDEAS, NOT ADS.

36. SHOW IDEAS, NOT ADS
Okay, maybe some ads, too

37. “Portfolios now contain app ideas,
experiential stunts, short-film scripts and
real-time marketing ideas. It’s great, but it
makes it hard to judge whether a student can
come up with long-lasting brand ideas, or
just random one-offs.”
- Lars Bastholm, Rosetta
“ We w a n t s t u d e n t s t o g o b e y o n d …
integration and ask, ‘What purpose does this
provide the user and what can I do to make
the user’s life better?’ ’What is [the behavior]
that can help us come up with the creative so
that it’s a sound creative strategy?’
-John Militello, Google

38. A PORTFOLIO IS NOT JUST A SHOWCASE OF YOUR
WORK, IT’S A REFLECTION OF HOW YOU WORK.
Stop making things. This world doesn’t need
any more stuff. It needs smarter systems. It
needs better ways to connect things that
already exist. Become obsessed with
connections, all sorts of connections —
useful, fun, unexpected, helpful, informative.
Then think how to insert things into them so
that you create something new.”
- Ana Andjelic

40. 7
ABANDON PERFECTION.

41. “THE SHOW DOESN’T GO ON BECAUSE IT’S READY.
IT GOES ON BECAUSE IT’S 11:30.”
- Lorne Michaels.

42. It took me much too long to realize:
DON’T FOCUS ON BEING SMART.
FOCUS ON BEING USEFUL.

43. “To feel absolutely right is
the beginning of the end.”
Albert Camus

44. 8
DON’T BE A DICK.

45. Cognitive biology proves that assholes are
just underdeveloped human beings
“The size of the human brain has tripled in the past
three million years; much of this growth is devoted to
interpersonal capabilities such as empathy and
cooperative planning.
!
In the harsh conditions faced by our ancestors,
cooperation aided survival; thus, factors that promote
cooperation have been woven into your brain. These
include altruism, generosity, concern about reputation,
fairness, language, forgiveness and morality and
religion.”

46. USE EMPATHY TO YOUR OWN ADVANTAGE
* MIT’s Agnes technology

47. 9
SPEND MORE TIME WITH PEOPLE
OUTSIDE OF THE AD INDUSTRY.

48. IT’S EASY TO FORGET THAT THESE PEOPLE
ARE NOT YOUR AUDIENCE.

49. THESE PEOPLE ARE.

50. ADVERTISEMENTS ARE LIKE THE SPECIAL EFFECTS IN
MOVIES. YOU DON’T NEED TO KNOW MUCH ABOUT HOW
THEY ARE MADE TO KNOW WHETHER OR NOT THEY SUCK.

51. 10
DON’T BELIEVE PEOPLE WHO
TELL YOU THAT THERE IS A
10-STEP LIST TO BECOMING
SUCCESSFUL IN ADVERTISING.

52. Not even me.

53. TEN THINGS TO KEEP IN MIND:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
You’ll always be a student
Watch the work.
Become a wonder junkie.
Question everything.
Pick a boss, not an agency.
Ideas, not ads.
Abandon perfection.
Don’t be a dick.
Spend more time with people
outside of the ad industry
10. Don’t believe anyone who tells you
there is a simple 10-point list

54. ME
YOU ARE THE FUTURE.

55. THANKS!