The hardest part of an advertising career is getting into your first agency. There are hundreds of bright young people who would love an advertising job, but only a small number of vacancies each year for newcomers.
For any kind of work, you need your basic skills - a degree in English or psychology, or at least some impressive VCE results. Media and account service will look for some evidence of maths ability. Computer skills need to be more than adequate these days - so many agencies are rooms packed with hunched hackers. So you need to make yourself good - a bit of an expert. If your inclination is artistic, study graphic design and computer graphics.
But most importantly, you need a real vision and desire to get involved with marketing. Agencies have tended to value selling ability, street smarts and flair, over purely academic honours. They don't give points for meekness. And you'll never get a start-up agency job through a search site - by the time you see it on your screen, it's gone.
So your first and most important selling job will be persuading the agency's general manager or creative director, that they want to give that precious spare seat in the office to you.
Some of the most seriously determined door-knockers are those who signed up for RMIT's three-year advertising studies course. In their determination to meet the prospective employers, they now run an annual "RMIT Pitch Night", a type of speed-dating game where agency and client management meet third-year students, eat sushi and browse their portfolios. They have gained sponsorship from the likes of Greys, George Patterson Y&R, Ogilvy & Mather and marketing magazine B&T, for the most recent event.
Like speed dating the students have a limited time to speak with industry guests, impress them with their work and personality, and hopefully get that important "let's talk" phone call in the morning.
Back in the 1990s, the late Seth Prokop devised a brilliant RMIT advertising short course. It would take about 30 keen students and over the first two months they were lectured on the various components of an agency, what each job involved, and a basic understanding of marketing.
Then for the last two months they had to form themselves into "agencies" with designated titles: managing director, media manager, creative director, art director, research manager.
They were then given a brief. One was the setting up of a national pizza chain; another time it was launching a new pasta sauce - with Heinz participating as the "client". Each agency received the same brief and had to develop a full campaign, with the same allotted "budget".
The amount of work those kids put into their agency was amazing. I had delivered some of the lectures and was part of the client's judging panel. I was highly impressed by the quality of research they carried out, the creative ideas they developed, the bright media innovations, the professionalism of the documents they produced.
They learned so much, not by sitting receiving lectures but by being a functioning advertising agency. They also learned the torture of being in a competitive pitch with not very sympathetic clients and hostile competitors. And for all but one agency, there was the pain of failing to win.
Not all of the kids got their agency job, but a surprisingly large number of them did. They were able to approach the pavement-pounding, door-knocking weeks ahead with a determination and confidence that got them noticed, and often opened a door.
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