{"id":23944,"date":"2021-01-11T09:03:59","date_gmt":"2021-01-11T13:03:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?p=23944"},"modified":"2021-01-18T01:36:26","modified_gmt":"2021-01-18T05:36:26","slug":"advertising-industry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/advertising-industry\/","title":{"rendered":"Advertising Industry Overview: Your Complete Guide"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

What is the advertising industry like? What kind of jobs are available in the advertising industry?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The advertising industry has grown over the last century. There are still major traditional ad agencies, as well as new opportunities in growing areas of marketing and advertising<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read this advertising industry overview to learn more about working in advertising.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Advertising Industry Overview<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

In the previous part, we looked at the craft of advertising. Now we\u2019ll zoom out and look at the domestic advertising industry as a whole from the point of view of employees, heads of agencies, clients, and the public. Then, we\u2019ll look at international advertising<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the time of the book\u2019s writing, fewer than 100,000 people worked in advertising in the U.S. and 15,000 in Britain, but the ad industry wasn\u2019t as unstable as newspapers would have you believe\u2014papers reported only on accounts that moved, not the ones that stayed. Only 4% of accounts changed agencies per year, and of the 25 biggest agencies in 1972, 24 were still the biggest agencies in 1983.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Employees<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

First: If you\u2019re not passionate about advertising, go do something else. Advertising pays well, but so do plenty of other professions that are easier and don\u2019t require as much passion. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you\u2019re sure you want to work in advertising, it\u2019s important to consider education, employers, positions, how to properly apply for a job, and how to keep it once you have it. Keep this in mind if you want to work in the advertising industry. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Education<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

At the time of the book\u2019s writing, 87 U.S. universities offered undergraduate courses in advertising and some offered degree programs. However, many of the instructors didn\u2019t have practical experience in advertising and didn\u2019t do research, and the textbooks were bad. Therefore, the big agencies preferred to hire smart people with degrees in other fields<\/strong>, such as economics, and the people who studied advertising ended up at smaller firms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Employers<\/strong> in the Advertising Industry<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

There are four types of employers in the advertising industry:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

  1. Media outlets<\/strong>, such as radio stations that sell advertising space or time.<\/li>
  2. Retailers<\/strong>, such as Sears, that have their own marketing departments and hire for jobs such as art director or copywriter.<\/li>
  3. Manufacturing companies<\/strong>, such as Proctor & Gamble, that need brand managers.<\/li>
  4. Advertising agencies<\/strong>, such as Ogilvy & Mather, that hire for a variety of positions. <\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    Ogilvy only ever worked in agencies, so this is the only category his book  covers in detail. Agencies tend to be interesting places to work\u2014you can move internally, the culture is stimulating, and agencies often have an international presence, so you can work anywhere in the world (it helps if you speak the local language).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    When you start your career, prioritize learning opportunities over salary.<\/strong> Look for an agency in the ad industry at which the top people teach interns, and the established employees are still open to professional development.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    What is the advertising industry like? What kind of jobs are available in the advertising industry? The advertising industry has grown over the last century. There are still major traditional ad agencies, as well as new opportunities in growing areas of marketing and advertising. 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