Visit to DDB Advertising Agency

On the last day of our trip to London we went on a group visit to an advertising agency. We had a talk from an art buyer called Daniel Moorey. He gave us an explanation of what his position at the agency entails, which is basically to find the right designer/photographer to create an advertisement. The concepts are usually thought up by the art directors and the designers are usually commissioned on the merit of their style. For a long time I thought that designers were left to their own devices when given an advertising brief, it has only been recently that I have discovered otherwise. It is quite a strict process as there are so many people to please and advertising is a big money industry. Daniel shown us a number of examples where illustrators have been commissioned by DDB Advertising Agency. My favourites were the marmite adverts by Al Murphy which very cleverly had different meanings when turned upside down, to show either “love them” or “hate them”. More of Al Murphy’s work can be found on http://www.al-murphy.com/

Daniel told us that to work in advertising it can be quite beneficial to have an agent. They will ensure you get a fair price for your work, which is quite difficult to estimate with no experience. Some companies with teams which have a creative background will empathise with low paid designers and give a fair price but in general they try to pay as little as possible. So having someone to negotiate the price enables illustrators to spend more time on designs. He mentioned a few agency websites which he looks at to commission illustrators from. One of them being Big Active, which has designers from many different backgrounds like photography, graphic design and illustration. http://www.bigactive.com/illustration A sight like this gives the art buyer a wide variety all in one place. Siggi Eggertsson whose work I have shown previously on my blog is featured on big active. Daniel explained that if an illustrator like Siggi was to create advertising work he should charge a premium for his style, as his illustrations are so distinctive future clients will see his work and associate it immediately with the previous companies he has worked for. This could deter them from commissioning him as it’s unlikely they will want to give the impression that they are associated with the previous work.
As well as looking to agencies to commission designers DDB’s art buying team have built up a large resource of designers from people contacting them like we have recently been doing. He gave us a couple of tips on how to ensure our work will be looked at by the recipient. He said the title of the email often gives a clue to whether the content will be any good. Usually something entitled forename surname photography is predictable and this is reflected in the work. Also because the art director/art buyer receives so many of these emails every day they want to be able to look at them quickly. So sending a PDF is not always a good idea as the computer opens up Adobe reader which takes up more of their time than necessary. He said that it would perhaps be better to include images onto the actual email itself along with a link to a website (which unfortunately I haven’t got yet). Many of the emails Daniel receive end up being deleted but when he likes the work and he feels it will adapt well to advertisements we saves the link to the website into a file on his computer. He also meets with a lot of designers. Along with the two other buyers on his team they try to meet with at least one designer a day to ensure they are up to date with new talent. So he said we are free to send him work if we like, and he will be more inclined to look at it as we have had the first introduction of going in to meet him. I don’t really see myself working in advertisement but this will be something to bear in mind for the future.

Link to DDB London main site- http://www.ddblondon.com/