Well I’ve been on vacation. Man vacation is awesome. Time away from this ad game that we lose at more than we win at it seems. I’m refreshed and looking at things in a different perspective. (We’ll see how long this lasts.) At any rate I ran across this article in the ever so brilliant Denver Egotist and thought it was a great quick reminder of how to sell what we do. I forget some of these key steps all of the time. I did find it interesting that the …

I just started reading a new book to help with my presentation skills. I’m not a horrible presenter but trying to become a great one so I picked up this book from Amazon for about $20. I haven’t even finished it yet but I’m already loving it. It’s written by an account guy, which I was very skeptical about at first, but it has some great insights and Steel makes some great points about presenting, client management, and keeping the ideas simple and impactful.
He also pulls examples from his experience …

Account people can freak out worse than clients (more of a reminder than something new)
EVERYTIME you are on production. I repeat EVERYTIME you get that call of “we have a hot new assignment for you guys. We know you are shooting but it’s DUE in two days.”
Porn can be a slippery slope to a worse addiction.
Fax machines are still around.
The gradient feather tool in InDesign is AMAZING.
Tampons + water + microwave = great steam effects for food photography but, sometimes a cigarette is better.
You can sell soap by talking about …

Even though I wasn’t alive during the “golden age” of advertising `a la ‘MAD MEN’, I can’t help but believe that popular culture (& therefore ad culture) has gone incredibly soft since that time. Case in point: I was recently told by some account people that a super I wrote for a web video needed to be changed because “there will be a legal problem” once the lawyers see it. The radical, incendiary statement in question- “This is where concept becomes reality”. Yep. Legal will have a problem with that …