If you're a copywriter or art director looking for a new position with an ad agency or marketing department, your portfolio is every bit as instrumental to getting a job as your ability to give a good interview. In fact, most hiring managers won't see you until they've seen your work. So if your book isn't good enough to impress an agency recruiter or/and creative director on its own, you may never get past the reception desk. Here are some tips on how to showcase your work to its best advantage whether you're just out of school or an award-winning veteran.
Less is more.
Keep your book to 12 or 15 pieces! Whenever possible, show campaigns of two or three ads each rather than single pieces. Quality counts! You're better off with one outstanding campaign and two others that are almost as good, than your best work plus a lot of off-strategy filler. Print ads are favored over storyboards.
The bounds of good taste.
Break-through creative is, almost by definition, unsettling. But to make sure that your work hasn't gone too far, show it to two or three other people and ask them what they think. If two out of three seem to have trouble meeting your eye, you may want to choose another campaign. An offensive campaign may be easily remembered, but to your detriment.
When you're in the room?
Good advertising should be able to stand on its own. Yet judging an ad fairly, often depends on knowing what the objective was and what obstacles or limitations the creative team had to overcome. Let's say you were asked to create an ad that would boost the hits on a client's website by 100 per cent on a total budge of $200. Keeping within budget, you created a black and white tombstone ad that exceeded the client's goal ten times over. Creative directors won't know the full story behind an ad unless you tell them.
Once you decide which campaigns to include, create a presentation sheet for each one that describes the client, your strategic objective, the concept rationale and the results of your work. Presenting this information upfront not only shows off the work better, it demonstrates just how good your communication skills really are.
Presentation skills are huge.
The sheets in your portfolio can serve as notes when you're making a verbal presentation of your work. Use them to help you explain the project's objectives and the rationale for the creative. An interview is an ideal opportunity to show how you would do in a client presentation, so the more polished you are the better.
You should also be able to tell how you came up with your ideas. Did you read 20 articles about the product on the internet, interview people who used the product, see it written in the foam in your cappuccino. Don't be afraid to tell the back-story (in brief).
Edit your book for every viewer.
If you're interviewing with a head hunter or staffing agency, your book should show a variety of products, approaches and projects. If you're interviewing directly with an agency, try to put in at least one piece (real or "spec") that's relevant to a product they might actually have as a client. Remember, a successful job search begins by marketing yourself effectively. And your portfolio should be the most powerful weapon in your arsenal.
Wendi Lalli is a copy supervisor and brand strategist for Lanyap. She has years of experience across a variety of communications disciplines includes marketing, advertising and public relations. She is also a portfolio advisor, available to meet marketing students by appointment.
