Day Six!

Today turned out to be quite an interesting day….

                To kick it all off, I went to the HP Master Class in the Young Lion’s Zone.  It was alright… it was a topic with a very cool outcome but the presentation was slightly disjointed.  They had done a campaign for Billboard magazine and had created different fonts that corresponded to different singers’ lives.  Some of the letters were fairly hard to distinguish but they had clearly put a lot of time and effort into it. They also remade stars’ faces with the faces of what they would consider their influences.  They also had an out of home component where you could pick your influences, take a picture, and then print your newly compiled face off of Flickr later in the day. The company brought in a software guy to write a program just to make the images which is now to sale but very expensive.  They also talked about how easy digital printing could make a project.  They redid a whole building, inside and out, in one day and it looked very professional.  It’s really quite impressive what they can do with digital printing. (In the HP White Zone I would have loved to have taken the bean bag home!)

                Next up was a meeting with the CEO of BBDO Atlanta. He was a lot more down to earth than I would have thought and has a son who is at the same stage of the game of life as some of us so his information really hit home.  His first point of the meeting was that creative communication is eleven times more effective in the market place.  People don’t want to see the same old ads and being creative is a way to create that competitive advantage.  Next, he pressed upon us that this is the Golden Age of Creativity because everything can be used as a media vehicle.  Technological advancements have made much more possible than ever before (i.e. re-do an entire building in one day using digital printing).  He thinks that there will be technological advances in the next ten years as there have been in the last twenty-five years…. Which is a little daunting when you think about the technological advances in the last twenty-five years!  He also emphasized that great work is a team sport and that nothing will get done without it.  To have a successful integrated campaign you have to have a team to orchestrate the different facets.  There has to be a leader and a supporting cast… very much like a hit band.  By taking all of these principles, it will help to win awards which will in turn attract clients.  Clients are interested in taking risks in this current economic climate which seems to be the perfect breeding ground for some astounding work.

                After the talk, Sandy and I stayed to answer some questions for Porter Novelli on camera.  I had a wonderful talk with a woman from Porter Novelli who stressed that people came to public relations through all channels… which as a nontraditional major was great to hear!! Then it was my turn on camera… it made me a little nervous but the guy for Porter Novelli was very encouraging and apparently I hit the right buzz words because I got a lot of thumbs up. The camera men were less than enthused with me because apparently I move around a little too much… but I supposed I made a nervous face (shocking right?) and he was quick to reassure me that it was fine this time because they were professionals but that I might was to hold still for next time.  The interviews we did will be spliced into a video that Porter Novelli is doing for Cannes… it will be interesting to see what makes it into the video!

                Also interesting, one of the BBDO Atlanta men asked for my email after confirming that I was graduating in December… it will be interesting to see what happens there!

xoxo

Kitty