Examples of Outdoor Advertising

Just before Easter the third year students had their 'London Week'. The year group was split in two and each group visited one agency a day. In total the cohort visited 10 agencies in 10 days.

Some of the agencies set briefs the week before and ran a crit when the students arrived. Some agencies were even more demanding and set a brief in the morning and then critiqued the work in the afternoon. A couple of the agencies gave presentations on how to get a job in advertising, showed some of their recent work & gave advice on portfolio content, industry expectations & how to successfully make the transition from University to career.

Monday saw visits to Leo Burnett & DLKW:–

Lily Peters and Amanda Elvidge graduated from the Lincoln Creative Advertising programme last June and have been busily doing work placements ever since. After a lot of hard graft and dedication the two of them finally landed themselves a full time position at Kindred, hoorah. Here's how they got there in their own words.

Following on from Abi's report about the visit to Ogilvy, here's Emily Walker's report from the recent level 2 visit to Leo Burnett:–

“On Friday 29th November 2013 level two Creative Advertising students visited Ogilvy & Mather in Canary Wharf, London. We sat in some very cool chairs and met some very cool people.

There are many ways to get a job as a creative in an advertising agency and getting the inside knowledge on the best hints and tricks is something that all Creative Advertising students want to find out about. That's why the Creative Advertising Society organise a series of events which invite down ex-Lincoln CA students to share their experiences of getting into the industry.

The society recently invited Laura Clark and Elliott Starr to talk about life at Leo Burnett and their experiences on work placements. Laura and Elliott shared lots of useful advice with the students which will hopefully make their quest to find a job that little bit easier.

Last week saw Claire Stokes and Maria Sousa Machado pop in to talk about their time at BBH. Claire and Maria have been at the agency for nearly a year now and they explained some useful information about the BBH Barn and the opportunities for placements there. Being 'clued up' can be a significant way to fast track your progress into the Advertising industry which is why we value the experiences of our old boys and girls so much.

Following on from the post on this blog in August about Lincoln Creative Advertising graduate Vix Jagger, with her creative partner Ric Hooley (who work at ad agency BBH), creating the 'thank you' ad to English fans for the Barclays Premiership, we have an update...

The team have wasted no time in getting some good work on to television and their new spot for McDonalds is appearing nationally as this post goes to press. I'll let Laura and Elliott explain how the ad came about.


"We started our placement at Leo Burnett in January, this brief was given to us in the first few weeks, needless to say it’s been quite the journey to get to where we are now! McDonald’s have just brought out new McCafé Iced Frappés all we had to do was launch them, but our competition was coffee shops such as Starbucks which are renowned for their Frappuccino’s.


 The idea is therefore that whilst Starbucks and the like might be offering a luxurious treat, it comes at a price and therefore isn’t as accessible. McDonald’s offers the same but cheaper. “Luxury for everyone” Months of preparation and a day driving around London on our very own open top bus, in the rain, wearing sexy rain ponchos! Here’s the finished article."

Well done team, a simple idea well executed, we're lovin it.

Claire Stokes and Maria Sousa Machado graduated from the University of Lincoln Creative Advertising course in 2012. Both of them had a very successful time on the course, scooping various awards including a D&AD pencil and YCN award. The girls are currently on a placement at Bartle Bogle Hegarty and are working hard to impress the agency.

They must be doing something right because they have already produced a number of TV commercials and have more in the pipeline. It's a great testament to the girls talent that they have got so much work out at an agency as good as BBH. I'll let the girls tell you about their experiences in their own words.

"So here we are, 8 months in at BBH and is safe to say it’s been a whirlwind, the good kind! We’ve had so many great opportunities here and would definitely recommend the agency to any young teams. There are no politics, it’s simply the best idea wins, placement team or not.

Not a day goes by when we’re not rushed off our feet and we’ve been lucky enough to work on five TV ads so far. It’s been a steep learning curve in production but the satisfaction of finally seeing our work on TV has been amazing. Makes us want it all the more!

We feel like we’ve found a great fit for us here, you can really tell when an agency feels right for the type of team. We are yet to meet an unpleasant person here and the atmosphere is always positive. So we’re doing everything we can to stay as long as possible!"

Creative Advertising graduates from the University of Lincoln's class of 2012 Jade Sturman & Sophie Townsend have recently completed this fantastic trailer for BBC's Strictly Come Dancing. It airs for the first time this evening at 8pm.

Here's what they said about the ad:-

"We’ve been working on this campaign for a couple of months now. We are currently on placement at RKCR Y&R and we were the Creatives on this TV trail and the campaign as a whole.

"After receiving the brief we came up with the concept and developed it, working alongside a couple of experienced Creative Directors. The BBC then decided to go with our concept and from then on we were involved in bringing it to life. After filming the trail there was a lot of postproduction to get the desired effect, as well as editing which we also were involved in.

"This trail is the first part of the campaign; we will then have a second trail going out, which will reveal the identity of the celebrities who are featuring on the Strictly Come Dancing show. Additionally as part of this campaign we devised radio trails and other media to support the campaign, such as TV stings and VTs (which are brief interviews with the talent that will play out as a build up to the main show) among other things.

"This project has been a funny one, as we haven’t really been able to breath a word about it to anyone, but the experience and what we have learnt along the way has been so valuable… Plus our mums are chuffed!"

Last week saw the Level 2 students visit some high profile advertising agencies in London. Getting first hand experience of the ad industry is vitally important for the University of Lincoln Creative Advertising students, who focus a great deal on 'real world experience'. The agencies get to see the next generation of advertisers, and the students get to see how interesting an agency is. It's a win-win situation. I'll let the students explain in their own words how the visits went, first up Suzi Paddison who visited VCCP.

"On Friday morning Group A made their way to Victoria to visit the agency VCCP. We were all very excited knowing that we were going to get a glimpse inside the agency which created great ads for brands such as Compare the Market and O2. We were greeted on the 5th floor of Greencoat House by Josh Dando, a Creative Advertising Graduate who has been working there with his partner Steven Dodd since March 2011.


Josh then gave us a very insightful Q & A session where we learnt about their journey into the agency, what they have been working on and how the agency works together. To finish the visit we went to a meeting room where we saw a show reel of some of VCCPs most recent successful ads, a great way to end the visit.


Going to VCCP was really motivational for us all and we feel we all gained a lot of great advice on what to do after graduating, and especially as it was from someone who was in our shoes not too long ago. A big thank you to Josh and everyone at VCCP for being so welcoming!"

Whilst one group of students were visiting VCCP another group went to JWT to find out more about the agency, Emma Thomas gives us her impressions of the visit.

"For many of our second year this was their first agency visit and as we stood looking towards 1 Knightsbridge Green, you could sense the excitement and anticipation in the air. As the clock struck 10am, all eighteen of us had been handed our passes and were heading up towards JWTs reception. At the top of the escalators we were greeted with a floor to ceiling wall of multi coloured butterflies. Already people were commenting on how cool an office space they thought it was.

James Hobbs, an ex lincoln student, and his creative partner Jeremy took us to the the Bullmore Room where we began our insight into the world of JWT. After a brief introduction to the duo we took a group tour around the agency. Traffic, accounts and the creative floor were all a buzz with creative conversations of current briefs and clients.

Once the tour was over and we were back in the Bullmore Room, James and Jeremy shared with us some of JWTs recent adverts and some of their own work, guiding us through the creative process of Andrex from initial ideas to final execution. Being able to see this process was both reassuring and inspiring to all of us. After almost two hours, we'd been given a first hand insight into both JWT and what it's really like to be a creative in the industry.

As we headed back down the escalators and left through the turning door, we felt more motivated and inspired then ever before to pursue our advertising dreams."

Finally Jenni Trotter tells us how her group's visit to DLKWLowe went.

"In the afternoon of the agency visit trip to London, Group A were lucky enough to visit DLKWLowe in South Kensington. We were unsure as to what to expect from an agency going through a huge creative change at the moment, however greeted by a mix of patterned walls, huge velvet armchairs, giant lightbulb feature and gold framed televisions, the agency definitely had a welcoming and quirky feeling from the very start.

We were met by Lincoln Creative Advertising graduates Neil Ritson and Stefan van Zoggel who gave us a great chat about their journey as a creative team – from pairing up in their second year to the ups and downs of placements to then getting hired at DLKWLowe just over a year ago, going on to create work for clients such as Thorpe Park and Alton Towers. They also gave us a brilliant insight into how to create a great book by showing us their portfolio that they took to book critiques and giving us advice on how to create a book which sets your creative team apart from all the rest.

It was great to see a team from our own course who have gone on to create their own stamp in a London agency which is currently building a great reputation in the advertising industry. We all found it incredibly motivational to not only sample an agency atmosphere, but also speak to people who have once been in our shoes and are doing so well for themselves."


Visiting advertising agencies is always very motivational for the CA students but this year's trip was particularly nice because all of the agency visits were organised by former students of this course. It's very rewarding to see CA graduates who are now staff at the highest profile agencies and it's a great vindication of all that we teach on the programme.