Examples of Outdoor Advertising

Do things that will make your mother proud is an agency motto. Mother prides itself on the collaborative efforts of all its sons and daughters. A tool they use to achieve this is using one giant table in the centre of the room; this throws different expertise into the mix that is the creative department at Mother. Accounts, strategists, creatives, finance and directors all sit in no particular order around this table. The dotted effect of various specialists is an attempt to bring down the walls between departments, all for the greater good of the creative process.

The process that Mother focuses on is ‘strategy before media’. Something that sets Mother apart from other agencies is the fact that they employ strategists to work closely with the creatives. Mother must be doing something right, as they remain one of the only large independent advertising agencies in London.

After the presentation strategist Bruno Frankel handed us a day brief. This brief was for a Stella Artois Christmas campaign. We were given roughly four and half-hours to come up with campaigns for a crit later on in the afternoon. This gave us a chance to explore the agency a little bit more. A creative environment of graffiti, giant plastic animals and the famous wall full of framed photographs of employees’ mums.

The experience at Mother London was informative, insightful and a lot of fun. I feel that this agency has made the students of Lincoln's Creative Advertising course leave London with a strong aspiration of what type of agency they want to work for.

Mother knows best.

On Friday morning we were given the opportunity to visit 4Creative, the in-house advertising agency for Channel 4. It was a completely different setup to the other agencies we had visited that week, they are more of a production company that does their own advertising.
We met by past Lincoln Creative Advertising graduates Greg & Mike and they had arranged for us to have an extremely useful talk from Ed Webster about the type of work they produce, from TV promo trails to direct mail books sent out to fans and we heard many stories about the Channel 4 celebrities he'd had the opportunity to work with.
It was very helpful to see an agency that follows their work through from concept to final execution, the quicker-than-normal turnaround of work and also the wide range of projects they produce from comedy for E4 to the more serious documentary work for More4.

Following on from the last post, here's a student review of the third year's recent visit to Inferno.


You can judge an agency from what it's boardroom chairs are like: comfy, leather and reclining, they even had wheels! This was a good sign. Feeling accepted was key and that is exactly what Inferno did, talked to us like we have worked there for years not just students who have come for the day.

After working in numerous coffee shops for six hours we returned to Inferno at the end of the day for the crit. Everyone was in a silent yet confident mood. I wouldn’t class it as a crit - it was more of a chance to discuss and evolve an idea. In fact the only thing to worry about was getting in the way of someone trying to play pool!


Overall my experience of Inferno was fantastic. I do wish we had been able to work in the agency for the day but I understand that Inferno had lots of work on, so space was limited. The worst part of the day was having to leave the free beer that was offered because my lift arrived! Hey ho.

Following on from the last post, here's a student review of the third year's recent visit to Creature.

The third years have just returned to Lincoln following a very busy and intense week in London where, between them, they visited 8 top London ad agencies and a recruitment agency.

During the week they visited The Talent Business, AMV BBDO, DLKW Lowe, Creature, Mother, VCCP, Ogilvy, Inferno and 4Creative.

The next few blog posts are reports from the students telling how they got on and what they learned.

AMV BBDO - Lucy Everett

AMV BBDO’s mission when it first started was to simply be the best communications agency.

With this in mind, when we were all set a brief to advertise the Museum of Childhood via digital media as well as ambient, we knew the message needed to be clear and simple.

Our agency visit consisted of a morning critique of the work that we had produced for the above brief with Creative Partner Mark Fairbanks followed with a new brief to complete during the course of the day. We were split into groups, given a middleweight creative team to use for their vast knowledge and were to complete the task of convincing people our age to start their pension scheme.

The day allowed us to tackle the brief, learn more about how AMV’s creatives tackle new briefs as well as learn how the industry works.

At 5pm we had our final crit with the other teams and Mark, each team presented their numerous ideas and we discussed which ideas were the most effective, learning about how best to target the audience, how to present in an agency and what worked best.

Overall the day was a huge success as we each learned all about new aspects of the industry, AMV as an agency and how our teams work under pressure. It was a fantastic opportunity for broadening our knowledge and advertising skills.

Yesterday the third years on the Creative Advertising course at the University of Lincoln had a talk from Andy Peel of the Young Creative Council.

Andy gave some great advice on how to find placements, portfolio content, life after graduation, networking tips and some of the differences between regional and London agencies.

Not only that, he showed us some of the latest work he's completed at a range of agencies as well as showing us some of the recent activities of the wonderful YCC.

Thanks Andy - very entertaining and very much appreciated!

With such a short amount of time to produce a large amount of work the pressure is really on.

Check back in late March when we'll be updating you on the students progress during their live client presentations.

Yesterday the third year art directors were lucky enough to have a full day workshop with world-renowned advertising art director Alex Taylor.

Acknowledged as one of the UK’s most respected and acclaimed art directors, Alex Taylor has gained an international reputation for her prolific award-winning work in advertising.

Our students like to embrace all culture, from Shakespeare to internet memes.

They also like to celebrate when they hit a deadline and hand in for a competition.

Finally-

-and perhaps more than anything-

-they like to dance.

In order to be good at Creative Advertising you need to be able to construct a good argument. Constructing good arguments requires looking at things from all sides and only when you fully understand your subject can you create innovative and persuasive advertising strategies.

That's why the Creative Advertising course holds an annual Great Debate competition between the Level 1 and 2 students. The students have to know the subjects they will be debating inside out and be able to present an equally good case for and against their subject matter. The students don't know which side of the argument they will be promoting until they enter the 'debating arena' and only have a couple of minutes to compose themselves before the battle of minds begins. Preparation is key and the students that have done the most extensive research will inevitably progress the furthest in the competition.


The competition runs at a hectic pace with second years and first years squaring off against each other whilst the third years sit in judgement and decide which teams proceed into the next round. The questions range from the esoteric to the plain bizarre and a successful debater doesn't allow their personal feelings to enter into the discussion – it's all about creating the strongest argument.

After much heated debate thirty six teams were whittled down to just two, Joe Lovett & Becky Cartey Vs Harry Price & Alicia Job making up an all first year final. After a titanic struggle Joe and Becky emerged as this years Great Debate champions and will get the chance to defend their crown in next years competition.


All this debating is great practice for developing a sound advertising brain and keeps everybody sharp. Now, which is best, poster advertising or social media?