By Design | Virginia Lu

Representative of almost every sexy, new tech toy that comes out.

Leica M9 iPhone skins!  Zomg. Love.

Editor's Note:  This was originally written for an AAU Federalists Blog segment on entry-level life in the real agency world, but I believe it will be re-cut for a more "digestible" form.  Since Media Guy's official last day was yesterday and no one reads this Tumblr, here is the original, unedited version, posted for interweb posterity.

7:45am - Early day at the office.  Our Media Guy conveniently fell asleep on me during a long night spent trying to wrap up a project, so he scheduled an 8am touch base to meet an afternoon deadline.

8am – I glance at the media aisle.  Media Guy nowhere to be found.  Great… I’m the only moron in the office that actually thinks an 8am internal meeting starts at 8am.

8:30am – Media Guy: “Everything looks good but I want you to add one more thing to represent the channel opportunities visually.  Let’s try making two semicircles, one side with drivers and the other side with destinations.  Then we’ll draw paths to show each relationship.  So there will be a bunch of lines crossing over each other - you know what I’m envisioning right?” 

(Uh, no… I actually have no clue what you’re talking about.  What you just described is a dreamcatcher.)

Me:   “Sure thing!  I’ll do it, no problem.”

Media Guy: “We’ll need a designer to help you on this.  Usually someone pretty junior takes care of profiles and personas… I think Mike Dorsey’s free.” (Ouch.)

We walk to the creative aisle (about twice as long and wide as the strategy aisle— just sayin’), to see if he can help out.

Mike: “Sure thing!  I’ll do it, no problem.”

(Juniors, account or creative, are quite the enthused bunch.  Apparently we are also physically incapable of saying the word “no.”)

Mike’s project manager: “No way.  I’ve got Dorsey until Thursday working on an iPhone app.  You can’t have him.”

Guess it’s up to me!  But I don’t know Creative Suite…  Or, do I? ;)

[Furiously toiling away at desk]

Um, so apparently I don’t.  I’ve struggled with the template for about 2 hours, and still can’t figure out how it was made.  Whoever conceived this thing was an Illustrator genius!  But this is the reality of my job, so I’m going to get this done right, one way or another.

12pm – Type has moved in transit and the vectors are shifting position [quiet panic].   I give up and decide it’s time to visit the creative bullpen.   After failed attempts by two legitimate designers, Art Director #3 comes over and is stumped as well.  They go on to debate for 20 minutes about how if I just cut some of the “content,” they could fit everything in without a problem.  Hmm… sorry guys, I know we want it to be pretty, but the “content” is this thing’s only real purpose.  I am then told there is no solution.

2:30pm As a last resort, I ping a former fellow student of mine at Academy of Art, emailing her the Iris of Satan, in hopes that she might know how to solve the problem.  Miraculously, she does.  (“Scale Strokes & Effects,” what in blue blazes…?)  Academy of Art has proven itself against all odds again.  She promptly tells me that I, along with every designer at my agency, should be fired and she should be hired in our place.  I thank her politely and hang up.

3:59pm – The PDF is off to the client about a minute before it’s due.  I get the stink eye from the Account Director while Media Guy presents my deck.  Dagnamit, he’s good.  Online behavior, buying styles, media consumption, lifestyles, attitudes… this is basically the first time he’s seen the material and he’s ripping through it like he just spent 30 wrist-cutting hours data-mining (no wait, that was me).   Thus is the life of the junior, deemed unworthy of speaking in front of a client (and rightfully so, to be perfectly honest—I can’t do what he just did).  Four days of research, condensed into 10 minutes of shining presentation glory.  Or sheer horror.  It’s about 50/50 right now.

So the moral of this story for all you future [junior] planners and strategists:  1) Book the designer well in advance so you can focus on doing your job.  2) Stop bitching and be grateful that at least your agency is not making you work in Excel.  3) Don’t get bogged down by something that’s probably ending up in the appendix anyway. 

 As a new addition to the Organic team, bright eyed, bushy-tailed, and fresh out of ad school, I can generally be categorized as a sort of receptacle for all things advertising.  Good, bad, or unsound, it all goes in.  This tends to be the case for most of my peers, since we have no real world experience to back up any harebrained ideas of our own.  Let me clarify: this is the case about 99.9% of the time.  The other .1% is accounted for by social media – a topic that often has young people raising the skeptical eyebrow of a harrowed, old pro.  Most social media “strategies” are composed of hasty tactics with the social punch of a Texas Instruments Facebook fan page.  So imagine my intrigue when I was asked to cover a session at Mediapost’s OMMA conference, grittily-titled, Media Agencies: Making Social REALLY Work for Your Clients.

Moderated by Richard Rocca from Six Apart, OMMA pulled together a nicely rounded panel including Ekaterina Walter (Intel), Blake Cahill (Visible Technologies), Eric Porres (Lotame Solutions), Matthew DiPietro (Federated Media), and our very own David Lewis, strategist extraordinaire and longtime Organic SF staple.  Points of view were thrown down and many a metaphor made.  Matthew DiPietro referred to social media as the “ocean we’re all swimming in.”  Richard Rocca likened it to a “party” in which we would have to seek out and make better through “food and drink” (social tools and conversation).  David Lewis challenged us with the question, “If you do happen to find the party, are you even invited?”  A valid point, often overlooked by too eager marketers. 

Popular topics seemed to be centered on authenticity.  Matthew DiPietro stated it’s the wrong idea for a brand to try and “build” a community when there are so many out there and active already.  It’s about adding value and enabling the established ecosystems.   Driving the point home was David Lewis, who emphasized the importance of successfully seeding the conversations that are already happening.

Blake Cahill reminded us to think across channels and be consistent.  A company cannot just say, “let’s try Twitter this month,” and then drop the effort if they don’t get the response they desire.  It’s important to keep the conversation going because once a brand taps into social media, their audience will continue to expect them there.  Richard Rocca told us not to think of social media as a self-sustaining community you can just set up and let run amok.   It’s a long-term commitment - a “continuum” as David Lewis put it.  The highlight for me was when Ekaterina Walter fervently threw her hands up and said, “Please do not say, ‘Social media is free!  It’s cheap!  Let’s just hire an intern.’  This is absolutely the wrong way to go about it.  Social media is important and should be treated as something that represents the brand.  It has [the opportunity] to do damage and needs expertise.”* 

So what have we learned?  Social Media is a culture of transparency that lives and dies by authenticity.  It must be nurtured and embraced as a lifelong element of a brand.  Well Twitter me surprised, it looks like some agencies really do know a thing or two about social.

...ignoring the fact that it's located in the International terminal and I always forget, everything about this brand experience blows the other airlines out of the water.  I am currently posting this from thousands of feet in the air, en route to San Diego (wifi on the house, until Jan 15).  Oh, how I love you, Virgin.  Let me count the ways:

1. Free premium drinks

2. Tweeting while listening to Ted Talks on Red (bonus points for being the top web pick)

3. Fancy, comfy earphones for free (I'm looking at you, JetBlue)

4. Beautiful safety video that is not only watchable, but actually memorable

5. Extra leg room when you have to change your flight last minute and get stuck in the emergency row

6. Local beer from 21st Amendment

6. Tiny boarding passes that actually fit in your pocket

7. And the most important of all - $50 flights