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Define Advertising Agency Lingo

January 12, 2009

Outlined below are industry terms, this article is broken down into two parts, the first part are actual terms used extensively throughout the industry, the second part have come from Advertising Agency Blogger George Parker. Those terms have somewhat made it into mainstream when describing the industry.

If you work in the industry, you will see these terms thrown around. After you see the normal terms, you will really enjoy the George Parker Terms on the second half.

Advertising Agency / Ad Agency = Any firm that primarily uses original creative work to help promote a third party client.

ACD = (Associate or Assistant) Creative Director — the creative directors assistant or second in command.

CD = Creative Director — basically approves and / or creates all the promotional work within the agency.

Books = Advertising History of artwork / ads that an individual created. Used primarily by individuals looking for work at an advertising agency.

Creative = This is the actual ad that is made for the client, they are generally called creative or copy withing the industry.

Concept Creative = These are concepts and unfinished subjected to client or Creative Director approval to go out.

Holding Company = half dozen or so firms that literally own the vast majority of advertising dollars. Many advertising agencies are nothing more than front names of these massive companies.

Media Buyers = Individuals that go out an literally purchase media on behalf of the client. They generally negotiate terms and act as purchasing agents. This includes (but not limited to) internet, print, TV, display, outdoor and other types of media.

Account Executives = Generally the point of contact within the agency for the client, mostly in “accounts” department. For smaller agencies sometimes the Creative Director might be the “account executive”

Account Review = This is when the client is having questions regarding the performance of their current advertising agency. Generally the client floats out a request for proposal, and solicits active bids from a short list of agencies to see if it is worth jumping ship to a new advertising agency.

Agency of Record = a term that means a company has outsourced it’s entire promotional and creative work to an advertising agency, at that point the advertising agency is the “agency of record” for company X.

Measured Media Spend = This is generally used to judge the value of a company in advertising dollars. If a company media spend is 10 million, that means that they spend roughly 10 million a year on measurable media. An example would be 4 million for TV, 2 million for Internet, 1 million for print, 3 million for display. So the advertising agency would have a good estimate on how many people they would need to service the account.

Digital Advertising = There are wildly differing views on this term. Many of the traditional advertising companies basically call web design using flash “digital advertising” , perhaps a contest or some other sort of online marketing such as large adwords purchases. Many of the younger advertising agencies call digital advertising “Blogging, SEO, Social Media” .. these are wildly differing disciplines and require a far differing skillset. The argument is that the holding companies and their host of companies are going after larger billable hours with little ROI for the client, the holding companies are resistant to any consideration that puts the words “SEO” and “Advertising” in the same sentence, as they don’t considering that form of advertising “real advertising” and have chosen to invest little in that field. This term will continue to be more and more of an issue in the future as the smaller firms are looking to vindicate their view that SEO, Blogging and Social Media are the actual future of Advertising, whereas the holding companies view media purchases, and creative artwork as tried and true method. During the economic collapse of 2008-2009 it appears that the hard economy will decide the argument as companies will look at ROI more and more.

SEO = Search Engine Optimization = working to allow a website to rank for related keywords in the search engines.

SMO = Social Media Optimization = basically online PR that centralizes on websites that that aggregate the “buzz” online. Example sites: Digg.Com , Twitter.Com , YouTube.Com .. generally this means making it enticing for viewers to “spread the word” on Social Media sites such as listed above.

Print Media = Newspapers, Magazines, fliers and the advertising placed in those outlets.

ROI = basically the definition of why Advertising Agencies exist, if a company puts a dollar into the advertising agency it wants more than a dollar out.

Branding Campaign = this is when an advertising agency tries to project a “larger than life” image of a company so the firm can charge a higher per unit sale. If the “brand name” is great, then the company can increase how much it charges for essentially the same product as non-branded competitors by large percentages. “this TV is made by XXXX. so it’s worth the extra 300 dollars over company YYYYY” … you get the point, even though company XXXX and company YYYYY use the same factory in China with the same components to make the TV.

Madison Avenue = This is generally the location where many of the larger advertising agencies are located in New York City. This area however has been losing prominence over the past several years when the current economic crisis and the outgrowth of digital marketing.

Pharma Advertising = That is advertising for the Pharmaceutical industry. It’s generally traditional type advertising, with 2 billion laws surrounding it that has been industry criticized for limiting creative, and on the flip side.. criticized for allowing too much creative.

Staffers = These are the the individuals that actually “do the work” for the client. Anyone that has 8 bosses such as in the movie “Office Space” falls under this umbrella.

Now for the funnies, these are some George Parker coined terms:

BDA = Big Dumb Agency - Any Advertising Agency within a holding company. These agencies are known for excesses and relying on their past brand name rather than future performance.

Poisoned Dwarf = George Parker with a solid regularity referrers to Sir Martin Sorrell, the CEO of WPP group plc with this less than glamorous term.

douchenozzle = Any C-level employee of an ad agency that is perceived to be abusing his or her power.

Golden douchenozzle award = This goes to any C-level employee of an ad agency that is making very bad decisions.

Uberdouchenozzle = This is used to describe the worst of the worst. Example would be a story from last year that Robert Mugabe signed up WPP group plc as his advertising agency to help promote his genocide. In this case, Robert Mugabe was called an Uberdouchenozzle by George Parker, as compared to just a douchenozzle by Sir Martin for just taking the money.

deutschnozzle - This is reserved for Donny Deutsch, prominent ad agency CEO of Deutsch advertising agency.

You don’t want to fly on my radar screen - I’ll change your name forever in the industry.

George Parker

George Parker

Written by TheFounder · Filed Under Advertising Agency News 


Comments

  • Adam

    You got the ACD title all wrong…

    ACD = Associate Creative Director

    This is the title directly below Creative Director, or basically the CD’s proxy on any creative decision if he/she is unavailable. Any “assistant” title would imply someone in a low level production or administrative job.

  • Adam

    You got the ACD title all wrong…

    ACD = Associate Creative Director

    This is the title directly below Creative Director, or basically the CD’s proxy on any creative decision if he/she is unavailable. Any “assistant” title would imply someone in a low level production or administrative job.

  • http://www.tribbleagency.com/ TheFounder

    Thanks Adam, I will edit the post to reflect your information. I however have to state that if the “Associate Creative Director” reports to the Creative Director .. how is this differing than an “Assistant Creative Director”.

    The reason I am asking is because I do know several individuals that their title is “assistant creative director” (holding company agencies) and they do the exact job you stated is for “associate creative director” …

  • http://www.tribbleagency.com TheFounder

    Thanks Adam, I will edit the post to reflect your information. I however have to state that if the “Associate Creative Director” reports to the Creative Director .. how is this differing than an “Assistant Creative Director”.

    The reason I am asking is because I do know several individuals that their title is “assistant creative director” (holding company agencies) and they do the exact job you stated is for “associate creative director” …

  • Adam

    Maybe it varies from agency to agency, but I’ve never heard “assistant” used in any other position than an administrative one, as in “Give that to my assistant, and she’ll mail it.”

    To me, Associate implies “closer to” whereas Assistant implies “subordinate to”.

    The ACD should be ready and able to work alongside or to step in and take over duties of the CD on any project they are assigned to, not just assist them on tasks the CD would do on an everyday basis as an adjunct.

  • Adam

    Maybe it varies from agency to agency, but I’ve never heard “assistant” used in any other position than an administrative one, as in “Give that to my assistant, and she’ll mail it.”

    To me, Associate implies “closer to” whereas Assistant implies “subordinate to”.

    The ACD should be ready and able to work alongside or to step in and take over duties of the CD on any project they are assigned to, not just assist them on tasks the CD would do on an everyday basis as an adjunct.

  • http://www.tribbleagency.com/ TheFounder

    Understood — I edited the post to reflect what you noted.

  • http://www.tribbleagency.com TheFounder

    Understood — I edited the post to reflect what you noted.

  • http://blog.sweetservices.com/ Ida

    Thanks for all the information on ad agency terms. I love the funnies!!

  • http://blog.sweetservices.com/ Ida

    Thanks for all the information on ad agency terms. I love the funnies!!

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