There is perhaps, no other business that so greatly influences our daily lives. Our choices regarding the type of cars we drive, the beer we drink, or the clothes we wear, are largely influenced by advertising.

The Work
As a career, advertising offers a unique blend of opportunities. In few other industries will you find a more eclectic group of individuals — all under one roof! The main areas of operation are client servicing, media planning, creative and research.

Client Servicing:
The front face of the agency, Client Servicing, represents the agency to the client and the client within the agency. After receiving a detailed brief from the client, the Account Executive and Account Planner chalk out a strategy based on the brand’s positioning, its USP and its communication objective.
While the better agencies require an MBA, some others will be satisfied with a Degree/Diploma in marketing or mass communication.

Accounts Planning:
This is a senior-level position in the Servicing Department. It involves evolving the overall strategic plan including the budget, selecting the right media and zeroing-in on the communication message after interacting with the client and internally with the creative team, the media planning department and if necessary, the market research agency. The various elements of the communication package are integrated into a logical whole in the context of the brand and its desired positioning in the market.

Media Planning:
Media Planners help ad agencies choose the best outlet or medium to reach the customer they want. They plan, schedule, book and purchase space in the print media (newspapers, magazines) or outdoors (billboards, kiosks and bus panels) and time (TV & radio, internet). The media planning exercise may also involve conducting some targeted brand or need-specific research to assess recall and viewer ship/readership of a campaign.
Typically, media planners have a background in Math's and Statistics, an MBA (from MICA or a good B-school) or an MBE, and are good with computers and number-crunching using sophisticated software.

The Creative Department
The creative department’s task is to harness the right words, the most appropriate and arresting visuals — anything and everything that will grab the attention and prompt a sale.
The creative team in an agency can be further divided into two sections: Copy and Creative.

Copy Department
After the AE briefs the creative team, the Copywriter gets down to the task of putting across the message in words — headline, followed by the body copy in the case of a press ad, a dialogue or jingle for a radio spot, or a detailed story board in the case of a TV commercial.

A good copywriter must be able to think laterally and originally each time, to co-relate masses of data and research findings so as to present the conclusions in language that is lucid and convincing. Besides a way with words, you need infinite patience to chisel and craft words into a subtly compelling sales pitch, until you’ve got it just right. And above all, you need to be highly creative and versatile. However unlike poetry or short story writing, copywriting is not creativity for creativity’s sake. The famous ad guru, David Ogilvy, puts it very succinctly, “If it doesn’t sell, it isn’t creative.”

Most copywriters start out as copy trainees after taking a copy test administered by the agency and proceed to write their way to the advertising hall of fame.

The Art Department
Takes care of the overall “look and feel” of the campaign starting with a “scribble” or rough sketch which accommodates the various components i.e. headline, visual, picture, text, logo, etc. in a balanced format within the given space. Selecting the size and type of the font (lettering), the photographic treatment and the overall treatment of the TV commercial is the purview of the visualizes and art directors who man (and woman) the art department.
While a high level of originality and creative talent form the mainstay, a BFA or degree in applied art or graphic design with knowledge of computer graphics/multimedia is mandatory.

Market Research
The Research department tries to measure the effectiveness of the ad campaign. It Is research that provides the media planner and creative a scientific and measurable basis to sharp-focus their strategy. These professionals are from a variety of disciplines, but share a common comfort level with mathematical or statistical modeling, sampling techniques and psychographics.

What it takes?
Advertising demands a high level of creativity, imagination and innovative thinking from every person working in this profession. Writers and artists need to develop a portfolio of their best work. This might include work from art school, or as a result of freelance assignments. Although no specific academic degree is required by most agencies, a commercial or graphic arts course from a reputed college of art coupled with some knowledge of multimedia and computer graphics is essential for those pitching for a spot in the art department.

Account Executives on the other hand, usually have a business degree in marketing, or mass communication or specifically in advertising