This chapter takes a look at the career paths of three direct marketing professionals and then lays out a plan for finding and landing a great direct marketing job.
HOW THEY GOT THERE: THREE CAREER PROFILES
Barbara Davis: Director of Account Acquisition Sears Financial Corporation Prime Option Services Division
When Barbara Davis joined Sears thirty years ago, she wasn't thinking about direct marketing. She was looking for a local employer who wouldn't make her work weekends. At the time she was a recently divorced mother and chose Sears because she could walk to it from her home on Chicago's west side. Her first taste of direct marketing didn't come until twelve years later, when she was promoted to staff assistant to the vice president and general manager of credit marketing. Her responsibility was to solicit new Sears credit-card accounts through direct mail, telemarketing, and in-store "take-one" displays.
Since 1975, Barbara Davis has specialized in credit marketing assignments. As director of account acquisition for Prime Option Services, she is an acknowledged expert in new account acquisition programs that utilize direct marketing and telemarketing. But she hasn't restricted her knowledge to credit-card marketing. She also understands how to merchandise through catalogs and mail pieces, and has gained enough insight into database marketing to teach a course on relationship marketing for the Chicago Association of Direct Marketing.
Ms. Davis note that her first break-the one that took her from the secretarial ranks into professional direct marketing staff- came "when the VP/general credit manager decided he wanted a minority secretary, and I was recognized as the best person in the company to fill that role. Soon after that, I was given the new-account solicitation duties that helped me leave clerical duties behind.
"Some people object to staying at one company for three decades, but it has worked for me. At Sears I have had the pleasure of working on many exciting projects. During my six years with Discover Card, we reorganized frequently to meet the growing needs of the company. There was a constant stream of new things happening, all the time."
Her advice for newcomers to direct marketing? "Take advantage of associations like the Chicago Association of Direct Marketing. Get involved in their programs and volunteer. Take as many direct marketing-related courses as you can. Immerse yourself in the techniques and the terminology used in the business, even if it isn't in your own area of responsibility.”
"Direct marketing isn't just putting a stamp on a letter and waiting for the phone to ring. It's an exciting and very profitable comer of the business world, whose complex skills can be used in any environment."
Karl Dentino: President, Rosenfield/Dentino Inc.
What's the best way to find a job in direct marketing? If you're Karl Dentino, you rely on . . . direct marketing!
After graduating with a degree in communications from New Jersey's Glassboro State College, Karl was awarded a scholarship to the Direct Marketing Educational Foundations' 1978 Collegiate Institute. Hooked by direct marketing at once, he decided to go into the field.
Dentino wondered how in the world he could get employers' attention in a difficult job market, especially since he had an undergraduate degree, not an MBA, and it wasn't from a well-known university. After reflecting on what he had learned from the Collegiate Institute, Karl decided to compose a one-page mailing to send to prospective employers.
The headline, "Here Are Five Profitable Reasons Why You Should Hire This Adman" appeared over a box listing the reasons:
- Experience (his r£sum6)
- Advertising skills
- Education
- Leadership qualities
- Self-motivation.
Twenty-three letters later, he received eleven interviews, two job offers, and a Bronze DMA Echo Award for a job search program.
In his first job at The Direct Marketing Group, he mastered production and account services. At Benton & Bowles Direct, he gained package goods experience by helping to develop Procter &Gamble's first direct marketing venture. He began his four and one-half years at Wunderman Worldwide as account executive on Merrill Lynch, eventually becoming account supervisor on CBS Columbia House (the record and video club), General Foods' Gevalia Coffee, and the U.S. Army.
In 1987, he was asked to start up the East Coast office of Rosenfield/Vinson Direct, an agency now known as Rosen-field/Dentino Inc. As president and partner, he directs all client-related account management activities, which involves developing new business and supervising account, creative, production and administrative personnel. In 1989, he received the first U.S. Young Direct Marketer of the Year Scholarship, which enabled him to visit a number of leading direct marketing companies throughout the country and discuss direct response strategies and approaches with their top management.
His advice to people trying to break into direct marketing is to approach the job hunt the same way a marketing manager approaches a direct marketing program. "The more you view the process as ‘generating leads and selling' instead of 'r£sum6s and interviewing,' the more successful you'll be."
Phil Herring: President, Herring/Newman, Inc.
As a bass trombone player for the Stan Kenton band, which he joined when he was 18, Phil Herring packed 320 one-nighters into fifty weeks a year on the road. But after two years of constant travel, he was ready for a rest-so he founded a music publishing company that eventually merged with Stan Kenton's. During his six years in publishing, he began to use direct marketing techniques, which he continued to rely on during a two-year stint in artist management and concert promotion.
At 29, Phil decided he'd had enough of the music business. But what could he do instead? On reflection, he realized that his direct marketing experience could serve him well in a career in advertising. "Getting out of the music business and into something else was the most difficult juncture of my career," Phil confesses. "But I managed to convince Walt Disney Telecommunications that my publishing background and direct marketing experience could serve them well."
At Disney, he helped launch Disney Home Video and the Disney Channel. Eventually, he decided to relocate to Seattle, where he joined Seafirst Bank as a direct marketer.
"It was at Seafirst that I realized that I had a career going in direct marketing and that I liked it. Unfortunately, six months after I started, I was laid off." Soon after, he started Seattle's first direct marketing agency. As he tells it, he christened the agency Northwest Communications Group because "back then, no one knew if a direct marketer could actually make a living in Seattle. The name was chosen to keep one's options open."
Today, his agency, Herring/Newman, is a highly regarded source of sophisticated, motivating, and effective work. It employs fifty people, has billings of $35 million , and has won a host of coveted awards, from Gold Echos and a Gold Mailbox (awarded for "the world's most innovative use of direct mail") to John Caples Awards and, most recently, an Honor Award from the American Institute of Architects (AIA) for its concrete, raw steel, and plywood offices.
"When I announced my plans to move to Seattle, an illustrator I represented shook his head and said, 'You know, there are people who want to be the best and the brightest in an industry, and they go to New York or Los Angeles. Then there are people like you, who move to Seattle.'
'The funny thing is that anything I've done of significance has been in Seattle. I've had so many people tell me that it would have been much harder to do the kind of work I do in Los Angeles, where pressures to conform are greater. But being in a secondary market has its advantages. If you look around, you'll see that in direct marketing and advertising, the best creative shops are not in the biggest cities."
On launching a career in direct marketing, he comments, "From an employer's point of view, the people I love to hire are just starting out. They very clearly have a burning desire to be in direct marketing. They know the agencies, and they know the advertising they like, for them, direct marketing is almost a hobby. These people stand out from the rest, who just walk in looking for a job and think advertising might be fun."
HOW YOU CAN GET IN
The Direct Marketing Educational Foundation urges prospective direct marketers to follow a five-point plan for mastering the basics of direct marketing and becoming an attractive prospective employee. The five points are as follows:
- Take a basic direct marketing course through a college, university, or professional association.
- Serve an internship with a direct marketing-related company.
- Enter student marketing competitions such as the Collegiate Echo competition.
- Read pertinent books and periodicals.
- Collect a "swipe" file of effective direct marketing promotions.
- Research individual companies using the Direct Marketing Marketplace and the agency "red book."
- Join a local direct marketing club to network with members and access their job referral services.
Learn from the Masters
"Those who aspire to new heights of direct marketing creativity should first climb onto the shoulders of the great practitioners of the past and present," encourages Susan K. Jones in her book, Creative Strategy in Direct Marketing. It's just one of dozens of excellent manuals that cover every aspect of direct marketing, from constructing appealing offers and crafting copy that sells to using databases and selecting lists.
A few dozen of the great books are listed in appendix C. Most are available through bookstores or libraries, or may be ordered directly from the Direct Marketing Association.
Start a Swipe File
If you're interested in a career direct marketing, start a swipe file right now.
A swipe file is your personal collection of direct mail pieces, self-mailers, catalogs, and space ads that intrigue you. If you're a mail-order consumer, most of these pieces will be sent to you for free. All you'll have to do is stop and examine each one, looking for packages you think are pulling well or beating control.
Collect a variety, from all segments of the market-consumer electronics, sporting goods, food, clothing, office supplies, books and videos, and collectibles. Analyze them, looking for what works: a real grabber of a headline, an unbeatable synthesis of copy and words, an offer that can't be turned down. As you collect these pieces, you'll be refining your taste in direct marketing.
The greatest swipe file around belongs to the Direct Marketing Association. Three years' worth of winners of the prestigious Echo Awards are on file in the DMA's Information Central, indexed by agency, advertiser, and product category. Employees of DMA member companies can borrow and study up to six portfolios of winning campaigns.
Each portfolio contains the actual creative package, along with information on the rationale behind the strategy and execution, the media used, and the response earned by the campaign-valuable background for any direct marketer interested in learning from the successes of others.
Creatives: Make a Portfolio
If you're aspiring to a career as a copywriter or art director, it's imperative to start a portfolio. Your prospective employers will want to see first-hand how you approach and solve marketing problems.
Your portfolio should include samples of your best work, including direct mail space ads, packages, or storyboards that
- illustrate a variety of products.
- come from several campaigns.
- employ a number of different creative approaches and creative and media executions.
- list media choices and explain why they were chosen.
Network, Network, Network
Executive search specialist Nancy Wright-Nelson believes that a job search is an appropriate time to shake the trees for contacts that can help you. Ask friends, parents, neighbors, even the mail carrier if they know people in direct marketing you can talk to. When you run out of personal connections, turn to your local direct marketing club.
Most clubs and professional associations offer formal or informal job networks that publicize openings and people who are seeking work. In addition, almost every club meeting is a net-working event of some kind. Before, during, and after the program, club members have plenty of opportunities to meet informally and swap business cards, discuss business trends, and introduce their businesses.
Anyone who is serious about a career in direct marketing should affiliate with the closest club as soon as possible, and make it the Corner stone of networking efforts.
WHAT EMPLOYERS ARE LOOKING FOR
Every position has its own list of duties and responsibilities, and every company has its own culture. So even though there are pre-requisites
for entering direct marketing, the criteria behind a decision to hire vary from company to company.
Each of the direct marketing professionals who contributed materials to this book has strong feelings about the qualities they are seeking in new employees, as well as how prospective employees should approach them. Their observations follow.
Know Your Stuff
To Rich Vergara of The Kleid Company, education in direct marketing is a critical distinguishing factor. "If I were looking at ten recent business school graduates and one of them had bothered to take a few direct marketing courses that would be the one I would hire. With so many colleges and universities offering direct marketing courses, and so many seminars available from professional associations, people interested in direct marketing ought to show a little initiative and complete at least one course before looking for a job."
Lowell Meyers of the Quill Corporation agrees. "Most young people I talk to haven't got the slightest idea what direct marketing is. I'm shocked to meet applicants who not only don't know a thing about the field, but haven't taken time to seek out its basic tenets. I recommend that anyone seeking a job in a nontraditional selling channel like direct marketing bone up on it first. An applicant has to bring a little something to the party to avoid exasperating a potential employer."
Graduate education is especially helpful. Executive recruiter Nancy Wright-Nelson believes that a master's degree will add 10 to 15 percent to a salary. A master's in direct marketing, now available at a handful of institutions, also commands a higher salary, but its value can be even greater in the long run-over the course of a career.
Show That You Can Juggle Balls
Dee Freund, Bradford's employment manager, says that the Bradford Exchange looks for signs that a prospective employee can cope with many responsibilities simultaneously. "We look for enthusiastic people who can juggle many activities at once. Extracurricular activities are important. Someone who demonstrates that they can carry a full load of classes and still find time for clubs and interest groups will catch our eye. Marketing degrees are important, too, and internships of any kind will make a difference."
Persist, Creatively
To Patrice Lyon, Ogilvy & Mather Direct's senior vice president, Network Development, persistence counts. "Direct marketing is establishing and maintaining a dialogue in a relationship. The people we hire understand that. They manage the job search process the same way they manage a direct marketing campaign as more than just a short-term enterprise”.
People assume that a campaign to join an agency like OMD ends when the company turns them down. They think, 'I didn't get the job, it's over with.' But that's just not true. People who keep in touch with us in an imaginative way-even if they don't get a positive response from us right off the bat-can eventually succeed.
"By 'keeping in touch' I don't mean just calling me to see what's happening. I mean reminding me that you're there in an imaginative, innovative way-like Karl Dentino did in his job campaign."
A recent OMD hire came to Ms. Lyon's attention because she knew an OMD copywriter. As part of her campaign to land a job at OMD, she sent Ms. Lyon notes and objects celebrating offbeat holidays, a good luck token on a Friday the 13th, a want ad painted on an egg for Easter. She used a succession of different ideas and formats in her campaign to enter OMD-and she succeeded.
"I'm keeping track of three or four people right now. Each of them is doing something that keeps them in mind as often as possible. Out of all the people trying to get hired at Ogilvy right now, they're probably the only ones who have made that difference."
JUMP-START YOUR CAREER: WIN THE YOUNG DIRECT MARKETER OF THE YEAR SCHOLARSHIP
This exciting program, launched in the U.S. in 1989, offers young direct marketing professionals a chance to earn considerable recognition and one-on-one meetings in the executive suites of the U.S.'s leading direct marketing companies.
Sponsored by Kobs and Draft Advertising and administered by the Direct Marketing Association's International Council, the scholarship is open to professionals under 30. Candidates, each one nominated and seconded by superiors, must have been employed in direct marketing for at least three years to be eligible.
A panel of experts reviews all applications, selects three finalists for personal interviews, and then chooses a winner whose achievements and initiative are outstanding. The winner receives a two-week all-expense paid tour of the top direct marketing companies around the country, discussing strategies and approaches with their top executives. The tour culminates in the city where the DMA's conference is held.
Nominees for the award come from all areas of direct marketing, as do the judges. Winners have come from direct marketing agencies, telemarketing companies, and catalog companies.
'The program is designed to open doors for young people with long-term potential, and give a booster shot to their career," notes Sid Liebenson of Kobs & Draft.
For more information, contact the DMA's International Council or Kobs & Draft Advertising.
REMEMBER, THE FUTURE IS BRIGHT
Direct marketing is a dynamic field whose prospects grow brighter each day. New applications for direct marketing and database techniques as well as new positions for the people who practice them are constantly being created.
As Karl Dentino notes, "In spite of the fact that direct marketing has been around for more than a century, we're just beginning to learn how to apply it to nontraditional categories like package goods and consumer products. The future for direct marketing is very bright indeed."
