How People Perceive Advertising

– By Alana Rendina
When talking to people about my job I constantly come across certain ideas and misconceptions people have about advertising. Most people have a completely different view of advertising and the people that work in advertising to the reality.
Firstly, I’d like to start off with the belief that working in advertising means every day is a party or day at the beach; that is very much not the case.
Sure, I love my job – it’s lots of fun to be a part of a team that comes up with different ad campaigns and it’s very rewarding to see the campaign succeed. However, most days are spent working tirelessly, coping with extremely long hours, late nights, and occasional weekend work. Then there are also the days when the project you’ve been working for weeks on day and night, has completely changed, and you now only have half the time and budget you previously had to come up with something totally new. This is when the agency goes into overdrive and you lose any social life that you once had.
Secondly, some people have this automatic thought that advertising is an unethical and dishonourable career where you’re trying to trick the public into buying things they don’t need. This is also incorrect. Advertising follows very specific, strict rules and guidelines that ensure all advertising messages are legitimate and not untruthful. The last thing an advertising agency wants to do is harm their and their client’s reputation by producing material that could be misleading or wrong.
Finally, another common belief is that everyone in advertising makes loads of money. I wish! Yes, it’s true, you can make a lot of money working in advertising, but not everyone is making six figures. The majority of people working in the field got their start by either interning for free or making minimum wage. Just as with any profession, you start at the bottom and work your arse off to get to the top. It’s very hard to make it to the top in advertising – and even harder to stay there.
So in summary, if you’re looking for a glamorous, high paying, career that’s a non-stop party – look elsewhere. But if you’re prepared to put in the work, advertising can still be an extremely rewarding career!

Write a comment