This summer I found myself interning for two months at an advertising agency in my home city of Tampa, Fla. I know what most of my fellow TV buffs out there are already thinking: Mad Men.
I must say that, before I started work at the agency, I was curious to see if the fictional world of Don Draper’s 1960s Madison Avenue philandering and passive-aggressive competition had any resemblance to the modern world of marketing. Or would it be just a bunch of regular, sober people who have a knack for knowing what makes people want to buy stuff? I was soon to find out if Don Draper was anything like the real-life whiz kids who turned our wants and desires into profit.
My first post was with the new business department, a group of strategy people and researchers whose job it was to get new accounts for the firm. Most of my research was concentrated on the travel sector, where the firm was looking to land a cruise line, like Carnival or Norwegian Cruise Lines.
I worked on a presentation—a deck, as it’s called in the advertising world—for prospective clients, filled with examples of the firm’s past work as well as statistics and data from their proprietary marketing models. While I found it interesting, it wasn’t exactly the high-flying juicy stuff (and by this I mean the creative ads, not the sex and boozing that are mainstays at 1960s made-for-TV advertising agencies) that Mad Men seems to be all about.
My big chance to get that experience was when I was sent to work in the mysterious creative department, the place where commercials and slogans come from. It was an exclusive group, and most closely resembled what I thought an ad agency would be: a group of about 12 people who worked in teams, intensely brainstorming ideas that would make people want to buy anything from the car of tomorrow to paper towels.
On my first day, I sat in on a presentation of ideas for an automotive account. Creatives come in teams of two, an art director and a copywriter, who do pretty much everything together—they share an office, they work together to write copy and campaigns, and they present their ideas to the creative director and eventually, to clients. It’s a special collaborative relationship that most other professions don’t have a place for.
The first team’s pitch was about the company’s newest sedan, and the campaign was based on reliability, the idea that the car won’t let you down. The pitch, something about the car key turning, wasn’t all that great—even I could tell. I braced myself for an awkward rebuke from the creative director, but none came. There didn’t seem to be any Don Draper-type tension present during the meeting.
The other team’s much better presentation didn’t spark any devious, intra-office competition. It was refreshing that even with something as proprietary as an original idea, these creative minds weren’t competing for who came up with the best idea but rather trying to build on whatever idea was best and make it better.
As far as the sex part of Mad Men, I overheard of a few promiscuous interactions between office workers, but no infidelities or hidden pregnancies. Real life just isn’t as dramatic as the 2D world. And from my intern cubicle, I could detect no alcohol in the office.
Lucky for me, Mad Men did not resemble my advertising experience—otherwise, I’d have spent my summer brewing coffee and fixing drinks for the idea makers. Instead, I was able to write a few ads, even one that—supposedly—made it to a client meeting. While Mad Men may make for good TV, I’m fairly certain that a marketing stint in 2010 is much better than Madison Avenue circa 1962.
