The Brandtern Experience

Market Street Sound

Mon, 18 Mar 2013 11:47:56 -0400

Today I had the opportunity to take a little field trip to Market Street Sound. Members of the Gatesman+Dave team lent their voiceover talents to a set of videos that will become a part of a new app we are launching for one of our clients. It was really interesting to get a whole new perspective of what actually goes into the video production process. I learned that voice is a very powerful tool when it comes to advertising. The same line can be said so many different ways. When recording voiceovers, it is extremely important to be aware of tone, speed, etc. to ensure that you are giving the appropriate message. I also really liked seeing the storyboards that our creative team came up with for these videos. They really helped me see the big picture and allowed me to match the voice being recorded to the actual video imagery. I look forward to seeing the final product!

Week 2: Getting into the swing of things

Mon, 25 Feb 2013 12:33:13 -0500

Last week was a busy one. I spent a lot of time with Meredith and Dan searching for new PR opportunities for the agency and learning how to create a media list. It was interesting to learn how to use CisionPoint as a tool to find potential media opportunities in a wide variety of local and regional publications. I also got the chance to meet with Dave C. and Kate who taught me all there is to know about traffic. Dave compared doing traffic at the agency to being an air traffic controller. You always need to be aware of each project’s progress and deadline to prevent any fiery crashes! While working on traffic, it is important to always be organized and aware of anything and everything going on in the agency to ensure that all projects run as planned. I look forward to hopefully shadowing him and/or Kate one day over the next few weeks and see exactly what their daily responsibilities entail. Lastly I researched the current web presence for a new potential client, both on Facebook and in the news. This will allow us to see what they are currently doing now to promote themselves and we can use that information to improve their overall presence. I can’t wait to get involved with more projects next week!

Week One: Just getting started

Fri, 15 Feb 2013 15:16:21 -0500

I just finished my first week of many as a Brandtern and I really like all that I’ve been exposed to so far. I got to work with Ben who taught me a lot about Facebook analytics. I thought it was interesting to learn how they can be helpful in determining the effectiveness of our social media posts, email blasts, etc. I’m on Facebook a lot in my free time and often “like” things, so it was interesting to see what people’s “likes” and other interactions really mean for a brand.

I also got a chance to familiarize myself with another one of our clients and complete next month’s editorial calendar for them. It basically outlines the day-by-day social media posts that will be made for the month.

Overall it’s been a great week and everyone has been really welcoming. People continue to periodically stop by my desk and introduce themselves, but it might take a couple weeks for me to put a face to every name! After this week, I’m definitely eager to find out what next week will bring.

Dan's first day as a Brandtern

Mon, 11 Feb 2013 12:40:04 -0500

Hey everyone! My name is Dan and I’m the sole Brandtern at Gatesman+Dave for the Spring 2013 session. I’m from the Philadelphia area and am currently a senior Marketing major at Pitt, graduating this coming April. I will specifically be working with the Account Management/ PR Social Media team over the next couple months and I look forward to contributing my creativity to the various projects I’ll be working on during my time here!

Today is my first day and even though it is always a bit overwhelming when you start a new job, everyone in the office has been really nice and welcoming. I’ve been getting a feel for the office, which is really cool and far different from anywhere else I’ve worked in the past. I’m loving the relaxed atmosphere and the lime green wall to my left will surely keep me alert! And it doesn’t hurt to be located across the street from one of my favorite restaurants, The Cheesecake Factory. I started off the day with the Monday morning meeting where everyone went through the list of to do’s for the week. It was helpful to get an idea of the possible projects I’ll soon be involved in. On a side note, there are a lot of people who work here so it may take me some time to know everyone’s names! Today I also got the chance to get familiarized with one of the agency’s clients and learned how we manage their social media initiatives. It seems like I’m definitely in for an awesome hands-on learning experience at Gatesman+Dave over the next several weeks!

The Brandterns Rev Up at the Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix

Mon, 30 Jul 2012 10:09:26 -0400

A couple weeks ago Sean and I were tasked with helping to plan an event for SHOP ‘n SAVE at the Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix. The Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix is the largest philanthropic event that SHOP ‘n SAVE participates in throughout the year. The event raises money for The Autism Society of Pittsburgh and The Allegheny Valley School. The objective was to introduce SHOP ‘n SAVE’s new Essential Everyday line in a fun way, while showcasing the line’s low price points. We developed the concept of a “Price is Right”-style Plinko game to inform people of Essential Everyday in an entertaining fashion and were also responsible for every piece of signage and equipment necessary to produce a successful launch. It was an awesome experience and we are truly grateful to have had the opportunity to plan and execute an event of this magnitude. Over the course of a two-day period we had more than 500 people visit our stand, take part in our event, and learn about our client’s new Essential Everyday line. We reached a ton of people and can only hope that their positive brand experience was as enjoyable for them as it was for us. It’s a great feeling when you get to see a successful final product of a project that you started weeks ago. We would like to thank everyone who joined us at the Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix – and we’ll see you next year!

"The frightening and most difficult thing about being what somebody calls a creative person is that..."

Thu, 26 Jul 2012 16:30:39 -0400

“The frightening and most difficult thing about being what somebody calls a creative person is that you have absolutely no idea where any of your thoughts come from, really. And especially, you don’t have any idea about where they’re going to come from tomorrow.”

- Hal Riney
from Art & Copy

At the beginning of The Brandtern Experience this summer, as we...

Thu, 26 Jul 2012 15:59:00 -0400

At the beginning of The Brandtern Experience this summer, as we were all getting to know each other, one of the first conversations we had was about music. Music has a universal power. Whether you’re a casual listener or really passionate about it, music is made to share and bring people together.

So that’s what brought us to making The Brandtern Experience Soundtrack. Initially we wanted to make an actual soundtrack, as if the experience has been a movie and we would choose tracks to narrate it. But instead, it just felt more natural for each of us to share five songs that we’ve been listening to while sitting at our desks or working on projects.

We’ve made it a collaborative playlist. So seriously, we want your input. What songs get you in the zone or inspire you to do great work? Whether you’re an intern or a top exec, everyone has their work day soundtrack. We want to know what it is. So go ahead and add a couple of tracks to our playlist. Tweet at us once you have or comment on our blog. Either way, we want to hear what you’re listening to.

So here it is. The music that gets our creative juices flowing. What’s on your playlist?

Skye
Dance for You - The Dirty Projectors
Soulshine - The Allman Brothers
Take a Walk - Passion Pit
My Body - Young the Giant
Towers - Bon Iver

Dave
Wild Wild Horses-Atmosphere
Tom Sawyer-Rush
Your Touch-The Black Keys
Shake Me Down-Cage The Elephant
Hey You-311

Kelsey
Good Arms vs. Bad Arms – Frightened Rabbit
Old Pine – Ben Howard
Tangerine – Mansions
No Light, No Light – Florence + The Machine
Wipe Your Eyes – Maroon 5

Sean
Explosions in the Sky – Your Hand in Mine
Third Eye Blind – Motorcycle Drive-By
The Format – She Doesn’t Get It
Blink-182 – Dammit
The Presidents of The United States of America – Peaches

"Only two weeks left of The Brandtern Experience! It’s been a great summer so far and..."

Mon, 23 Jul 2012 15:06:00 -0400

“Only two weeks left of The Brandtern Experience! It’s been a great summer so far and we’ve learned so much! Now we’re just making the best of the time we have left!”

- Kelsey, Skye, Sean and Dave
Brandterns Summer 2012

Brand Yourself: Create a Positive Online Presence

Thu, 19 Jul 2012 09:35:01 -0400

In the internship and job application processes within the Communications industry, it is crucial to have a strong and professional online and social media presence but it is crucial that you are consistently branding yourself. Increasingly, employers are turning to the internet to research candidates. However, with the overwhelming amounts of information online, your name can get buried, or even worse, confused with someone else.

You don’t want employers thinking that you are something you’re not, especially when they think you have a criminal background when the worst you’ve done is forget to use a turn signal that one time! That’s exactly what happened to the founder of BrandYourself.com, a site committed to helping individuals manage their online presence and search engine results.

We decided to research ourselves, to think like recruiters and analyze our name’s search engine results. To narrow down the field we searched our names and included our school names.

Sean hit the name jackpot. There’s not that many Sean Tubridys out there so most of the results on the first page pertained to his LinkedIn and Twitter account or were about his study abroad experience. However, during his school career he competed in several advertising competitions and there was no mention of that on the results page. He would benefit from making links to articles about his teams’ successes and helping those links to reach the first page.

Skye Gould is also a pretty original name (lucky!). Most of Skye’s results were about her contributions to album artwork, which is perfect as she is a graphic designer. Her Twitter page also showed up as well as the article about The Brandtern Experience. One problem though was that her portfolio page, which is crucial for employers to see, was not visible through the search engine search. That’s something that needs to be fixed.

Now onto the not so lucky ones.

Dave Felt: Dave is a standard first name and unfortunately his last name is interpreted as a verb in the search process. This clutters his results with interviews with other Dave’s saying how they “felt.” His LinkedIn Profile and Twitter accounts are present on the first page so that is a good thing, but much more results such as press he has received and his other social media sites such as his Visual CV should be coming up. Employers need to be able to see his online presence much more clearly, otherwise he may fall into the “maybe” pile. No one wants to end up there.

Finally to Kelsey Miller. With Kelsey being one of the most popular baby names from the 90’s and Miller being the third most popular last name in the U.S., “Kelsey Miller” is possibly one of the most generic names out there besides Jane Doe. Adding her school name Syracuse to the end does help to clarify the results but even at that many results for Kelsey’s and Miller’s (a lot of athletes specifically) turn up on the first page. Also, she has given opinions to her school newspaper on topics like the basketball team or her favorite type of Pita and frozen yogurt. Recruiters don’t care. She could really use search engine optimization to push those articles down the page and bring forward articles that discuss her successes.

So whether you’re plagued by a generic name or even if you’re one of the lucky ones with a unique one, you need to check out your online presence and what search results recruiters are seeing. Check out BrandYourself.com or other sites like it to make sure you’re putting the best of you out there!

Checking in with Skye!

Mon, 16 Jul 2012 09:15:33 -0400

The past few weeks at G+D have been extremely busy and exciting! I have been able to work a lot of different projects and even went to a photo shoot for one of our clients, Gabriel Brothers.

During a typical workday, I make design revisions to different pieces for many of the agency’s clients. I have had the amazing opportunity to also create some ads myself. A few weeks ago I was able to participate in the brainstorming and creation of some ads that will run at a major summer event which is sponsored every year by our client. This was a great experience to work with the creative team from start to finish on a project.

When I went on the photo shoot for Gabriel Brothers I was able to see first-hand the long process of a creating the “Back To School” campaign for the clothing store. I was able to help behind the scenes as well. From steaming clothes to setting up props for the different scenes, I definitely got a full experience of the production side.

I can’t believe we only have a few weeks left as Brandterns, but we have some exciting projects and opportunities coming up that I look forward to!

I got to go with Sam, our copywriter, to a voice over recording...

Tue, 10 Jul 2012 00:00:00 -0400

I got to go with Sam, our copywriter, to a voice over recording session for a client commercial today. It was pretty cool seeing how the recording and editing software was set up. Even cooler though was realizing the true power of a voice and its inflections. I never knew that one sentence could be said in so many ways and invoke such different reactions. It was interesting hearing all of the different options for the same sentence and then helping pick which pieces would be used for the final product.

See, we’re really not stuck behind our desks all day! I got to go downtown, tour an audio recording facility and see a part of the advertising industry that I never would have thought of. Oh, and I got to talk to the current President of the Pittsburgh Ad Federation. Not too bad.”

See, we’re really not stuck behind our desks all day! I got to go out into a city, tour an audio recording facility and got to see a part of the Advertising industry that I never would have thought of. Oh, and I got to talk to the President of the Pittsburgh Ad Federation. Not too bad.

Job and Internship Recruiters Turn to Social Media

Mon, 09 Jul 2012 15:52:00 -0400

Job and Internship Recruiters Turn to Social Media:

According to this infographic from OnlineDegrees.com, job and internship recruiters are turning to social media now, more than ever, to reach qualified individuals and to screen applicants. Are you utilizing social media to it’s full potential in your job/internship search? Find out!

"I have learned to respect ideas, wherever they come from. Often they come from clients. Account..."

Mon, 09 Jul 2012 10:26:48 -0400

““I have learned to respect ideas, wherever they come from. Often they come from clients. Account executives often have big creative ideas, regardless of what some writers think.””

- Leo Burnett

We’ve come to find that this is what Gatesman+Dave is all about! Collaborate or perish! That’s the benefit of being at a small agency. You aren’t pigeonholed into one role as defined by the industry. Solid input and great ideas can come from anyone, no matter what section of the agency they sit in. In fact, Gatesman+Dave even believes good ideas can come from interns! How awesome is that?!

On set at the client photo shoot: Dave's Experience

Thu, 05 Jul 2012 00:00:00 -0400

The other Brandterns and I recently got to participate in a photo shoot for Gabriel Brothers , one of Gatesman+Dave’s clients. The experience was very insightful, and once again taught us many things that a student is unable to learn in the classroom. We had many different responsibilities including ensuring that the talent signed photo consent forms and shadowing the Art Director while also observing some of the creative aspects that go into capturing the perfect images for the client. My primary duty was to collect and gather enough behind-the-scenes video and still shots to generate content for our client’s social media outlets. Prepping before the shoot began was beneficial because my objective was to collect quantity and variety.

Knowing what shots I lacked and who I wanted to interview was huge, but you have to be prepared to adapt when necessary. An example of just such an occasion was during my final interview of my two day experience. I wanted to interview this younger model who was extremely well spoken for his age, but I had to tweak the questions that I had drafted for the older models. It was a rewarding experience seeing how much time and effort actually goes into organizing an event such as this, and learning how difficult it is to keep everyone involved on schedule. Check back soon to see our client’s video if you would like to see how a photo shoot works first hand with client/talent interviews and more!

On set at the client photo shoot: Sean's Experience

Tue, 03 Jul 2012 00:00:00 -0400

(Above: What a leader! Sean escorts the younger models back into the school to escape from the extreme heat outside.)

On the hottest day of last week, I had the opportunity to accompany Art Director Matt and Assistant Account Executive Jenna to a photo shoot for Gabriel Brothers. I had never been to a photo shoot before, aside from my senior pictures, so I did not really know what to expect. I was surprised to see how much thought and precision goes into every single shot. At each location, at least 200 pictures were taken until they had the perfect shot. The talent had to be rearranged and put in different poses until it looked just the way the client wanted it to look. Everyone involved showed a ton of patience throughout the day, especially considering the intense heat we were enduring.

It had to have been 100 degrees outside during a photo shoot in and around a bus. I was surprised how well the talent and photographers conducted themselves in the extreme heat, because I was drenched in sweat! Throughout the day, I was taking behind the scenes pictures and videos of the photo shoot that will be used for social media. Overall, it was a very interesting day and I was able to experience something I had never been a part of before. I think my interest still lies more in the media and planning areas of advertising, but I’m glad I got to see how stressful and tedious the job of an Art Director can be sometimes.

Twitter Knowledge

Mon, 02 Jul 2012 16:56:00 -0400

Twitter Knowledge:

A recent report shows that most marketers are failing to use Twitter effectively. Are you tweeting on the right days at the right times? Find out how to maximize the effect of your tweets and use Twitter correctly in this article from Mashable

http://mashable.com/2012/06/26/marketers-failing-twitter-study/

So we mentioned before that we got the opportunity to help...

Mon, 02 Jul 2012 00:00:00 -0400

So we mentioned before that we got the opportunity to help brainstorm for a client ad! We thought it would be easy but soon enough we ran into what we now call “Creative Block.” We set up a camera and documented our struggles, our frustrations, and finally our triumphs. Check it out!

On set at the client photo shoot: Kelsey's Experience

Thu, 28 Jun 2012 00:00:00 -0400

I got a steam burn today. That sucked. But other than that, the client photo shoot I went to today was awesome! Yeah, I had to steam some clothes to get out the creases, and no I didn’t know what I was doing (thus the burn), but being a part of the hustle and bustle of the shoot was really cool. I assisted the client in picking out outfits and accessories, I helped to position the models, and I got to eat free lunch! Best of all I got to be on set for all of the shoots. That was definitely my favorite part, shadowing our Art Director Matt and understanding the thought process that goes into every set and shoot. I really picked his brain about everything: from this photo shoot, to other types of shoots, how he determines what shots are needed, how to turn them into ads, and even just about Art Direction and his background in general. It gave me a lot of insight!

This internship has opened my eyes up to other possibilities for my future, from Account Management to Social Media. It’s been a wonderful experience but lately I’ve been struggling to decide what aspect of agency life I want to be a part of. But talking to Matt helped to reaffirm the path that I started out on. Even though going into the creative side of things can be extremely challenging and taxing, it is constantly exciting and rewarding. So for now, I’ll keep travelling down the creative track. But then again, I am the girl who changed her major four times her Freshman year, so who knows what I’ll change my mind to next week.

Creative Billboards

Tue, 26 Jun 2012 16:35:00 -0400

Creative Billboards:

“A few weeks ago we got to participate in a creative brainstorming session for a client billboard. Now, we can’t stop thinking about them! Billboards are considered to be one of the most challenging types of advertising because of the speed at which consumers pass by. 7 words or less is the golden rule! Our Creative Director gave us some words of wisdom though: Start off with a billboard. If you can get a concept through to the consumer via billboard, the other ads will be a piece of cake!
Check out these awesome billboards that have perfected the art of brevity and creativity.”

http://twistedsifter.com/2012/06/50-funny-creative-billboards/

"Good enough sucks"

Thu, 21 Jun 2012 17:13:00 -0400

“Good enough sucks”

- Gatesman+Dave mantra