Ah, yes, the classic icebreaker! Whenever you’re meeting someone for the first time, particularly in a social setting, the conversation quickly turns to careers when someone, desperately seeking for some means of extending the conversation and making a connection, inevitably asks, “So, what do you do for a living?”
It’s also the question that has vexed advertising account directors for decades. Because there’s no simple answer. The industry (advertising) is exceptionally well understood, but the job (account director) remains somewhat of a mystery to the outside world. Here’s what I mean:
STRANGER: “Well, it’s certainly nice to get out for once.”
ME: “I agree. We don’t get out enough.”
STRANGER: “Oh, do you have kids?”
ME: “Yep, three girls! You?
STRANGER: “Wow, three girls, huh? You’re outnumbered. We have a son and a daughter.”
ME: “That’s great.”
STRANGER: “Yeah. So what do you do?”
ME: “I work in advertising.”
STRANGER: “Oh really! So you come up with all those great ads I see on TV?! I really love that new Old Spice ad. Did you guys do that?”
ME: “No, we don’t do Old Spice. And no, I don’t actually come up with the ads themselves. That’s the creative department.”
STRANGER: “Oh (somewhat disappointed). So do you make the ads? Like film them?”
ME: “No, that’s handled by a producer. And even the producer doesn’t make the ad, they hire a director who films it and an editor to edit it.”
STRANGER: Sighs (slightly annoyed). “Do you run the ads then? Like in the Super Bowl?”
ME: “Nope. That’s the media department.”
STRANGER: “So, what do you do anyway?”
And now we get to the crux of the issue. Many people will say that the account director is the liaison between the client and the agency, or that the account director is responsible for managing the client relationship. Or that the account director takes assignments from the client and distributes them to the appropriate people in the agency. None of which are wrong, but to me, those answers aren’t totally right either.
Here’s my definition. The account director’s job is to know and to figure.
It’s our job to know what’s going on with our client’s business, and then figure out what needs to be done to make it successful. We know what our client’s competition is doing, and we figure out how to respond to it. We know what consumers are really interested in, and we figure out the best ways to talk to them. It’s our job to know what benefits our client’s brand has to offer, and to figure out the most compelling way to communicate them. We know what work needs to get done, and we figure out how to help our co-workers complete it. At the end of the day, the account director has to know everything that’s going on, and figure out what needs to be done next.
Now you may be saying to yourself, “Well, that’s all well and good, but you’re a digital agency. Why on Earth are you talking about advertising account directors?!” Good question. While the work we do at Enlighten (now Perficient Digital) is not strictly advertising, many of the same skills and abilities that account directors have been using since the era of Mad Men (minus the boozing and carousing – more on that in another post) apply to the development of smart, successful digital strategies. Understanding user dynamics, brand value, and the digital competitive space are all critical to figuring out how to create an innovative and engaging digital experience.
By the way, I realize I’ve painted a picture of the account director as a bit of an all-knowing, all-figuring superhero, but that’s just to make a point. I’m not arrogant or naïve enough to think that we do it all alone. We’re just the first link in the chain. It takes the hard work and intellectual capacity of designers, project managers, strategists, IAs, planners, engineers and many, many more to make great work. And knowing that is the most important part of figuring out what we do.
What Exactly Do Account Directors Do, Anyway?
by Perficient Author on July 5th, 2011 | ~ minute read
