Diane is a group creative director at DDB in Chicago. She has been at DDB for 23 years, working on international brands such as McDonald’s. Find out how she approaches her writing and learn from the techniques of a proven master.
As a child, I realized I loved words. In second or third grade I was inspired by the idea that the 26 letters of the alphabet can be arranged to make people do an endless number of amazing things like laugh, cry, swear, pray, propose marriage. It’s infinite. Yes, I always knew that I was interested in the power of words, and always wanted to work with them in some way.
I studied journalism as my main degree, because I thought I wanted to become a reporter. But I discovered that I didn’t like prying into other people’s private affairs when they had sad stories to tell or were experiencing trouble in their lives. I had a good nose for news and I somewhat enjoyed writing the stories, but I wasn’t comfortable with some aspects of the research and interviewing process. Another thing I had to cope with was writing articles that were unbiased and without emotion, despite prying into people’s lives to get them.
My professors helped me shift to magazine writing and then other creative writing challenges. I liked how advertising let me use my instincts to understand how a consumer related to a product. Journalistic writing started to feel scientific in nature, following a dry order. It simply didn’t have enough empathy in it for me.
So I went into the advertising program, and I bloomed. It was a general curriculum that gave me the whole picture – creative, production, planning, and account management. More than that, it helped me and the other students put together a portfolio, and source a list of agencies to approach for work as a copywriter. I had a few interviews, and got lucky. I netted my first job at a small agency in Chicago.
But I always wanted to work for DDB. I was pretty single-minded about that. So when I finished my first commercial, I took it over to DDB and said “will you hire me now?” Somehow, that did the trick. Now, I try to stay that passionate about coming in every day, because you are all only as good as your last assignment.
Even though I’m a manager of people these days, I still like to write on occasion. I work on branding campaigns and tactical work for large companies including Safeway and LensCrafters. But how does that happen? The planners and account people bring the briefs to the creatives. We take it all in, use the products, and listen to the target audience talk about the product. We will eat the food, walk around the grocery store, shopping mall, or museum, and absorb the experience as much as possible so we can let it all cook in our brains. You never know where inspiration will come from.
We challenge the client if we experience something that seems amiss. Then we process the raw material, work up the messages, and come up with ideas until we feel like we’ve turned over every stone. We often put each idea on individual sheets of paper – words or pictures – and stick them to the wall.
After that, it’s best to walk away and let things hibernate. It’s like a “cocoon” phase and it lasts for a day or so. This is simply about leaving the thick of it and returning later with fresh eyes. And often when you’re not even thinking about the assignment, the answer comes to you.
Normally when we return to the work after the “cocoon” phase everything gets assessed
with new sense of clarity. Some of it climbs to a higher plane and some of it drops away. The good stuff starts to have more zing, the excitement builds, and the words and visuals come more easily.
Once the basics of the concepts have been cracked the discipline expands and we can then add more detail and missing media options, such as direct mail solutions, events, or online treatments. It’s rare, but ideas that we threw away at an earlier stage sometimes can be folded into a different concept as things evolve.
We have two or three teams of art directors and writer partners working simultaneously on the same brief. When they come to me saying “we have two ideas,” I know that they have had five or six on their shortlist. So I often ask them what else they have just to make sure the territory has been well mined.
The roles of the art director and writer often switch during the early stages of creating the concepts. If a writer simply sits down and types up a television script for example, and then shares it with their partner, it’s too one-dimensional. Most media vehicles are visual, after all. Plus if you take the time to get the creative thinking right, the writing becomes straightforward. When I am the writer on an assignment it’s only after the concept is nailed down that I lock myself away to put the actual words on paper. It is often already written in the air before that.
I can recommend a little book by James Webb Young called A Technique for Producing Ideas. It describes the whole process of conceptualizing, explains a technique using index cards, and the right time to put ideas to one side to let them cook. This process works for any profession you’re in, even non-creative ones.
Just out of graduate school I was interviewed for a job that was out of my league, but I was trying to reach for the stars. I had sent my beginner’s portfolio out for a position in Paris. I couldn’t possibly do it because I didn’t speak French well enough, but I felt I had nothing to lose. I have always had a fascination and love for Paris. Soon the creative director in Paris called me. He said he couldn’t hire me, but explained that he could tell I had the feu sacré – the sacred fire! After that I walked on air, and this compliment never left me. It gave me a huge boost of confidence, and I recommend to any aspiring writer out there to stick your neck out. You may find out you have the feu sacré.