Advertising art director

Employers will often expect you to have a foundation degree, higher national diploma or degree in:

• graphic design
• advertising design
• illustration
• fine art

Entry requirements

You'll usually need:

• 1 or 2 A levels, or equivalent, for a foundation degree or higher national diploma
• 2 to 3 A levels, or equivalent, for a degree

More Information

• equivalent entry requirements
• student finance for fees and living costs
• university courses and entry requirements

You can start as a junior creative to develop your skills on the job and work your way up through training and promotion.

You could get some experience before applying for your first job. This will give you a better understanding of the industry and is a good way to make useful contacts.

You can contact agencies directly to ask about placements, and make industry contacts through relevant groups on social networking sites like LinkedIn. You can get more advice on how to approach advertising agencies from the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising.

In larger advertising agencies, you may be trained through a structured graduate scheme, if you have a relevant degree.

Career tips

Your creativity and ability in art and design are the most important things to many employers.

When looking for jobs, you'll need to show a portfolio or 'book' of your work to potential employers, as you'll be employed on the strength of your artwork and ideas.

Further information

You can find out more about careers in advertising from the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising and Discover Creative Careers.

You'll need:

• knowledge of media production and communication
• the ability to sell products and services
• knowledge of English language
• to be thorough and pay attention to detail
• excellent verbal communication skills
• thinking and reasoning skills
• the ability to come up with new ways of doing things
• the ability to organise your time and workload
• to be able to use a computer and the main software packages competently

Your day-to-day tasks may include:

• working closely with a copywriter to create original ideas that fit your client's brief
• producing storyboards (for TV commercials) or sketches of your ideas
• presenting the ideas to the agency’s creative director and account team
• helping present ideas to the client
• making any changes that the client asks for
• hiring graphic designers, artists, photographers or film companies to produce the artwork or TV ads
• choosing studios or locations and attending photo or film shoots
• making sure that budgets and deadlines are met
• overseeing the final editing of the finished adverts.

You could work at a recording studio, in an office or at a client's business.

Your working environment may be outdoors some of the time.