It’s not new to complain about the craft of writing being under assault. I’m sure when the printing press was invented monks everywhere were cursing Gutenberg’s terrible invention. These days, writers in the ad world are called upon less and less to be simply professional and proficient writers. But I see this as less an assault on writing than a transformation of our profession.

When I was new to the ad business, young writers were only expected to have print books. Imagine that. A book with only print ads. Creative directors usually would ask, “but how well do writer long copy, occasionally we have to do brochures around here.” Remember brochures?

It wasn’t until the early 0’s that CD’s even cared if you’d written a banner ad sometime in  your life. Client’s weren’t throwing a lot of money at it so it was relatively less important. But the discussion slowly evolved from “how’s your long copy” to “do you understand how to write for the web.” How quaint those days were.

I say this not to date myself but to point out the radically different skill set agency creatives are asked to bring to bear on a daily basis. How radically different?

Here are the skills I’ve used in the last year as a “copywriter.”

Photographer

Social media strategist/analyst

Director

Website architect

Videographer

Blogger

Tweeter

Video editor

Sound editor

Producer

Colorist

Writer

It’s not just me that’s stretching their skill set. It seems the advertising business is no longer letting writers simply be writers. We’re now responsible for the creation of content across every media imaginable. And that means understanding strategy, production, and having some skills that will help get the job done.

Posted on: October 18, 2010, by : Jimmy Gilmore