Persistence is a trait valued in this career path; showing the same quality in your job search can help pay off.
The strategies mentioned in Chapter 10 also apply here. Use your uni-versity's resources as well as the library's.
Here are some additional tips:
Start your job search before you near graduation. Those who arrange internships for themselves have an edge; they've already become familiar faces on-the-job. When an opening comes up a known commodity (who performed well during the internship) is going to be chosen over an unknown one.
Learn as much as you can about the agency or firm you're interested in. In other words, target your prospects.
Help In Locating These Employers
Various contacts, journals, and directories that can aid in your job search.
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, median annual earnings of advertising and marketing managers are approximately $57,300. The middle 50 percent earn between $38,230 and $84,950 a year. The lowest 10 percent earn less than $28,190 and the highest 10 percent earn more than $116,160 a year.
Median annual earnings in the industries employing the largest number of advertising and marketing managers are as follows:
Professional and commercial equipment $69,800
Telephone communications $64,100
Computer and data processing services $60,800
Advertising $54,300
Management and public relations $51,100
According to a National Association of Colleges and Employers survey, starting salaries for marketing majors graduating in 1999 averaged about $31,900; advertising majors, about $26,600.
Salary levels vary substantially depending upon the level of managerial responsibility, length of service, education, firm size, location, and industry. For example, manufacturing firms usually pay advertising, marketing, and public relations managers higher salaries than nonmanufacturing firms do.
For sales managers, the size of their sales territory is another important determinant of salary. Many managers earn bonuses equal to 10 percent or more of their salaries.
Nonsupervisory workers in advertising average $647 a week-signifi-cantly higher than the $442 a week for all nonsupervisory workers in pri-vate industry.
The table below shows the median hourly earnings of the largest occu-pations in advertising, compared to all industries:
Other surveys show a variation of $25,000 to $250,000 for marketing managers, depending on the level of education, experience, industry, and the number of employees he or she supervises.
Salaries for sales professionals are harder to pin down. Depending upon the setting and the product, workers can earn as low as minimum wage or in the high six figures with commissions and bonuses figured in.
There are more than 21,000 advertising agencies in the United States, but the American Association of Advertising Agencies (the 4 As) estimates that the number of openings for new grads is only a fraction of that each year.
Marketing, advertising, and public relations managers hold about 485,000 jobs in the United States in virtually every industry. Employment is expected to increase faster than the average for all occupations through the year 2008. According to the Occupational Outlook Handbook, increasingly intense domestic and global competition in products and services offered to consumers should require greater marketing, advertising, public relations, and promotional efforts. As businesses increasingly hire contractors for these services, rather than support additional full-time staff, private consulting firms and agencies may experience particularly rapid growth.
Employment growth may be tempered by the increased use of more efficient technologies that could replace some workers. Competition for jobs will be keen because the glamour of the industry traditionally attracts many more job seekers than there are job openings. Employment also may be adversely affected if legislation further restricts advertising for specific products, such as alcoholic beverages, or via specific media, such as billboards.
