Top Agency Creatives Tell ‘How to Write a Newspaper Ad’.

Four leading advertising-agency creatives share their “secrets” for “How to Write a Newspaper Ad” in a new ad campaign launched by the Newspaper Association of America at its annual Marketing Conference.

Amid hand-lettered text and eye-catching illustrations, in each full-page ad the featured creative talks about the power and importance of newspaper advertising. The campaign was created by The Martin Agency, Richmond, Va., whose president and creative director, Mike Hughes, served as chair of NAA’s 2001 ATHENA Awards, which honor creative excellence in newspapers. In addition to Hughes, the creatives appearing in the campaign launch are Lee Clow, chairman/creative director, TBWA/Worldwide, Los Angeles; Neil French, worldwide creative director, Ogilvy & Mather, Singapore; and Luke Sullivan, chief creative officer, WestWayne, Atlanta.

The ads are available for use by all NAA-member newspapers and can be viewed and downloaded at NAA’s Web site at http://www.naa.org/adcampaign. The San Diego Union-Tribune and USA Today are among the first who’ve said plan to run the ads.

“When you’re doing an ad campaign featuring creatives, directed to other creatives, you’d better be creative,” commented NAA President and CEO John F. Sturm. “These advertising leaders have found provocative, unique ways to tell us about their passion for print, and the unusual ad design and layout really add power to the argument that newspapers are an outstanding medium for creative advertising.”

Hughes said his team at The Martin Agency had a great time working on this campaign. “This is a chance to work with our advertising heroes. We have all learned so much about advertising from Lee Clow, Neil French and Luke Sullivan. This is our chance to share that knowledge with everyone who makes newspaper advertising — from ad agency creative people to retailers, to the guy writing a classified,” Hughes said. “Newspapers are my first love. I used to be a newspaper reporter and I’ve never tired of seeing my words on those big newspaper pages.”

The campaign is slated to run regularly through the next two years. Among the creatives to be featured in future ads is Jeff Goodby, partner and co- creative director of Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, San Francisco. “We’re thrilled to have such legendary creative minds contributing to this initiative,” noted Mort Goldstrom, NAA vice president of display advertising. “We hope their passion about newspaper advertising will be contagious, and that this campaign will inspire agencies and advertisers to find new ways to harness the power of newspapers.”

NAA is a nonprofit organization representing the $59 billion newspaper industry and more than 2,000 newspapers in the U.S. and Canada. Most NAA members are daily newspapers, accounting for 87 percent of the U.S. daily circulation. Headquartered in Tysons Corner (Vienna, Va.), the Association focuses on six key strategic priorities that affect the newspaper industry collectively: marketing, public policy, diversity, industry development, newspaper operations and readership. Information about NAA and the industry may also be found at the Association’s World Wide Web site on the Internet http://www.naa.org.

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