Norman wins Bronze at Cannes

Norman Tang, Congratulations on winning your first international metal : a Bronze award in Design, with Andy Soong and the team at Publicis.

I think you're fearless

Sign up for the upcoming fear.less eBook by Clay Hebert and Ishita Gupta. Click on the title.

The New CATS in Town

95% launches an amazing new training programme for organizations outside the ad industry called CATS, which stands for Conceptual Age Training Series.

Times have changed. Traditional solutions need to be replaced with innovative ideas. These ideas can only come from executives who are not mere rote thinkers, but highly skilled, and also highly driven creative problem solvers.

CATS is a unique programme of short trainings that are designed to activate creativity and reinforce marketing skills, while developing resourcefulness and passion.


To demonstrate what we mean, our own Marketing Exec Grace went around town personally delivering letters of introduction to HR Directors and Heads of Companies.


Each letter was held aloft by a helium filled balloon with an uplifting note for those braving the downturn.




This was accompanied by a letter in an envelope that explained the advantage of being a furry feline : you'll always land on your feet!



Grace and her team (Kalsum, VJ, Josh and Becky) sure got lots of attention and brought smiles to many faces.

In the CATS workshops, you will be led to generate powerful and innovative ideas, and you'll surprise yourself by revealing new, imaginative ways of presenting a solution!

The first workshop is titled EXPERIENTIAL MARKETING. It will be held on Tuesday, 31ST March 2009.
Please call Grace (03-2287 7095) for more information and the full 2009 CATS training calendar.

P.S. We have only 30 places to offer for the EXPERIENTIAL MARKETING workshop. So if you hurry, there's still time to send in your registration details. Call Grace to register today!

Tips for Copywriters

Click on the title and link to Joel Lim's blog. He's a very talented young copywriter (young compared to Janet) who made it to Associate Creative Directorhood and then won the Astro scholarship to pursue his Masters. Now studying in Australia, he seems to have lots of time to blog. (Fans of Dune will love it!)

Haha, found this old photo of Joel as a judge at one of our Idea Generators' shows. Pix shows, from left : Participants Tang, Naim, Joel, Shen, Badd, Yng, Janet, and the three other judges Alexis Fernandez, Jeff Orr and Raymond.

In a recent email, Joel said "As 95% The Advertising Academy, you have a niche in the area of a "true" creative advertising syllabus.

IACT hammers marketing and some advertising into its students.
Limkokwing and The One Academy churn out designers.

95%, by being The Advertising Academy is perhaps The Only Advertising Academy today.

I don't know of any other school that has a proper creative advertising programme. And creative advertising is the foundation stone on which planning, client service, etc, is built. AWARD School does teach creative advertising, but it is a fleeting, intensive course.

Great news and a timely, natural progression, fantastic!

One day, agencies will have the Alchemy and the Magic that once made advertising great decades ago. This is the creative gold and dignity that I am pursuing, and God willing, will one day preach."

The Final Presentation

After six months of training, the pioneering batch of Hydrogen candidates presented their final assignments on Wednesday 11th February. To simulate the ad agency environment, the candidates were divided into groups, comprising of an AE, a Strategic Planner and two Creatives.

The mission? To re-position Skol Beer and induce trial with the objective of beating Tiger Beer to be the number 2 brand to Carlsberg.

The brief was given by Abhinav Sharma, Strategic Planning Director of McCann Erickson.
The work was judged by :
• Brian Lee, Director, Corporate Marketing, Samsung Malaysia. He was with Carlsberg when Tiger Beer (Skol's main competitor) was launched.
• Zayn Khan, Managing Director of Ogilvy & Mather.
• And Abhinav himself, of course.



Trainers Agnes Liew-Gan and Peter Gan watch the show while Shahnaz does camera duty.







While the AEs and Planners presented the advertising strategy and creative ideas to this panel, the Copywriters and Art Director presented their portfolios to a group of Creative Directors.


This was an intense face to face grilling where each candidate was seated in front of a CD, explaining the thought processes behind each idea. It was an enriching, enlightening and unforgettable.













The CDs who generously contributed their time and inspiring guidance were :
Jeff Orr, Group Executive Creative Director of TBWA-ISC\Malaysia.
SP Lee, Managing Director & Executive Creative Director of Dentsu Malaysia.
James Yap, Creative Director of Saatchi & Saatchi.
Vincent Chan, Creative Director of GanForHire.
Alvin Ng, Creative Director of TBWA-ISC\Malaysia.

VINCENT CHAN :
"When reviewing the work of 95% graduates, I always expect to be excited, enriched, enthralled and entertained. There's just so much talent and unbound creativity in the work that it's hard to imagine ANY serious advertising student not wanting to be a part of your programmes, which, to me, are a sure-fire way to getting noticed in the industry."

ALVIN NG :
"The students' work was impressive, taking into consideration the kinda crap I came up with when I was a student.
They were well prepared, enthusiastic and confident (thankfully they didn't mix up confidence with arrogance).
Overall, they give the industry a lot of hope for the future and once they get into the workforce, they surely can make a difference... if they want to."

BRIAN LEE
"The presenters both from Account Management and Strategic Planning not only did their homework and research well but also exuded a level of confidence required for the industry they will soon join.
I believe 95% The Advertising Academy is the first in the country to provide not just academic requirements but real life experience for participants to have an accurate feel on what the industry is really about.
This would definitely prepare the Hydrogen candidates to short-cut their ‘freshie’ stage and hopefully have a quicker and quantum leap at the beginning of their career.
I truly believe this will set new heights for the industry."

Kancil Awards 2008: BEST of the BEST in the student category goes to Ng Bee Nee of 95%

WHOOHOOOOOO!!!
At the 2008 Kancil Awards, Ng Bee Nee's entry stood out from over 100 other students' work, and was judged to be the BEST of them all.

This is what some of the Kancil Award main jury said about her entry :

Pann Lim from Kinetic Singapore : "I love ideas that say so much but are yet so simple. Ideas that cut through the clutter (literally). Ideas that make me smile. Ideas that make me feel - Is this the end of my career?"

Adrian Miller from Saatchi & Saatchi : "She demonstrated that she has the basic requirement for a copywriter : strong grammar. The rest I can teach."


















Mun from BBDO : "I would hire her."

Alex Burnard from New York's Crispin, Porter & Bogusky : "She made an effort to brand herself."

Bee Nee has a degree in English from UK and she is now a Hydrogen candidate at 95%, under contract to Grey Malaysia. CONGRATULATIONS BEE NEE!
Your career as a copywriter is launched :)






To find out how ad agencies can pre-book Hydrogen Candidates, please contact Felicia at 03-2287 6095.









Hey, did you know that the top Kancil Student Award Winners for the past four years (ever since we opened) are graduates of 95%?!
2005 : Norman Tang
2006 : Andrew Wong & Christopher Choong
2007 : Fajar Kurnia
2008 : Ng Bee Nee
You guys are the rare few individuals who are hungry and passionate to be the best in the industry. Thanks for giving us the honour of training you, you guys will be the leaders of the industry one day.

More Winners at Kancil Awards...

At the Kancil Awards last night, while it was great to see Bee Nee claim the Best of the Best Student Award, we were also very proud to see past graduates (who are now working) win as well. The standard of the Malaysian Kancil Awards is extremely high. Malaysia is among the best in the region, and our Kancil Awards maintains the same high standards as the top international award shows. Sometimes, it is even easier to win at Cannes or the One Show than it is at Kancil!

This says a lot about the winners.

CONGRATULATIONS TO ALL!

Daniel Ang at Rapp Collins.
Bronze : BMW "harp"
Merit : BMW "let there be light"
BMW "harp" also won a Bronze at Effies and Finalist at Cannes.

Norman Tang at Dentsu.
Bronze : Maybank "WhatIsMToYou" website

Hex at Lowe & Partners
Bronze : Ikea "staircase"

Bala at McCann Erickson
Silver : SOL crash helmet TVC.

For the full list of results, click on the title of this post.

Fajar wins at The Art Directors Club, New York.

Click on the title of this post to see Fajar's winning entry : Diver.

Crowbar Award Winners

Crowbar is an annual student award organised by the 4As of Singapore. It started out as a local competition, but has now become an international event with entries from as far as UK.
Click on the title of this post to read more about Crowbar and find out who is Billy, the kid in this photo.













This year, graduates from 95% The Ad Academy picked up 12 finalist awards!
The finalists are :
Anthony Limanjaya
Fajar Kurnia
Natasha Angeline Joie
Wilson Santoso

Janet and Shahnaz joined the finalists at the Award Presentation Dinner at Orchard Hotel in Singapore, last Friday. The event gets bigger and bigger every year (the food also got better!).


Congratulations! May this springboard you to higher heights in your advertising careers :)

Zion Tan joins Saatchi!

Zion got the good news today : He will be starting work at Saatchi & Saatchi in August.
Wow, Saatchi & Saatchi! Well done, Zion! You really did a great job during your training here and this is a hard-earned success for you. May it be all the sweeter for your incredible effort.
A huge, hearty Congratulations to you :)

Hex shares her story

Find out how Hex got in to the big bad world of advertising. Click on the title of this post.

Ad Agencies want Doctors, Lawyers and Bankers.

The best people in advertising are the ones with a rich variety of life experiences.

Ad agencies around the world are recruiting people from non-advertising backgrounds.

If you have a background in Business, Law, IT, Engineering, Psychology, Philosophy, Sociology, Journalism, Backpacking or even Fire-Eating, you may already have what it takes to get in to this incredibly exciting industry. Contact 95% to find out how.

Advertising is said to be:
"The most fun you can have with your clothes on".