The 6 Weirdest Ways to Get a Job in Advertising

Advertising isn't like other businesses. If you want to work on the creative side, being downright strange is often a plus. Naked photos of yourself? Letters written by Hitler? Demands for free beer? They've all been done, with varying levels of success. Here's a look at seven of the strangest job application methods used by unemployed admen and women, or those just wanting a new gig:

1. Get Adolf Hitler to write you a recommendation
   Babatunde Adebola, a copywriter at DDB Lagos Nigeria, created this letter from Hitler in an allegedly successful attempt to win persuade the Miami Ad School's Niklas Frings-Rupp to give him a place at the college's Hamburg, Germany, branch. (Click to enlarge.)
2. Display yourself as a nude centerfold Lawson Clarke set up this web site -- featuring himself au naturel on a bearskin rug with a strategically placed TV -- in hopes of getting a new job as an ad copywriter. The art direction is so good he could be an art director too. The site landed him loads of freelance work.
3. Send your prospective new boss a penis joke on Twitter
   Johnathan Pelleg won a $70,000 job as a copywriter at Saatchi & Saatchi LA when he won a contest run by the shop's creative director to award the vacancy to the best message he received on Twitter. The victorious tweet: "You have to be concise on Twitter. Like a circumcision, everything extra gets cut off whether you like it or not."
4. Buy the Google search terms for your prospective bosses' names
   Alec Brownstein bought the names of six executives he wanted to work for so that when they Googled themselves -- inevitably! -- a message from Brownstein was the top result. He now works for one of his targets at Y&R New York. Total cost: $6.
5. Demand free beer
   After being rejected by Publicis Seattle three times, Anthony Godoy got down to brass tacks in his fourth job application: "what I am applying for is the Friday keg. I would have put that first, but didn't want to infer that I have a drinking problem. No. While we're on the subject, what kind of beer are we talking about?"
6. Promote yourself as a "skirt for hire"*
   Karalee Evans landed a job at Sydney's Amnesia Razorfish by starting a blog advertising herself as "a senior skirt now available for hire" seeking "a bold and beautiful agency." The blog caught the eye of the trade media and now she has a new career.

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