Full-service advertising agencies and the rise of the jack-of-all-trades: a hyphen-heavy blog

Written by 5ivecanons Staff

Disclaimer: This blog is very hyphen-heavy. If you have an aversion to hyphens, we recommend you stop reading now and venture to other, less grammatically correct blogs. 

At our consumer engagement agency, 5ivecanons, we wear many hats. We also wear many layers, as it gets a little cold in here. But, I digress. It’s no secret that 5ivecanons is a small advertising agency – but we have a family of dedicated staff. As a full-service agency though, that doesn’t mean our staff gets spread thin… it means that we’re able to do more.

Being a jack-of-all-trades is a necessity for a small shop. Rather than splitting a project between 3 or 4 people, (an account manager, traffic, designer, and copywriter), we’re able to consolidate four jobs into one. This usually means faster turn-around time for clients, lower prices, and one person that knows the project like the back of their hand.

Wearing many hats means that for the most part, we’re interchangeable. If someone is busy or on vacation, we can pass the work on to someone with an open schedule. Being a jack-of-all-trades means being adaptable to any situation, whether it be out of the office on a photo shoot, writing copy for a blog article, or creating content for social media channels. A full-service advertising agency, especially a small one, doesn’t stop working if someone is out of the office. We adapt, pass projects to another person, and move on.

How do you become a jack-of-all-trades, you ask? Hell if I know. It’s not something that can be taught. Like creativity, you either have it or you don’t. It’s about what you dabble in, the skills you took to more easily than others, and whether or not you practiced them.

So branch out a little, try new things. Make mistakes. Get messy. And if at the end of the day you find you can’t be a jack-of-all-trades, then give us a call. We all answer the phones, too. (904.353.2900)