Dani Bassil: We Shouldn’t Be Ashamed of Working in Advertising

Dani Bassil wasn’t one of those people who saw an ad and thought to herself that she wanted to be a creative. It all happened by accident. 

Her initial application was in fact to the marketing team for The Australian, which brought her into the world of advertising agencies. In particular the legendary George Patterson Bates, who soon offered her first job in the industry. 

Thrown in at the deep end, she found herself working on two accounts that seemed to be perfect for the fledgling account manager, Chanel and Arnott's biscuits, a combination of two of her favourite things. The second massive account she remembers working on was the iconic Coca-Cola billboard in Sydney’s Kings Cross. It was a summer ad, and her and the team spent ages on a beach shooting this campaign. In her words, it's like heaven to work with creative people. 

“I remember standing there at the bottom of the billboard, looking up and just thinking, ‘I can’t believe I get paid to do this job’,” she said.  

Dani was well and truly bitten by the commercial creativity bug from that moment on. With only a few months to secure a VISA, she made the decision to move to the UK for two years. Those two years then turned into almost 20. 

Dani describes the moment she set foot into the London offices of Mother as ‘career defining.’ 

“There's something incredible about advertising where you work with the most beautiful minds in a really fun and fast paced environment. I just want to keep doing it until I’m 85,” she said. 

After 18 months back on Australian soil, Dani has had the time to reflect on the two different markets. She loves the fact that the Australian industry is ‘very relationship-based.’ She mentioned that client relationships often feel more like partnerships in Australia. Due to our smaller size and smaller budgets, advertising in Australia is very much a team sport. 

“That's the really wonderful thing, being in it together through thick and thin, the ups and downs,” she said. 

Dani touched on the transformation happening at the Clemenger offices. There is a real sense of revolution and change in the air. With a motivating creative vision and a heritage to uphold, Dani and her team have been working on a long term plan to create a Clemenger that we all already know and love - but better. 

She encourages everyone within this market not to be ashamed of the fact that they work in advertising, but rather showcase it for what it is: creativity. 

To Dani, a good creative leader is someone that can set people on a journey. Someone with a clear creative vision and motivation. She believes that within the current fragmented state of media, creativity will come out on top. 

“Most of the products aren’t unique. The brand is the important bit, the brand is what you remember. You’ve gotta make that as interesting and compelling as possible. This is where creativity comes in. It’s not AI, those are table stakes. It’s the creativity that connects with people that's important,” she said. 

Dani and newly appointed CCO Adrián Flores have a massive focus on the work. Transformation isn’t something that happens over night. There is a common understanding of that amongst the Clemenger office. Each day is a new step for Clemenger in their journey of re-discovery and with Dani at the helm, it’s sure to be one of great impact. 

“We’ve got this legacy agency that arguably put Australian creativity on the global stage and we’re taking it into the future,” she concluded.