Episode #28: How to Light Your Creative Spark with Special Guest Eva Day

In this episode, Kelly & Julia chat with agency Creative Director Eva Day to learn How to Light Your Creative Spark. As a 30-year advertising agency vet, Eva shares how she manifests ideas with her creative posse, a sense of humor, and some good deeds as sprinkles of inspiration. 

How to Light Your Creative Spark with Special Guest Eva Day Episode Recap

In this episode, we have the pleasure of talking with Eva Day, a 30-year veteran of the design and advertising realm, a creative director, painter, talented illustrator, and, above all, a devoted mother. We dive into Eva’s inspiring journey and her strategies for sparking creativity in the fast-paced world of marketing.

Eva’s creative journey began in middle school when she fell in love with designing billboards for a class project. Her father recognized her passion and directed her towards a career in advertising, which she embraced wholeheartedly. From that moment on, Eva knew she wanted to become a commercial artist and pursued her dream through formal education and her first job as a designer at a college when she turned 19. After becoming a mother, Eva faced unique challenges in maintaining a career in a demanding agency environment. Balancing the responsibilities of motherhood with her passion for creativity led her to freelance work, providing flexibility while raising her son. Eventually, as her child grew older, Eva re-entered the agency world and continued to excel in her creative endeavors.

Eva’s professional journey included some unconventional twists, like creating a unique approach to get more business by using special boxes that highlighted her creativity and talents. This innovative strategy caught the attention of potential clients and eventually led to her connection with the Two Marketing Moms team.

Finding Inspiration and Nurturing Creativity

A Personal Retreat: Eva shared her secret source of creativity—the shower. She explained that the solitude and rhythmic feeling of warm water help her reach her creative zone, allowing ideas to flow effortlessly.
Absorbing Visuals: Eva draws inspiration from photography and design templates. She emphasized that seeing visually appealing elements, even if unrelated to the project at hand, can spark creativity and open up new ideas.
Learning from the Greats: Eva turns to historically successful ad campaigns and award-winning designs for inspiration. By studying the work of renowned creatives, she gains insights into what works and learns how to build on existing concepts.

Eva acknowledged the rising popularity of tools like Canva, which have made design more accessible to the general public. While recognizing the value of these tools for inspiration, she also discussed concerns within the creative community regarding the devaluation of professional design services and the need to emphasize the unique skills and expertise that professionals bring to the table. Eva’s favorite projects involve crafting logos, which she sees as the essence of an organization’s branding. She revels in the challenge of creating the perfect logo that represents a brand’s vision and can stand the test of time. Additionally, Eva shared her passion for TV shoots, relishing the rare opportunities to work on set and contribute to the magic of storytelling.

Eva Day’s remarkable journey through the world of advertising and creativity demonstrates the power of passion, inspiration, and perseverance. As a creative director and devoted mother, she continues to inspire those around her with her dedication to excellence and innovation. Whether it’s designing captivating logos or tackling complex marketing challenges, Eva’s commitment to igniting the creative spark remains an inspiration for aspiring artists and marketers alike.

Eva’s final pieces of advice for finding that creative spark are truly inspiring and unique. Connecting with nature and observing its perfection can offer a plethora of ideas and inspiration. Taking the time to appreciate the intricate details of a butterfly wing or the pattern of a spider’s web can lead to innovative designs and concepts. Nature has been a source of inspiration for artists and designers throughout history, and Eva’s advice reaffirms its significance.

Furthermore, Eva suggests performing random acts of kindness and helping others, even strangers, to boost creativity. This might seem unrelated, but the joy and euphoria that arise from doing something selfless can significantly impact one’s creative mindset. By spreading positivity and making the world a better place, creatives can create a more favorable environment for their ideas to flourish.

Julia and Kelly respond to Eva’s advice, acknowledging the importance of incorporating different perspectives into their work. They talk about their collaborative dynamics and how their differing personalities and working styles contribute to their creative process. Julia shares her approach to picking clients’ brains and seeking inspiration from random encounters, while Kelly discusses her desire to understand other people’s perspectives.

As the conversation wraps up, it’s evident that creativity is not just about technical skills or techniques; it’s about embracing different experiences, being open to ideas, and connecting with the world around us. Eva’s insights and advice remind us that creativity can be found everywhere, from the smallest details of nature to the interactions we have with others.

Creativity is not a finite resource that will run out, nor is it limited to a select few. It is a limitless and boundless wellspring of ideas that can be tapped into through observation, empathy, and acts of kindness. Whether you’re an experienced designer or a budding artist, Eva’s wisdom offers a roadmap to a more creative and fulfilling journey in the world of design. So, the next time you find yourself stuck in a creative rut, take a step back, observe the world around you, and remember Eva’s advice – inspiration can be found in the most unexpected places.

Episode Transcript:

Julia 

All right. Welcome to the Two Marketing Moms Podcast. On today’s episode, we are talking about how to light your creative spark with special guest Eva Day. Eva Day is a 30-year veteran of the design and advertising realm. She is a creative director, painter, very talented illustrator, and most importantly, a pretty decent mom. I mean, that’s an understatement, Eva. She’s an awesome mom. I want to steal all the paintings from her house, especially the one on your stairwell. And she did our Two Marketing Moms branding, which we love and represents Kelly and I very well.

Kelly

It certainly does.

Julia 

So welcome, Eva.

Eva

Thank you.

Kelly

Thanks for coming Eva, we really appreciate you taking time out of your very busy day. We wanted to start talking a little bit about your journey. And how did you become a creative director in advertising? Where did you start? How did you know that you wanted to be in advertising? And especially how did you know you wanted to be on the creative side?

Eva

Yeah, it’s, it’s funny, it started actually quite early in my life, I was in middle school and in art class, and one of the assignments was to do a billboard for a product, believe it or not. And I really enjoyed that. It was green beans; I remember very specifically. And I really enjoy the process of trying to put the art into a billboard shape. And I remember going home that night and telling my dad about it and asking him, what job does this kind of thing? And he said that’s advertising, that’s commercial art. That’s what they call it back then before graphic design. And, and from then on, I said, okay, I’m going to be a commercial artist. And so, I knew from middle school, which is very rare. A lot of people know that they want to be an artist of some sort. But to know, specifically at that young age, I feel pretty blessed about that I was able to just kind of pigeonhole exactly what I wanted to do so young in life. I went to school specifically for commercial art that may not fly nowadays. But back then it was all about how you could draw on your portfolio and that sort of thing. And when I turned 19, I got my first job as a designer at a college so it went on from there.

Julia 

Talk about Eva, how your career changed when you became a mom.

Eva

Oh, big changes, it was hard for us to have a kid. And so, I knew a typical agency lifestyle at that time, would make it even more difficult. So, I started freelancing and left the agency environment when we had our son, so I could be home for him, but then you’re trying to work while a toddler is running around your house. It made it quite challenging. And then as he got older, he’s 15 now, I was able to six years ago, to go back to regular agency work, but so for a time I was freelancing mostly for other agencies. And I even would step in when other creatives were going on maternity leave. I’d actually stepped into their role for six weeks when they were on maternity leave during that timeframe, too. I was quite known for that I got passed around as maternity leave.

Julia 

We’re going totally off script but you have to tell these stories, Eva, tell everyone that cool thing you did to get more business which ended up where you and I eventually met and became soul sisters.

Eva

Oh, God. Yeah. My husband was in the Navy. He’s retired now but he was in the Navy. We moved around every couple years. So, every time we moved, I had a new base that I had to go to. And so, I came up with a box and it was it was “three ways to reduce stress”. And inside of the box, with three smaller boxes, numbered…I spent a lot of time on it. And the first box was chocolate and it said, “sometimes reducing stress helps when you eat something sweet”. And then the second box was a toy. And, the other way to get creative was to just open your mind and do something fun and with a little handheld toy and the third box was a Starbucks gift card and it was to meet me for coffee and let me tell you how I could make your life a little easier. And so, I took these boxes to different creative directors in the city. And interestingly enough, Williams Whittle, where Julia worked was not one of them. But the creative director at the time Rich, he needed some help. And he called a creative director friend who had kept this box for a year and gave him my information and then it just started from there. So, I met Julia about 15 years ago, after a little box capade.

Julia

Did you know this, Kelly?

Kelly

No, I’ve never heard that story. That’s a fantastic story. And I want the box.

Julia  

I bet Eva has given you tons of boxes, or “boxes”, quote unquote, in terms of all the amazing like, comps she puts together.

Kelly

That’s true, she does give me a box daily, a box of creativity.

Eva

I wish I’d saved one. I never I didn’t make an extra one for me to have to look at to remember so and back before I had a smartphone, so I didn’t even take a picture of it. So, I have nothing, but I do have the old art files of the logos and the artwork that made up, but I wish I had the actual box. I’ve gotten very lazy or over the years trying to in a saving work and stuff that I had had done the actual printed pieces so but I do have some of the really old stuff which is entertaining to show Kelly with recently.

Kelly

Yes, and old photos too, which are awesome. Let’s dig into talk a little bit about creativity and sparking creativity, because we’ve had a lot of new projects coming in lately where we’ve had to kind of generate some new excitement. And we’ve got a new one coming, very soon. And a couple of new ones. And I want to just to ask you, how do you get yourself in the right state of mind to start a new project? You know, after we have had a briefing session, you know what the assignment is, and what the creative brief is…where does your mind go? Where do you start?

Eva

Well, that’s there’s a lot of different ways to do it. And it can be quite challenging, especially when you’re working with the same client year after year. So, you know them very well, which is very helpful. But then at the same time, you’ve already been coming up with ideas for that client over and over again, and to be able to try to come up with something brand new, can really put you in kind of creative block kind of situation because you kind of get weighed down with what you’ve done before. And so, one of the first things that I do is, is I find my happy place and for some people it would be maybe someplace away from work or someplace else in their house. Some people can really thrive when they’re in some place really busy like a Starbucks, you know, it’s almost like the white noise drowns out anything else. And in some people need to be in a place of rules, then maybe sitting on a couch with their dog if they have one, and snuggling or whatever. But whatever that place is, whether or not it’s a physical place, or a place in your mind, you have to get there first. So, it’s almost a physical situation. And some sometimes a worse place I can be as in front of my computer.

Kelly

I agree with that. I don’t know if you do Julia, but I don’t get most of my ideas while I’m sitting there at my desk. It’s when I’m working on it in my head afterwards. And for me, those ideas come at night like after 10 pm. I’m always jotting them down, grabbing my phone and writing them down in the middle of the night because that’s when they come to me but, Eva, you have a special place where your ideas mostly come from.

Eva

It’s my shower, and I’m glad to admit that for the Internet to know but yes.

Julia 

Mine is running. I have to be running for about 30 minutes to clear my mind. Okay, just to eliminate all of the voices. And then 30 minutes in, I reached this point or I have clarity. And then I get all these amazing ideas. And then I have to stop and I use the record app. And I just walk and talk my ideas to capture it.

Eva

30 minutes into a run, I’d be unconscious on the ground. That doesn’t quite work.

Kelly

I read that a cognitive scientist named Scott Barry Kaufman did a study that concluded that 72% of people get creative ideas in the shower. So, you’re not alone.

Eva

I’m not alone. I think it’s the rhythmic feeling of the warm water hitting your back or your head or, just you have this private moment, people tend to leave you alone, unless you have small children. You know, when you’re in there, and so I actually, if it doesn’t necessarily happen organically, like if I have a new tagline I need to come up with or a new campaign slogan or, or something like that. I think about it a little bit and what needs to be done, what direction I want to go into. And then you know, I tried to do that before I’m already planning on going into the shower. And then I just kind of let it ruminate. While I’m in there, and usually something comes out of it, the only challenge is, is just you have to hold on to it long enough until you grab a towel and a few situations where it went, like just like that, and I had to try to remember it afterwards. But yeah, it’s a good spot. And I’m really glad to share that with everybody. But yeah.

Julia 

Well, 72% doesn’t lie.

Eva

It’s wherever you feel like you can relax and open your mind. And so. what’s important is that can happen anywhere for anybody. So, keeping something around in places that your ad that you can jot stuff down, and I know everybody works on smartphones nowadays and types that in smartphone, which is which is great. But for me, nothing beats just like doing a quick sketch on paper. It’s there’s, there’s a tactile response of writing something on paper that makes a big difference. In fact, I have small like sheets all the time, and I just constantly sketching on them old pronounce or whatever. And even if it has nothing to do with what I’m working on it, it will inspire me when I just start sketching stuff out.

Kelly

So, from there, how long does it take you to feel like you generally have some clear concepts. I mean, obviously, it varies depending upon the concept, but do you go for quantity? And then focus on the best out of that? Or how do you kind of hone them down? Based on you what you’ve come up with?

Eva

Yeah, historically. You know, clients usually like to see a lot of ideas and for some reason, I would say about 80%, almost 80% of the time, my first one or two ideas are the ones that are taken are the ones that the client loves the best or the ones that we love the best. It’s usually a couple logos I do that are the ones that are chosen no matter in what order I present them to the client. I don’t know why necessarily that is but so then after that, then then I’m kind of you know, so the quality seems to come first and then there’s this perception of quantity that you feel like you know, the clients may not feel like that they’ve gotten their money’s worth if they don’t see a certain amount but I think after the first four or five ideas you’re really just throwing darts at a wall at that point it’s some of your best stuff tends to tends to come out, at least it does for me. Some people their nuggets come after pages and pages of writing and then picking out the best of one and the best of another input together. But that hasn’t really panned out hasn’t worked out well for me.

Kelly

And with account people like me, adding in “what if you did this” and “what if you tried this”?

Julia 

With writing I do have to write a whole page before I can stop and go back and find the best of what’s on that page. I always feel like quantity definitely helps with writing.

Kelly

For me, I need to know as much about a particular subject as I can. For me, it’s kind of digging into, who the client is, who are their target audiences, really observing the research and looking at and understanding the target audience from different points of views, and then stepping back and then pondering. So, for me, it’s all about just absorbing that knowledge is really important, and then take a step back, because my problem solving doesn’t work without having all of these different data points in my head, and then making those connections eventually comes and happens.

Eva

As a creative, mine is very visceral. Mine is putting myself in the place of the person that we’re talking to, I try to become that person. And I get very emotionally involved in that person, which sounds a little crazy, and it makes me a terrible person to watch movies with, because I am that person in that movie. And I get very emotional during movies, because especially movies that are, just generally emotional, because I really get into there. And I think, that’s what’s really helped me in my career is an ability to do that is it’s difficult, and it’s taken years to try to hone those skills, and it’s not perfect, I mean, it’s hard for me to get into the feeling of a 21-year-old nowadays versus what I was like a 21, so there are some challenges, but in my case, most of my clients tend to work with people that tend to be within 20 years of where I currently am. And it’s a little bit easier to do that. So, it becomes a very, very visceral.

Kelly

It also becomes easier when you’ve had 30 years of experience? I mean, I know that you can nail something in two weeks, or even a week or even a couple days, and you may not necessarily be able to do that, starting out in your career, you learn how to do that and learn techniques to come up with those ideas faster. You have a pretty fast turnaround time in terms of whether that’s a deadline that we’ve given you, or what you put in your own head. But how do you turn those around so fast, because you are able to quickly absorb information, and then come back out with a couple different ideas that hit it on the head nearly every time?

Eva

I hate to admit this, but I’m definitely a deadline person, I tend to work right up to the deadline. It’s almost the pressure of it. Forces something to open up in me if the worst thing you can do, I’ve helped some friends here and there with their businesses, they’ve started, you know, as a favor, did a logo like, oh, even whenever you have time, well, they won’t see that for months. It just, it doesn’t work out that when I have when I have a deadline. As I get up to it, it gets more and more intense. And, and so I need that I need to know it has to be done by this time on this day. And that’s really kind of how I work best and casual. Casualness. I think I almost need the deadline.

Julia 

I was going say I think it’s the speed at which Eva works sometimes is the speed at which you expect Kelly?

Kelly

I think you’re probably right. Yeah.

Julia 

I usually try. Like when I’m working on creative projects try to carve out as much time as possible because I don’t like quick turns with creatives. Because whether it’s visual creative, or copywriting or a concept or even like a marketing plan, I want to have enough time where I can block certain times on the calendar and kind of like, pick it apart one little piece at a time. Because I know I can’t just I will procrastinate. And then at that last second, it won’t be like my best work, you know. So, I wanted to ask like, so one of the things that I do for my creative process is like I go look for inspiration, right? Like especially when I’m writing I want to just go read articles about the subject, because I know that like a sentence or a stat or a something will just get the gears most moving. And then I’ll, I’ll start to like, it’s like I’ve opened like a cavern, you know what I mean? And it could just be a couple words, but like, talk to us about like, what if, and what you use for like inspiration.

Eva

So, I will do several things. One is I will look at photography. And even if the photos don’t have to do with what I’m actually working on, sometimes those visuals will inspire me. And it might be just a combination of colors or action or texture. So, I started off working, looking at a lot of photography, I also when I’m really needing to do something new and different, I look at old work, not my old work, but really good stuff historically, you know, stuff that had won big awards, or was just like, really well known in the market famous ads and, and that sort of stuff. I not copying their work.

Kelly

You’re recycling old ideas?

Eva

No, I’m being inspired by the possibility of what could be done. And I’ve made mentioned to you guys historically, as my first commercial art teacher, he walked into class on the very first day, and he said, “there are no new original ideas”, which just took all of us off our chairs. It’s not how we expected to start this class or start our career to be told that we’re not going to come up with anything new. And I didn’t understand it, then. And it actually kind of upset me, then, but 30 years down the road, I understand what he’s talking about, because you will inevitably see something that you thought was an original to you that somebody else had done some years ago, or some variation of it. And so having yourself be bogged down with the stress of trying to come up with something that is never been seen before, can really just take away from your it just squashes your creativity. But you don’t have to stress yourself with whether or not it’s the next big thing.

Julia 

Yeah, I mean, I know Eva will probably hate to hear this. But you know, Canva, I think has really opened up like graphic design to make it more accessible to everyone, right? It doesn’t mean great design is made on Canva. Normally, crap design is made on Canva. But what I do love about Canva is that there are so many templates, you can just put in a keyword. And visually, I will get some inspiration, like if someone used like a scripty font, or if someone used a different color palette, like a certain color palette, I’ll be like, Oh, okay, I know how I can do this for a client. You know, it’s usually like socially, social media images. But I think it’s a good tool for inspiration.

Kelly

I’m going interrupt here because Eva and I have had multiple conversations about Canva, even with other art directors. And if you’re a traditional art director that was born and bred, you know, through the traditional Adobe Suite, you will stay in the Adobe Suite, you will have a hard time moving into Canva. And so, most of the art directors, creative directors that I that that have started that way are really against moving into Canva. I mean, like adamantly opposed. Do you want to give your two cents on this? Eva?

Julia 

I don’t I think you’re talking about two different things. Kelly, I don’t think anybody goes to college and gets a degree in art or graphic design or anything and ever uses Canva that it’s just not that you’re talking about two different things, I think.

Eva

Yeah. You are seeing templates for things and getting inspiration by them. That’s, that’s fantastic, whatever gets you going. And I can’t say that I’ve never been inspired by, you know, seeing templates, especially when I’ve been searching out like web templates for you know, for clients that they can use and, and there’s some really, you know, really good design out there. As far as you know, I started before the computer I was doing everything on board. You know, so it’s so learning new programs and that sort of thing that, you know, as a tool is one thing. And but what Kelly’s talking about is, is, is the fact that traditional art directors, senior directors, and creative directors, they see the, the public’s use of Canva, as stealing from, taking away some work that they would have had. Otherwise, it’s kind of the stock photography, what stock photography did to the advertising photographer. And that’s the controversy.

Kelly

The idea that anyone can design anything, right?

Eva

Yeah. You know, and then, so they have tools. And, people starting to devalue what it is that we bring to it. And, that’s a little difficult thing for those of us in the business to swallow is…

Julia 

I think, I think it’s incumbent upon us from the agency side, people that are account managers to understand the levels of design. And I know, we’re going down like a little rabbit hole that I just opened. But I would never do a real creative project for a client in Canva. I even work with a creative director who’s very young, she’s like, 25, and so good. And she’s like, Canva, are you kidding me? No, I’ll give you a PDF of my concepts. And you can rebuild them in Canva. So, I think of it in kind of tiered ways of selling the creative. And so, if anyone is out there selling Canva designs, as the next leader of the McDonald’s account creative. I am sorry to tell you, it’s not going to happen.

Kelly

Well, which kind of leads us to the next kind of iteration of this, which is what is your favorite thing to work on? I mean, I know the answer to this question, but is it TV, radio? Is it print? Is it digital, social?

Eva

Well, Kelly knows my favorite thing is logos. Logos are my favorite, because they are just the purity of an organization or business. It is what you know, it is their first vision of their branding, really. And so, I do have I do have a passion for making the perfect making the perfect logo that inspires and in somebody can build on and they keep it forever. So that’s my first favorite. And my second favorite thing is being on TV shoots. I love TV shoots are very few and far between. So, it might be part of the fact that they are you know, a rarity. They are the diamond that we don’t get to have that frequently. But it’s just, it’s just a fun environment. It probably stems from the fact that I had always dreamed I’m working on movie sets when I was, if I didn’t become a graphic designer, I would have tried to get in the movie industry in some way, shape, or form. I don’t know how but I just I think it’s fascinating. I just love it. So that’s, so that’d be my second favorite thing to do. And I’m not going to go down a whole list. But my third favorite thing, and Julia knows is print and die cuts, which is going away. But I still love me a very creative folded piece with tactile paper and doing things that you wouldn’t expect it to do. And it’s like a puzzle, you know, just trying to you know, how are you going to make it work for the budget for the client for the end user and putting all those puzzle pieces together is I find that very fascinating and very engaging.

Julia 

I don’t think it’s going away Eva, I think that that the talent of people that can do those types of things is waning sightly because the hunger for more graphic design and animation and videos is kind of taken over. But I mean, you’re a genius at it.

Eva

Yeah, I was called the “die cut Queen” for like 20 years now. Definitely.

Julia 

Okay, let’s talk about some of your other like hot tips. Eva, I love this one, “no one is going to die”.

Eva

Yeah, that’s probably one of my favorite ones. We take ourselves too seriously. And, and even though our clients might be curing cancer, or trying to, nothing that I design is going to save somebody’s life. And so, when you take yourself too seriously, when you take your work too seriously, and I don’t mean to blow off what you do, obviously, you know, our work is important to our clients, and doing it well is important to our clients. But when you put yourself on that stress pedestal of the world is going to implode if I don’t get this tagline, chest writer, this headline just right, then you take your chances of having a creative moment just really far away, you just need to just lighten up basically and just realize that the good is fine for a lot of stuff. Not everything needs to win and Addy and you have to realize what needs that you know that that specialness and what just needs to get done and in put those into perspective. So yes, nobody’s going to die based on what you do.

Julia 

Yes, until I feel like who can be so serious and be creative at the same time. I mean, you need to open yourself to like different emotions, happiness, sadness, excitement, maybe the emotion of a seriousness, but it shouldn’t be serious.

Eva

You find a lot of creatives have a lot of interesting, and dark humor. So, it’s part of who we are, when you walk through a creative department in an ad agency, it’s like you’ve walked into a whole different part of the building, you know, things get silly, you’ll see a lot of Marvel comic characters maybe hanging around, people throwing footballs at each other playing practical jokes, or whatever. And it seems like we’re a bunch of people who are not taking our profession seriously. But that’s what we need to do in order to come up with those ideas.

Kelly

Which begs the question, post COVID, obviously, everyone’s working from home, and we’re not in a collaborative environment anymore. How has that impacted you?

Eva

A lot. I worked freelance for a long time, which I mentioned earlier. So once I left a traditional agency and environment for that period of time, I found that to be the most difficult, so I call it getting together your creative posse. And it can, it can be different people. And you can either get together on a phone call or Zoom call or in person if possible. And just to throw ideas around, and they don’t even have to be in the industry. I have a particular girlfriend that I call a lot. Just she is left brained and I write braid. And just her perspective on what I’m talking about, sometimes will jog ideas. And that whole thought process of have no idea is a bad idea. anything no matter how ridiculous it is, or crazy it is, or stupid, it seems to be, you know, write it down. Worst case scenario, you will have at least marked off the directions that you do not want to head in and narrowed your focus. And that’s the worst-case scenario. And generally, out of that, even if it’s hours later, something will click from it, that will inspire you to do what it is that you need to do. So, I have different people for different things. And, Kelly and I have had our moments and we don’t necessarily agree, but I think it’s that times that we don’t agree some of our best work has come out of that really.

Kelly

True a lot of that back and forth. And thank you for saying that. Because we don’t always agree and I definitely push Eva in certain directions because all account people to some extent or want to be creatives, right? And so “what if you did this?”, and she’ll step away and ponder it and surprise me a lot times and say that’s a crap idea initially, but then later might think okay, well maybe that’s workable, it’s not always a crap idea.

Eva

I mean, I’ve worked with you both for different things and you work completely differently. You both have a different working styles and I’ve had to adjust to them. But they’ve both inspired me in different ways and done it in different ways. So, it’s really, interesting. And it’s fun.

Julia 

I was going to say I never argue with you, Eva.

Kelly

It’s just me.

Julia

It’s just our personalities. And weirdly enough, Kelly and I have very similar personalities. Yeah, I do you have some work styles that here and there are very different. Well, I love the creative posse idea. I feel like one of the ideas. One of the things that I love doing is just picking the clients brain, like what I call like off the record, like, we’re not on the record, like, let’s just like, let me just pummel you with questions that are just going down an easy path, not necessarily focused on the exact topic for the creative and let and let their creativeness come out. So that I can pull all those things out. And that way, if we incorporate those into the final product, they just feel more heard. They relate to it more. It’s, it helps. I also, like even love talking to random people that don’t have anything to do with what I’m doing about different subjects. They probably think I’m a total weirdo for doing it. But it’s because I like to listen to other people’s perspectives, because you’re right, it could spark some creativity.

Eva

And you bring up a point that you may have not considered, which could really change things.

Julia 

All right. So, as we wrap up, what is your last piece of advice for getting that creative spark Eva?

Eva

There’s two more. So, one is to get out in nature. And the reason is because it nothing is more perfection than nature itself, you can get inspired by textures and colors of what nature is put together. But also, even architecture I have looked up close to a dragon butterfly wing, like on the screen, and, and the pattern is actually quite incredible. Spider Web with do on it can be quite fascinating. If you take the time to look at small things and how they how they fit together, I’ll even use my old iPhone and take pictures of it and blow it up. And, and that can really inspire something new. And I I’ve created designs based on things that I’ve seen in nature. So that’s one and well. And plus, I mean, you know, stop and smell the roses, that phrase didn’t come out of nothing, there’s, there’s a reason why that phrase exists. And people you know, set it for many, many years, is to take that time out. And it’s just really important.

So, my other thing that people wouldn’t think about, is to go and do a good deed. And that sounds kind of nutty, but like go outside, help your neighbors get their trash cans in, go to the grocery store, Tell the lady in front of you that she looks really nice. And that color on her blouse that looks really lovely on her the smile that you get and that thank you one you’ve made her day better. And that’s always a good thing. Maybe she’ll pass it on and make the world a little better place. But the other thing is that it makes you feel really good and that kind of euphoria you get when you do a pure thing for no real reason. Is like creative gold. It just puts your brain in like the right space. I’m I can be quite the introvert when it comes to strangers. And it’s very hard for me to do and I’ve been training myself these last few years to make a point to find somebody during the day to say something to them like just the other day at the gym. I totally am like I think you’re adorable and I know you’re a mature woman and I shouldn’t use the word adorable. But you just you’re just really a lovely lady and in her face just changed like it just changed and I was just like up the rest of the day because I told the lady she was adorable. So, I really recommend it if you’re in a block if you’re in kind of a dark place, do something for somebody else and especially if it’s a stranger to somebody you don’t know. Yeah, that’s my other creative inspiration.

Julia 

I love it. Well, thanks for getting together with us, Eva. We, I think we go in over a lot of great tips for how to get your creative so

Kelly

Thank you so much.

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Kelly Callahan-Poe

Kelly is a true admom, an advertising and digital marketing executive with 30 years of both agency and client-side experience on the West and the East coast, and a mom for 16 years. Kelly is currently the president of Williams Whittle Advertising in Washington, D.C. Find Kelly on social:

Julia McDowell

A DC-agency girl, Julia’s career blossomed while working up the ladder at a top ad agency in the mid-Atlantic region, from account coordinator to President! Since 2017, Julia has been building Five Ones, working with many associations as well as continuing work for prestigious nonprofits.  Find Julia on social: