Ads the ‘great mirror’ to pop culture, in the age of persuasion

Think back to when you were four years old.

What do you remember? Was there something that happened to you that impacted you and the entire course of your life?

For popular broadcaster and marketer Terry O’Reilly, it was a television commercial he starred in for a local bakery in his hometown of Sudbury, Ontario. The commercial had a lasting effect on O’Reilly’s thoughts on the importance, influence and power of advertising and the art of persuasion.

Fast forward and the national and international award-winner is now known as one of Canada’s most influential marketers. A testament to a journey in advertising that began at the age of four.

Growing up in a small, isolated town, O’Reilly was removed from popular culture. Residents in the nickel capital of the world only listened to two radio stations, and only watched CBC Television. The upside was the focus on imagination, and the impact of what O’Reilly heard and watched was great.

In high school, O’Reilly enrolled in a television and film course that spanned the entire five years of his secondary education. The program whetted his appetite for broadcasting.

O’Reilly graduated from high school and moved to Toronto, his first experience in a large city, and attended Ryerson University. At Ryerson, a lecture series introduced him to the world of advertising. 

“When advertising professionals would come to speak, I was fascinated. Coming up with ideas and strategies, working on brands with actors and film locations, I just sat there wide-eyed. I knew if I picked the direction of broadcast, my path would reveal itself. And it did with advertising,” he said.

Starting as a copywriter in Burlington, Ontario, O’Reilly eventually made his way back to Toronto, worked for some of the most creative advertising agencies in the country, then started his own business, focusing on his passion for radio. In 1990, he created a business that he couldn’t find in North America. It was an audio production company that didn’t produce commercials from a director’s point of view, but rather a writer’s point of view. Pirate Radio and Television was founded on that philosophy.

On Wednesday, O’Reilly – best known as host of the award-winning marketing series The Age of Persuasion, now Under the Influence, on CBC Radio – will receive an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from the DeGroote School of Business at McMaster.

[img_inline align=”right” src=”http://dailynews.mcmaster.ca/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2012/06/PiratePic.jpeg” caption=”Advertising samples and other materials included in the extensive Pirate Group donation to McMaster University.”]

Pirate Radio and Television donated a significant collection of advertising campaign materials from some of North America’s most iconic brands – Molson, Coca Cola, Pepsi and McDonalds, as well as Olympic campaigns, the first AIDS public awareness campaign and election advertisements – to McMaster in February of 2012. More than 50,000 radio and television commercials are among the archives and are of particular significance to O’Reilly.

The educational value of the donation is vast, spurring interdisciplinary research between the faculties of humanities, social sciences and business. The collection can be examined by students and researchers and is the only one of its kind in Canada. As a living archive, Pirate will continue to share campaigns and creative work with McMaster.

“There was a desire for the archives to be incorporated into academic courses, to preserve and study from the best practices to spur creative and new innovative ideas. McMaster University was the best place to put the archives,” said O’Reilly. “Advertising is the great mirror to popular culture and what is going on at any given time. It reflects our culture and how we think and feel, and that’s why it is important to study advertising, because it touches every aspect of our lives.”

O’Reilly will share what he knows about the influence and persuasion of advertising and its impact on our world when he addresses the graduating class of business students Wednesday. He says he will stress the importance of never losing the ability to create ideas.

“Idea people are what the advertising industry wants. The ability to conceptualize and create an idea from scratch is important. But so is persistence. In what is a highly competitive field, the act of never giving up does matter. If you want it bad enough, you’ll get it.”