An advertising coordinator's job description and duties vary widely depending on the individual company as well as its size. Advertising coordinators in smaller firms may have increased responsibilities by acting in several different supervisory capacities such as by "wearing many hats." For example, a person employed in this role at a smaller agency or business may be the art director as well as the coordinator. Mainly though, advertising coordinators support marketing efforts and bring together projects by keeping everything on schedule and paying attention to the details.
In essence, coordinators in advertising are project managers in many respects. They coordinate different project activities from various departments in order to see a marketing project get completed on time with all its components intact. Like a project manager, an advertising coordinator is usually expected to do follow-ups with clients and prepare reports on the strengths and weaknesses of the end products, or deliverables, to use as information for future projects.
Advertising coordinators may gather the details of what is required for a trade show brochure or other marketing materials from the sales department and bring those to a copywriter and art director. They may then oversee the printing and production as well as perhaps approve the final copy. An advertising coordinator is often a supervisor who reports to a senior account executive or creative director or sometimes both.
The coordinator may supervise marketing assistants to complete tasks for promotions. Creating and distributing memos to different departments or branch offices is often a regular responsibility for advertising coordinators. Working on a computer daily to edit marketing materials or check the use of images for legal reasons may be other advertising coordinator duties. In communicating with clients, advertising coordinators typically answer their questions by email and telephone. Coordinators may also communicate with clients face to face, especially during group meetings held at the advertising agency.
Compiling market research information as well as graphs or charts for promotional campaigns is a common task of many advertising coordinators. In this capacity, an advertising coordinator may work with the sales department of a business to complete print or online marketing copy projects. He or she may supervise the needed work being done by junior staff that would include fact finding and data entry.
Selling advertising space is a task that some coordinators may do. This could be in print, web or broadcast form. Depending on the company, the ad space may be for a trade publication in the client's industry.