The world of advertising is hard to keep up with. It's constantly changing, moulding to peoples desires and cravings. BAMN, named after its four members - Ben Culpin, Annabelle Manus, Michael Wessel and Nikolay Mihaylov, seems to be on top of this evolving industry though, staying one step ahead with original and creative ideas. The future looks bright for the group, though for now only Ben and Nikolay are creative partners.
The four recently came second in Ad Venture, an international competition open to students from the EFCCE academic members' establishments and from other establishments that teach commercial communications. As a result, they presented their campaign video "I guess it's just a Leeds thing" at the European Foundation for Commercial Communications Education in Berlin.
Since Berlin, Nikolay now believes that his team "belongs in this industry". The result was also less important for Michael, who expressed how much the personal feedback from "important people" afterwards was "more encouraging than any prize."
Positive feedback for BAMN's unique creativity can only be encouraging. Ben cites this to how everyone in the group has roles, and that these compliment each other. "You can't do everything and it was great to know that I was working with such talented people."
Unlike the others though, Ben doesn't think he has a certain style he'd attribute himself with, saying that he's "still learning and trying out new things". Annabelle believes that the team's versatility is one of their strengths though. "We are not afraid to stick to a concept we believe in even if it means taking a risk.
"It's hard to stand out in the design world and people do come up with a whole lots of strategies to be different," she continues. Nikolay explains further that this is "an age where thinking outside the box is not enough. You have to be able to connect the dots. You have to be able to see the big picture and then worry about how things would play out."
A "dot connector" is how Nikolay describes himself, or maybe just an "inquisitive human being" he goes on to say, where as Annabelle says that she's more "methodical", saying it's "important to stick to your principles and convictions to get anywhere". Whatever your style, it seems important that when in a team, everyone knows their roles and "compliments" each other.
On their own, the members of BAMN have different ideas on advertising and creativity. Their new and original ideas put them in an exciting place in the field of advertising though.
Michael insists that people new to the industry must have an open, creative mind. He claims that when talking to people in the industry, they will "listen to what you have to say because they are generally interested in a broad range of fields and always want to see things in a different perspective."
Listening seems to be a theme amongst the BAMN team. When coming up with ideas, Nickolay stays aware of as much as possible, such as social media or friends, as ideas can come from anywhere. "Everything counts", he says. "You never know. That's why it's so engaging and sometimes I even think that the process of brainstorming is like an addiction to me."
For Ben, creativity has become something he does for fun and work, something he would advise for everyone. "Don't ignore what you're interested in because this is most likely something that you're either good at, or willing to get better at. For me, advertising is about understanding your client's desired message, and finding a way to relay this to the target audience. To do that, you need to be able to put yourself in their shoes and really understand what makes them tick." Perhaps an obvious reason why BAMN's creativity has been so popular and left audiences with a product to remember.
