Dave Trott’s Blog

Jimmy Greaves was the most prolific goal scorer England ever had.

He was being interviewed about how he scored so many goals.

He said, “I’d reckon to get in the box 400 times a year.

About 200 times the ball would come across.

About 100 times I’d connect with it.

About 50 of those would be on target.

About half of those I’d put beyond the goalie.

And 25 goals a season would do me.”

So there it is from the greatest striker: do it by the numbers.

When I started my first job, I was like most juniors.

A lot better at print than TV.

So that was all anyone ever gave me: press briefs.

I wanted to learn about TV, but it was a vicious circle.

You’re not good at TV: so they don’t give you any TV briefs: so you never get good at TV.

I had to find a way to break the circle.

So after work, when all the senior teams had gone to the pub, I’d take the TV briefs off their desks and photocopy them.

Then I’d work late at night writing scripts.

Then present them in the morning before they got in.

It didn’t make me a lot of friends with the senior creatives, but in that first year at BMP I got six commercials made.

One of them was very good, two were okay, and three were bad.

But at least I was getting practice at TV.

In order to get 6 commercials made in those days, you would have to make at least 20 animatics for testing.

To get 20 animatics made, you’d need to have presented about 60 scripts to clients.

To get 60 scripts presented you’d need to show the creative director over 100.

And you’d probably have another 100 that weren’t good enough to show him.

That’s 200 scripts to get 6 commercials.

So there you have it.

A Career in Advertising: The Jimmy Greaves Method.