ITG Recruitment Ad

2000 Two-color print ad for a campaign designed to recruit young programmers. Working directly with the CEO on concept, I designed the shell, wrote copy, and created the illustration. I conducted an A/B test of the illustration with staff engineers and recent MIT grads. Rocket Girl concept was approved after Skateboard Girl got rejected for not looking fun enough.

recruitment ad for Merrill Lynch ITG
Ad as printed in the Boston Software News

2021 Remake

The web image of the original ad looked horrible on today's high resolution monitors. Reformatting 20-year-old digital assets took longer than anticipated. The cleaner design made the illustration look worse, which led to redrawing it. Twice.

original ad with new Rocketgirl art
Rocketgirl 2021 Remake based on the published illustration. The rocket is designed to look like a flying Vespa scooter. Can't remember where I first saw high heel ankle boots with padlocks, but haven't been able to get them out of my head ever since. Original art is approximately 9 x 7 inches.
original ad with new Skateboard Programmer art
Skateboard Programmer 2021 A "director's cut" remake based on the original thumbnail sketch. Her computer bag is based on the Swissgear one I had in the early 2000s. She's got two batteries and an optical disc drive taped under the board. Original art is 5 x 4.5 inches.
Thumbnail sketches
Skatebaord Programmer, proposed idea for the ITG recruitment ad
Skateboard girl
Rocketgirl, the accepted idea for the ITG recruitment ad
Rocket girl
Fun facts
The background graphic has a modified C++ snippet with the comment-out line "** If you're squinting to read this, we want to hear from you **".
The ad ran in the Boston Globe, Boston Software News, C++ Users Journal, and various trade journals. It generated a ton of resumes that led to one new hire on our 40-person team.

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