Being in the ad industry, we pride ourselves on being creative. And while it is something we are always thinking about, we’ve come to realize one thing: creativity is a fragile thing. If you try to rush it, dictate it, limit it, or add too many rules, you end up with an inferior product.

While our industry hinges on short timelines and on-your-feet thinking, it is important to make sure the creative team has a healthy environment to function within so they can create the best work possible; creativity, ingenuity, and originality must all be fostered. Some features are essential, like open space, music, toys, and a team approach, etc. But something else is essential that we might not consider a quality or necessity of creativity: time.

When our creative team finishes an execution, their work is good. But giving them an extra hour – hell, an extra ten minutes – they can always tweak their work to make it GREAT, whether it be a color change, a new font, or an additional element. Fostering a creative environment that doesn’t put creative under the gun can only bring good things for everyone at an agency.

See what creativity looks like.

Every day, we do amazing work for some pretty cool clients. We get to do amazing work, have fun, and create some awesome stuff along the way.

We recently created some designs for a client of ours: Chicken. Yes, chicken! (Okay, okay, The National Chicken Council). Aside from an awesome Facebook page and a sweet Twitter account, we’ve create some merchandise for all those chicken lovers out there. Check out some of our work below, or just go check out the CafePress Shop (and buy some chicken stuff).

Last week, I came across a post on Toxel.com (a favorite site of mine) about 15 Examples of Modern Web Design. Yes, these are all cool looking and provide visual stimulation, but they go beyond just looking sweet. Check ‘em out:

Web technology is expanding exponentially in so many ways, and we should embrace it, especially if it makes life a little bit easier. And that is what modern web design is about. Things like Cascading Style Sheets, or CSS, are enabling web designers the ability to create amazing works of art while still enhancing functionality and site efficiency.

And although CSS and other web technologies aren’t necessarily new, they continue to update and change for the better, allowing increased usability. Their usage continues to enhance design and functionality, two things that go hand. And yes, while the sites above are artistic and beautiful, they are more than just pretty. They connect function with identity, which is just good design.

At any advertising agency, there are many parts. There is usually some mix of creatives, account service, word of mouth/social media, traffic, and PR professionals. (Hint – if you want to see the people behind The Cyphers Agency, click on some of the links in this blog post)

We thought it would be a good idea to let you know what all of these people do, and why, when you put us all together, we come up with such great ideas.

Account Service – The people in account service at The Cyphers Agency are constantly making sure that our clients objectives are being accomplished. They oversee all projects and campaigns, and provide strategic and planning insight throughout the process. Communication (to keep clients happy, and keep the agency “account”-able) is essential with account service personnel.

Creative Department – These groovy folks aren’t just the ones creating ideas, websites, building facebook and iPhone apps, designing print ads, and filming television ads. Yeah, they do all that, but their most important job is conveying ad messages and accomplishing strategic objectives in unique and memorable ways. If you can see it, these people did it. And they put a lot of thought behind the idea.

Word of Mouth / Social Media (we call it “Push-N-Pull” here at Cyphers) – This department spreads the word for our clients. Whether our clients want to increase awareness, increase web traffic, improve customer service, search engine optimization, increase customer reviews, (BREATH….) perform market research, distribute promotions, handle a crisis, or just start “Facebook-ing” and “Twittering”, this is the department that will be getting your message to the people that want to hear it.

Traffic – This department handles the behind-the-scenes management of all the jobs. Who needs what? Where does that job need to go next? Traffic handles the who, what, when, where, and why for all of our clients. Most importantly, our traffic department ensures that all of our jobs are out the door to clients on time.

So hopefully you now have a greater understanding of how advertising agencies work. Why does ours work so well? Because we don’t just do our jobs separately. From brainstorms to our open office to staff meetings to following each other on social networks, there is a lot of communication here at The Cyphers Agency. That way, when something important happens, we all know about it quickly. Or when someone has an idea, we can all build on it quickly. This is just one of the reasons that The Cyphers Agency is greater than the sum of it’s parts.