- What should your art director resume include?
- How can you create a professional summary?
- How should you describe your work experience as an art director?
- Include a fitting art director resume education and certifications section
- Which key skills are relevant for an art director resume?
- How to select the most impactful art director resume template
- Key takeaways for writing an art director resume
An art director uses their eye for design to visualize creative concepts and campaigns. Writing a resume, however, may not come as naturally. If you want to catch a hiring manager’s attention, follow this guide and example to prepare a great art director resume.
In this article, we’ll discuss how to craft the perfect resume, including:
What an art director resume should include
How you can convey your strengths, experience, and education
The right skills to add to your resume
Advice for choosing a professional template
What should your art director resume include?
As an art director, you know how to convey concepts visually to capture an audience’s attention. You want to achieve the same goal with your resume, using your words to motivate a hiring manager to take action. Your resume should provide an overview of your experience and the results you’ve had in other jobs, whether you’ve worked in advertising, publishing, or film.
Your art director resume should include these sections:
A resume header with a link to your portfolio
A resume summary
A work experience section
An education section
A skills section
How can you create a professional summary?
Companies want to hire art directors who can conceptualize and execute creative ideas to help them stand out from the crowd. In your professional summary, make a pitch for why you’re the best person for this job. In two to three sentences, highlight your design experience, relevant skills, and career achievements. Show a hiring manager how you’ll add value to their organization.
If you want to grab an employer’s attention quickly, consider adding a bulleted list to describe your areas of expertise, as we’ve done here in the example. List your core competencies for the role, such as campaign management, website design, and brand alignment.
Offer in-depth industry expertise to deliver polished print and digital products within tight deadlines. Excel at planning and coordinating successful leading-edge digital marketing and email campaigns. Skilled leader, coach, and collaborator, guiding teams and working with creative staff to ensure top-notch content development and execution of projects according to specifications and deadlines. Unparalleled dedication to client satisfaction, collaborating with clients from project initiation to delivery to ensure complete satisfaction.
How should you describe your work experience as an art director?
If you’re applying for an art director position, you probably have several years of experience. In your work experience section, provide an overview of your past jobs, including your primary responsibilities and the contributions you made to campaigns or publications.
List your work experience in reverse-chronological order. Include any job you’ve held that’s relevant to the position, such as a graphic designer, photographer, or digital designer. Provide your job title, employer’s name, and employment dates. Include a short paragraph describing your duties and a bullet list of achievements for each role.
As much as possible, quantify your impact by providing statistics and data. For example, you might mention the return on investment for a digital marketing project you managed. If you don’t have hard figures to quantify your work, focus on your key projects and contributions. Here’s an example:
Aligned creative concepts with strategic goals to boost the company’s brand recognition.
Art Director at Loyal Dog Marketing, Milwaukee, Wisconsin 2017 - Present
Planned and managed email marketing projects, including list management, email proofing, email scheduling, and email statistics analysis.
Designed and developed mobile apps.
Tested new client websites for design and functionality.
Collaborated with sales manager on project planning, copywriter on content development, and data analyst on email-list data merger.
Oversaw website-coding process while engaging with developers to implement requested client-website changes.
Evaluated email campaign metrics to determine campaign performance.
Secured donations and acquired new members for nonprofit clients through email campaigns.
Orchestrated email campaigns for multiple client organizations via Campaigner; managed campaign setup, testing, and deployment, including content for A/B testing, personalization, and segmentation.
Digital Designer at The Bon Ton Stores, Inc., Milwaukee, Wisconsin 2016 - 2017
Designed e-commerce content, including homepages, special product guides and shops, gateways, and topper banners.
Created email designs for promoting products, including coding emails in HTML.
Administered projects from initial turn-in and release of creative to UI team or email deployment.
Extracted imagery for use from other designers. Managed email-template library. Liaised with Creative Director in resolving issues pertaining to creative.
Engaged with copywriters to drive creative decision-making.
Collaborated with marketing department in producing “hot” emails with short turnaround time. Partnered with e-commerce merchandise managers in managing special shops.
Led design and functionality of e-commerce shops targeted to fashion trends and specific customer bases in collaboration with merchandise managers.
Conceived and implemented new creative concepts to boost sales and establish company as a go-to store for on-trend fashions.
Digital Art Director / Digital Designer at The Bon Ton Stores, Inc., Milwaukee, Wisconsin 2010 - 2016
Oversaw digital art projects from concept to execution. Directed photo coordinators regarding use of backgrounds and images, and styling needs during photo shoots.
Collaborated with photographers, stylists, and hair/makeup teams to create fashion-forward imagery compliant with company’s brand standards.
Designed creative for e-commerce site, including home pages, special product guides and shops, gateways, and topper banners.
Created and coordinated distribution of marketing emails and prepared email templates for use by other designers.
Presented background photoshoot concepts to Creative Director. Provided creative content ideas to copywriters and ensured content development met deadlines.
Accelerated email campaign development process by designing and managing credit card program and email template library.
Tracked and managed all projects to achieve on-time execution.
Include a fitting art director resume education and certifications section
Most employers require art directors to have a bachelor’s degree in fine arts or a similar field. Provide an education section to show you meet an employer’s requirements. In this section, you can also highlight any relevant design certifications you’ve earned.
Follow these guidelines for your education section:
Provide the essential details. You don’t need to go into detail about your education. List your degree or certification, along with the institution where you received it.
Put your highest degree first. List your education in reverse order. If you have two or more degrees, put your highest one on top.
Include certifications. Provide the names of certifications you’ve earned or are currently working toward if they’re relevant to the role. For example, you can list the Adobe Certified Professional credential if you have it.
Bachelor of Arts in Graphic Design at the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee, Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Bachelor of Science in Communications at Carroll College, Waukesha, Wisconsin
Which key skills are relevant for an art director resume?
Obviously, an art director needs to have a variety of creative skills and technical proficiencies, such as design software. But how do you know which skills to highlight on your resume?
The best way to choose the skills for your resume is to review the job description. Hiring managers usually provide a list of skills they expect candidates to have. If you include the same or similar skills on your resume, you can align your expertise with the position. Mentioning similar skills can also help your resume rank highly if it’s scanned by an applicant tracking system (ATS). (You can learn more about mastering the ATS by reading our article on resume ATS optimization.)
While you should tailor your skills to each position you apply for, some common skills for an art director resume include:
Campaign management
Client and vendor relationships
Photoshoot coordination
Web or digital design
Catalog development
HTML
Adobe Dreamweaver
Expert Tip
In your skills section, make sure you mention your technical proficiencies. It can be helpful to group them in a separate section, like we’ve shown in the example. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics projects that the biggest growth in the field will come from the shift from print publications to websites and mobile platforms.
Microsoft Office; Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Dreamweaver, QuarkXPress, BEE Pro, CheetahMail, Campaigner, Imgur, HTML
Email Marketing Campaign Management
Client & Vendor Relationships
Photo Shoot Coordination
Web Design / Digital Design
Ecommerce Design & Content Development
How to select the most impactful art director resume template
While you might be tempted to show an employer your creativity, keep your resume clean and professional. You can add some color and design to the layout, but make sure those elements don’t overwhelm the rest of your resume. After all, you want a hiring manager to be focused on your qualifications.
Additionally, be concise when describing your work experience and skills. Keep your resume to one page if possible. However, if you have many years of experience, a two-page resume will be effective.
If you want some help with creating your resume, choose one of our professionally designed layouts from our resume builder. You can also get some creative inspiration by browsing over 100 resume examples we have available.
Summary example
Offer in-depth industry expertise to deliver polished print and digital products within tight deadlines. Excel at planning and coordinating successful leading-edge digital marketing and email campaigns. Skilled leader, coach, and collaborator, guiding teams and working with creative staff to ensure top-notch content development and execution of projects according to specifications and deadlines. Unparalleled dedication to client satisfaction, collaborating with clients from project initiation to delivery to ensure complete satisfaction.
Employment history example
Art Director at Loyal Dog Marketing, Milwaukee, Wisconsin 2017 - Present
Planned and managed email marketing projects, including list management, email proofing, email scheduling, and email statistics analysis.
Designed and developed mobile apps.
Tested new client websites for design and functionality.
Collaborated with sales manager on project planning, copywriter on content development, and data analyst on email-list data merger.
Oversaw website-coding process while engaging with developers to implement requested client-website changes.
Evaluated email campaign metrics to determine campaign performance.
Secured donations and acquired new members for nonprofit clients through email campaigns.
Orchestrated email campaigns for multiple client organizations via Campaigner; managed campaign setup, testing, and deployment, including content for A/B testing, personalization, and segmentation.
Digital Designer at The Bon Ton Stores, Inc., Milwaukee, Wisconsin 2016 - 2017
Designed e-commerce content, including homepages, special product guides and shops, gateways, and topper banners.
Created email designs for promoting products, including coding emails in HTML.
Administered projects from initial turn-in and release of creative to UI team or email deployment.
Extracted imagery for use from other designers. Managed email-template library. Liaised with Creative Director in resolving issues pertaining to creative.
Engaged with copywriters to drive creative decision-making.
Collaborated with marketing department in producing “hot” emails with short turnaround time. Partnered with e-commerce merchandise managers in managing special shops.
Led design and functionality of e-commerce shops targeted to fashion trends and specific customer bases in collaboration with merchandise managers.
Conceived and implemented new creative concepts to boost sales and establish company as a go-to store for on-trend fashions.
Digital Art Director / Digital Designer at The Bon Ton Stores, Inc., Milwaukee, Wisconsin 2010 - 2016
Oversaw digital art projects from concept to execution. Directed photo coordinators regarding use of backgrounds and images, and styling needs during photo shoots.
Collaborated with photographers, stylists, and hair/makeup teams to create fashion-forward imagery compliant with company’s brand standards.
Designed creative for e-commerce site, including home pages, special product guides and shops, gateways, and topper banners.
Created and coordinated distribution of marketing emails and prepared email templates for use by other designers.
Presented background photoshoot concepts to Creative Director. Provided creative content ideas to copywriters and ensured content development met deadlines.
Accelerated email campaign development process by designing and managing credit card program and email template library.
Tracked and managed all projects to achieve on-time execution.
Education example
Bachelor of Arts in Graphic Design at the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee, Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Bachelor of Science in Communications at Carroll College, Waukesha, Wisconsin
Skills example
Microsoft Office; Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Dreamweaver, QuarkXPress, BEE Pro, CheetahMail, Campaigner, Imgur, HTML
Email Marketing Campaign Management
Client & Vendor Relationships
Photo Shoot Coordination
Web Design / Digital Design
Ecommerce Design & Content Development
Key takeaways for writing an art director resume
When writing an art director resume, aim to show an employer how you’ll add value to their marketing campaigns or publications.
Describe how your experience has prepared you for a new role, including specific details about the results you’ve achieved.
Highlight your technical proficiencies to demonstrate your ability to use design software and tools.
You can show some creativity with your resume layout, but make sure it doesn’t take the focus away from your qualifications.
