Can anyone recommend any good sources of inspiration for advertising / marketing / social campaigns? preferably books or websites
Except I’m looking more for the sort of inspiration that I can actually relate to when it comes to the more day-to-day sort of work I do… it seems like most of what is out there inspiration-wise is just huge, world class advertising campaigns for the sort of clients I can only dream of getting.
I find it hard to get inspired by this sort of work because it’s in a whole different league to what I do for my job.
Is the best way for me to find inspiration just by looking at case studies of on other design agencies’ / freelancers’ websites?
Why wouldn’t you aspire to doing world class work? Aim for the stars. But sure, if your client can’t, then figure out a way to bring quality for price. Value engineering, we call it. You have to know what’s possible before you can scale it down to a more affordable solution.
During my 50-year career that ended in 2017, I always drew significant inspiration from The One Show https://www.oneshow.org/categories/print
Since entries for the Awards for 2021are currently in the mix, I would suggest you take a look at the 2020 winners (listed with the Options at the top right of the website.)
Of course, the Creative Directors of some of these winners had mega-bucks to work with, you can still gather significant inspiration for even the smallest of budgets.