ACCOUNTABILITY & ADVERTISING!

In my opinion there is ample justification for questioning a major advertising pretension that it does, indeed, work at all!

All human knowledge is provisional but it is also incremental, the sum of what we know to day is far greater than thirty years ago – with, possibly, the sole exception of marketing/advertising.

It is more than possible that people may look back on the six or seven years either side of 2000 as a period of aberration, when advertising people temporarily became obsessed with technology. And forgot that the most intoxicating thing in human existence is our ability to communicate face to face. In fact to INTERACT!

Advertising Agencies rushed into broadcast television and, more recently the Internet, the reason for this has nothing to do with advertising effectiveness, but all to do with economic imperatives. After all agencies tend to nurture their own illusions.

Similarly it is always possible to face up to any problem simply by fixating on fictional evidence, i.e. "Advertising works"

In to days over informed world (better known as clutter), magazines for example have much going for them…

1. Magazines are actively purchased
2. Magazines are technology-proof. They are very portable, they require no electricity – you can take them anywhere an iPod would go. And a lovely expression I came across the other day "bed, bog, bath…very flexible.
3. Ads add value. In the US it has been established that advertising is an integral part of every magazine.
4. Magazines offer engagement.
5.Better still magazines can effectively INTERACT with television!

Print isn't dead, however judging from the poor quality of creative emanating from agencies these days perhaps "Advertising Agencies are dead"!

Most certainly they lack an understanding of the word "Communication"