If Goodby asked: how do I inspire people to buy more of my clients' products in the current complex media environment (or, better yet, how to become more relevant in consumers' lives), then he may have come to a range of possible solutions, some of which may have been quite interesting, and all of which could have been actually expected to increase sales and/or promote the client's brand.
I believe that one of the biggest challenges facing is that we keep trying to find new solutions using old tools. Pre-roll, post-roll, pop-ups all come from seeing new tools through old lenses. We spend our time looking at how we can either force people to see our ads or trying to scream louder louder then anyone else.
It's the reason that I've spent so much time over the past 15+ years explaining to clients that we need to look at innovative ways to deliver better experiences. Ana says it very well -- how do we inspire people?
Take a look at how you ask and answer this question -- how do you inspire people to buy more of your products?
Simply put, Goodby seems to think that all we need is better advertising. Yes, times are challenging, and our response is to try harder to do what we are already doing. If we were just a bit more creative, or had a tad better copy, or be slightly more funny, then "advertising could morph itself into something people actually want to experience and seek out".Good luck with that.
The question here is not one of advertising at all. And framing complexity and uncertainty of the current media environment as an advertising question, can only limit the range of possible solutions. If Goodby asked: how do I inspire people to buy more of my clients' products in the current complex media environment (or, better yet, how to become more relevant in consumers' lives), then he may have come to a range of possible solutions, some of which may have been quite interesting, and all of which could have been actually expected to increase sales and/or promote the client's brand (Emphasis mine).
But no, let's talk AGAIN about advertising.
Goodby wants a more efficient old system. And he is hardly the only one. This kind of path-dependency in thinking is known both in studies of decision-making and in real life. Thinking that agencies' can't change because "there's simply too much money and corporate energy devoted to this cause for those budgets, and hopes, to disappear overnight." Hm, something's not going to fail because there is too much invested in it? Bigger systems collapsed for less: financial system and Soviet Union come to my mind :).
i [love] marketing. : not quite correct, mr. goodby.
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