The expansion of digital communication and advertising was largely based on the unprecedented things that social media brought. The ability to interact with the target audience. The dissemination of the message by the recipient and not by the traditional process of one-sided transmission.
But when the dust settled, what was revealed was that the advertiser essentially had to get off the canvas if he wanted to gain the consumer's interest.
In the last 50 years, since the beginning of the “Creative Revolution” in the late 1950s, advertising has made strides, changed and essentially acquired an important role in pop culture, but it has slowly become trapped in the canvas that was delimited by the “dimensions” of the media. A television spot had to be 30” or 15”, within this time frame the advertiser had to manage to fit his creativity and convey the message that would boost his sales. Print Ads, on the other hand, were given more opportunities for creative exercises but were still limited due to the dimensions of the media and the lack of opportunities to expand the idea.
At the same time, the development of the media buyers profession, those who bought space and time for messages to be broadcast, took away budget and, to a large extent, creativity from advertising creatives. It makes sense since if you had the ability to buy enough TV and radio time and plenty of space in print media, you could monotonously repeat your USP and broadcast your message.
In digital, from the time the first banner appeared until very recently, we were limited to banners usually at the top or right of sites that led to a site that operated in the same way as traditional media. One-sided dissemination of information with minimal user intervention in the dissemination of the message. All of this contributed to the formation of a strange status quo that defined that 10% of the budget went to the idea and its production and 90% to buy space and time to spread it.
Somewhere along the way, Social Media entered our lives. Especially after 2008, their growth rate began to far exceed anything that had come before. The two-way communication capabilities they provided soon became a vehicle for changing the culture of companies that wanted to advertise, as messages suddenly ceased to be unanswered, while at the same time the user could become the carrier of the messages themselves if they were of value to him.
However, these changes did not lead to an improvement in the quality of advertising. Most of us perceived the new reality somewhat awkwardly. Many used the media just like paid space for listings or advertisements. With advertising messages that may or may not have interested the user. The next stage was contests.
Like became the holy grail. Like and win a trip. Like and go on a date with such and such models. Like and get two boxes of coffee. They essentially became the new coupons, but without any sales. Everyone wanted enough fans on their pages without anyone thinking about what exactly to do with them. Everyone was furiously copying the practices introduced by Howard Luck Gossage in the 1960s, but forgetting the strategy and logic behind the actions.
Fortunately, the battle for likes lasted a short time, and we slowly began to understand the big truth. Why fight for likes and not fight for the creation of unique experiences that will lead to two-way communication with users? In addition, we have no reason to be trapped. The canvas is no longer defined and we now have the ability to think without limitations and expand our creative approach beyond what the available means allowed us until recently. In practice, we do not need to follow the 10-90 model.
The need to buy time became a need for great ideas. To launch the new F-Type, Jaguar instead of releasing commercials shot an amazing short film starring Homeland's Damien Lewis:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=blT3IHPce20
With the media budget stress removed, even Lana Del Ray was brought in to write the soundtrack. More recently, Honda took the concept of interactivity to the next level. To promote the new Type R, they created an interactive video on YouTube in which every time you press the R button, the video and perspective change:
Removing the canvas from the equation suddenly led to the next revolution in creativity. Now advertising has become interesting again and now instead of transmitting messages, we create experiences. Now advertising becomes – again – a game of skills, abilities and intelligence. A field that concerns more and highlights the -really- best.
