{"id":1720,"date":"2023-04-19T10:39:11","date_gmt":"2023-04-19T09:39:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bjanda.com\/blog\/?p=1720"},"modified":"2023-04-19T10:39:11","modified_gmt":"2023-04-19T09:39:11","slug":"a-hard-business","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bjanda.com\/blog\/a-hard-business\/","title":{"rendered":"‘A Hard Business’"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

It is rare for our mainstream media to pay any attention to the advertising industry. Ads \u2013 yes; why advertisers should boycott various news channels \u2013 sometimes; the business \u2013 no. This week \u2018The Guardian\u2019 did exactly that, featuring a story<\/a> on how the industry is suffering from, and I quote, \u201cburnout and inequality\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

The Media Leader picked up on the same issue, although Nick Manning\u2019s piece<\/a> there identified a different underlying cause. Money.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I think both have a point. But there\u2019s more to it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although it is fashionable to blame burnout, stress, working late and the rest on the industry\u2019s ills, it was ever thus. It always used to be a badge of honour to be noticed staying later and getting in earlier than anyone else, and whilst it was neither clever nor necessary it was a thing; it did happen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I suspect (but can\u2019t prove it) that if there was a way of measuring the time spent actually working, as opposed to travelling, socialising, generally fannying about, today\u2019s admen work no harder, and no less hard than their predecessors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What is true, thank goodness is that we are certainly more aware than we used to be of the impact long hours at work, or the stresses caused by the threat of losing an account has on overall wellbeing and mental health. But when all\u2019s said and done, I\u2019m not convinced that the ad world is all that different from other service industries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As to money, the industry has never been able to compete with what it would consider its competitive set. Management consultancies as one example used to pay a starting salary in my day around double that paid by the agencies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Agencies are not massively profitable enterprises for a host of reasons, but first, second and third amongst them is the sad fact that many, many client boards don\u2019t see the value in the work that we do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We\u2019ve been complaining about access to the C-Suite for years and have not advanced our cause one jot. We now have the tools we need; we just don\u2019t use them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We need to change that, so much is clear, but underneath it all there are far too many agencies and far too little work. In a buyer\u2019s market, especially when the thing being bought is a vaguely defined commodity, like impressions or views, as opposed to priceless creativity, prices will drop.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Management consultancies, of whom there are comparably few compared to even media agencies pay to attract the best. We don\u2019t.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the past we got by on the basis that advertising was a fun, creative way to earn a living.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Agencies used to spend time going around the universities, presenting at careers fairs, promoting the industry. I may very well be wrong but I\u2019m not sure they do that so much these days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I think the decline in the attractiveness of the industry starts with the word \u2018creative\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018The Guardian\u2019 piece at the start of this post quoted four campaigns. In chronological order they were: Levi\u2019s Launderette (1985); Guinness Surfer (1998) and Cadbury\u2019s Gorilla (2007). The fourth, John Lewis is current, although for how much longer given their change in creative direction is questionable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

John Lewis aside the latest in \u2018The Guardian\u2019s\u2019 hall of fame is 16 years old.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The latest public musings from Levi\u2019s had their CMO talking of the brand\u2019s priority to be always on, in effect placing quantity (of audience) over quality (of message).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Graduates used to want to join the ad world because of the ads. Yes, the money was important but the focus within the industry on creativity and originality of thought over academic qualifications was appealing to many.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today the focus is more (to quote Sir Martin Sorrell) on mathsmen over madmen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We want creators of spreadsheets, social media obsessives, interpreters of acronyms, masters in understanding the numbers, over having and honing the skills to unlock the desires, wants and needs of real people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1947 Bill Bernbach wrote a letter to his agency colleagues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It started: \u2018Our agency is getting big. That\u2019s something to be happy about. But it\u2019s something to be worried about too\u2026\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It ended: \u2018The danger lies in the temptation to buy routinised men who have a formula for advertising.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

People are leaving, or not joining the ad industry because it\u2019s no longer about magic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The rest is noise.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It is rare for our mainstream media to pay any attention to the advertising industry. Ads \u2013 yes; why advertisers should boycott various news channels \u2013 sometimes; the business \u2013 no. This week \u2018The Guardian\u2019 did exactly that, featuring a story on how the industry is suffering from, and I quote, \u201cburnout and inequality\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bjanda.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1720"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bjanda.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bjanda.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bjanda.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bjanda.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1720"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.bjanda.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1720\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1722,"href":"https:\/\/www.bjanda.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1720\/revisions\/1722"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bjanda.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1720"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bjanda.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1720"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bjanda.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1720"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}