Adnerds

I’ve been in advertising for over 25 years now. I can hardly believe it myself. And I really feel like advertising has enabled me to do what I like doing the most. So I count myself very lucky. Yet, on my mailbox at home, there is this sticker which says “No Publicity”. “Why,” one could ask, “it’s your bread and butter!”.

I tell you more. I’m blind as far as ads in magazines or newspapers are concerned and I consistently feel an urge to pee whenever a TV-program is interrupted by  commercials. That is most definitely not so because I don’t like advertising, which I obviously do. It is so because I simply hate spam, just like anybody else.

I’m just as well a consumer. And like any other consumer, I do like advertising as long as it’s about stuff I’m actually –or might be– interested in. I profoundly disapprove of spam. Spam is intrusive. Spam is disrespectful. Because spammers treat consumers like cattle. Is there possibly anyone besides cows who takes no offense being considered to be bovine?

The only circumstance in which I would think about removing the ‘no publicity!’-sticker from my mailbox, is if the mailman would take a personal interest in what I’m paying attention to at any time and only give me the advertising for products or services I’m in for. And even though some of us are still in denial, we all know that newspapers, magazines and TV as we know it are terminal.

The internet in general and social media in particular offer everything you need to reach out to consumers personally – as opposed to randomly. So, how come advertising agencies are still doggedly involved in this spam business which is treating people as cattle and merely bothering them with things they whole-heartedly dislike? Where on earth is the gain in that?

Well, it is because all tradional advertising agencies are still stuck in the obsolete business model of the media business. Because that is where their big bucks used to come from. They are smothered with fear now they see their commissions evaporate. And still their strategy for the future is one of holding on to old media as long as they possibly can. That is why they are still in the business of randomly blasting messages at masses. That is why they are still in the business of spam.

As for the advertisers, I take it they are ill-advised. Because today, any advertiser has the means to reach every consumer who is sincerely interested in whatever it is they are selling. Which is, if you are in the know, a no-brainer.

So, tell me honestly, who’s the stupid cow here: the spammed or the spammer?