Back in 2020, I gazed into my crystal ball to see what 2021 would bring. Preparing to do it all over again this year, I dug up my comments to see if any still held.
- There will still be morons out there shouting at us on Linkedin to only do digital marketing. Yep, that’s still a thing but they are now following me around YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, Twitter and every other place where I watch a video.
- There will still be morons writing opinion pieces about how TikTok or ‘insert latest social media platform’ is going to fundamentally change the advertising business. I didn’t see Generative AI coming at the time but in my defence, I’m not sure anyone did.
- There will still be morons talking about Millennials and other non-sensical categorisations. Please, please make it stop!
- Smart advertisers will keep taking a long-term view, building their brands and investing in channels based on the brief. We’re all on the lookout for more of them.
- Everyone in the ad industry will continue to start sentences with, “I’ll tell you what clients want…” but, as always, very few clients will do the same. I still haven’t heard a client say that.
- Digital companies will still be arguing with the Government about the news media bargaining code. And they are still arguing. Governments have swung from protecting children to funding journalism and a few in between. Yet the digital behemoths are still obfuscating.
- Change will continue, it will be rapid but like all things in this life, it will come one day at a time and we will all be able to manage. Just like Ron Burgundy, that escalated quickly.
It seems everything and nothing has changed in the past four years.
Advertising is less like an industry and more like a high-speed rollercoaster missing half the track. Thrilling, yes – but absolutely terrifying if you’re not strapped in.
What’s the bet all this will still more or less track four years from now?
