What does advertising practically do?
It enhances your communication, and it brings your products and services before consumer eyes. It does not make anything better; it just creates the opportunity for a client to pick you and your products/services. If your product or service sucks, it is just a waste of time and money. If your online presence is poor, your ads won’t be efficient. If you are looking for miracles, avoid advertising. In fact, if you decide to advertise you should be very careful when and how to advertise so that you meet with your audience. Also you have to pick very wisely the company that will represent you for that purpose.
But what is Advertising?
Wikipedia says: “Advertising is the practice and techniques employed to bring attention to a product or service. Advertising aims to put a product or service in the spotlight in hopes of drawing it attention from consumers.”
In general, I do agree with the claim but, advertising is more than wishful thinking, hoping, and praying.
Along with the second industrial revolution (1870), marketers understood the need to increase customer spend. So in the late 19th century, modern advertising was introduced to the markets and has been constantly evolving ever since. It is quite remarkable that very early (1910s and 1920s) advertisers realized that human instincts could be targeted and harnessed. This would result in the desire to purchase.
First Radio ads began in the 1930s and TVCs ( TV Commercials) began during the 1950s.
The rise of mass media communications allowed companies to advertise directly to consumers. This forced businesses to focus on the brand and increased the need for better insights into consumer purchasing, consumption, and usage behavior, their needs, wants, and aspirations.
Digital Advertising today consumes almost 50% of the global ad spend and for many companies, it is the only advertising method.
I started my career in Traditional Advertising, specifically in BTL (Below the Line) which originally is considered 1to1 advertising but if you ask me I would say it would be more accurately described as face-to-face advertising; since a brand representative called “promoter” would most times be present during the interaction of your brand with the consumer. BTL advertising could be anything that is directly interacting with the consumer. Here are some examples: events like exhibitions, tradeshows and sponsorships (concerts, sports events etc.), street and in-store promotions, Point-Of-Purchase materials and merchandising, and direct mail.
I have worked with great global brands back in the day, like Sony Ericsson (when they were a market leader), LG Electronics, Sony, Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Henkel, Vodafone… and I have probably pitched to all the global companies that have a Greek branch, heh. Besides the deliverables and the high-stress levels, advertising is so fun … I have such good memories from back then, I learned so much about Marketing, advertising, project management, and setting achievable goals.
Later on, Digital Advertising came knocking on my door. At first, I resisted and then I spent a large chunk of time learning and adapting to digital ads. Be aware that the principles of advertising and marketing are the same, the media and the ways are different… a lot. So, it took a while to adapt before I stood proud and ready to take on any new clients in this new journey. But that was a valuable lesson for me. Resistance to change and fear is paralyzing. I try not to forget that. Soon we expect advertising to change again and adapt again to the new A.I. age. This time we aim to dive deep into this new era early on, fearless.
