To understand why the rise and fall of “digital” is a necessity, it helps to understand why “digital” was invented at all. It was – of course – a marketing tool to eke out a relevant place in the client’s mindset. 10 years ago, “campaign making” was solidly owned by traditional agencies, while “relationship management” was firmly in the hands of direct marketing agencies. Thus the most promising way for young agencies to gain relevance was not by claiming one of those functions but by owning the expertise in the new digital forms of execution. Their USP:

“Nobody can do ads in the digital channel like we do. ”

And the digitals were right. To their big frustration, and despite continuous scoffing, the traditional agencies did not “get” digital. Neither how it works, nor how it’s produced. So the digital agencies picked up business. Lots of it. They did so on top of the traditional budgets in the first half of the decade, and of course heavily at the expense of the regular account holders in recent years.

It was all fine and dandy, as long as digital wasn’t on the client’s main agenda. Despite all the revolutionary rhetoric of the digitals’ self-marketing, they were sitting pretty in a safely profitable spot, growing at a fast clip making material for a “channel” without much real responsibility for the brand.

However, the more successful that “channel” became, the more obvious it was, that it wasn’t a channel at all. To be fair, a lot of people noticed; but the clients didn’t care.

Until 2008. When the economic crisis started to build momentum, clients finally took a serious holistic look at their ad budget from a top level. And for the first time, digital agencies were dancing on the main stage. As they moved up the attention ladder, they soon received their first real shots at becoming brand leaders. It was theirs to prove not only that traditional agencies “don’t get digital” but also that digital agencies “got brand”.

However, most digital shops have failed to do so. One only needs to read the laments on the creative social blog to feel the deep disappointment that the world has not changed into a paradise of fantastic one-off online experiences.

We now know this: Digital – conceived as a channel – cannot lead a brand. But by the same token, non-digital can not lead anymore either. And all of a sudden, both traditional agencies and digital agencies find themselves in the same race: To be the “next agency”.

A race neither of them is well prepared for. But forget the scrambling agencies, they’re not even half as freaked-out as their clients, who all of a sudden are longing for the days when they knew that 50% of their budget was a waste, but the other 50% reached millions. It is their desire to find new footing, that is fueling the “big race” for the next agency.

If digital is conceived of as the new ecosystem of brand communication, who will have the ability to lead?

Definitely someone for whom the word “digital” is about as noteworthy when talking about advertising, as the world “color” is for my parents when they talk about television. They just don’t.

Digital advertising is dead. Long live advertising.

Und so kommen wir zur Werbung.

Vom Billig-Briefkopf auf Crowdspring bis zu Doritos Superbowl TV-Spots gibt es inzwischen kein Werbemittel mehr, das nicht durch “Mengenkreation” ziemlich erfolgreich ausgedacht worden ist. In der Regel auch nicht weniger lustig als von uns Profis.

Was die aufmerksamen Köpfe der digitalen Revolution in den letzten 5 Monaten dazu gesagt haben, gibt’s jetzt in einer etwas drögen, aber dafür umso reichaltigeren Slideshare-Präsentation. Natürlich bringen sich die Erfinder hier mediengerecht in Stellung, aber jenseits des Instant Brandings nimmt man doch viel mit: wo sich Crowdsourcing effizient einsetzen läßt, und warum eventuell dabei kein Cannes Gold rauskommt, und wieso das vielleicht bald egal sit. Kurz: Ein netter Happen für alle, die darüber nachdenken, was wir uns in Zukunft noch mühsam und teuer selber ausdenken, und was wir einfach für wenig Geld die Vielen machen lassen.

Das Wichtigste steht praktischerweise schon im Vorwort (S.5). John Winsor, Chef der Crowdsourcing-Agentur Victors & Spoils, fast sehr viel in ganz wenigen Worten zusammen: “Marketing that’s built in a world of scarcity will be challenged to work in a world of abundanceThere is a new model of marketing emergin. … In this new model, guidance and inspiration go much further than command and control.”

Über zwei Dinge werde ich wohl noch länger nachdenken. 1. Gibt es vielleicht neben der Knappheit der Medienflächen (Tschüss!) eine andere Knappheit, die Messagekontrolle wieder interessant machen könnte? 2. Weiß Winsor schon, was er mit “much further” meint?

The iPhone barely needed any creative advertising, because the perfect ad was built in: By an innovation obsessed CEO. By excellence in craft & design. By an emotion-causing brand. The advertising was so simple, bar any creative surplus, that a monthlong depression should have been the least result of working on it.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=0lfmlKYZ-vU

A product demo over elevator music! These spots would not have sold a single Zune. (To be fair, I don’t know what would.)

Successful campaigns like this signal a problematic situation for ad agencies and their clients alike. Lousy products or low interest categories have little sway in the attention market of  social networks. No matter how much you spend. The blogosphere fails reliably when it comes to advertising something else than free beta software or sexy gadgets. Webspace marketing expert Seth Godin advises companies to make better products or else:

“The goal is to create a product that people love. If people love it, they’ll forgive a lot. They’ll talk about it. They’ll promote it. They’ll come back. They’ll be less price sensitive. They’ll bring their friends. They’ll work with you to make it better.”  (Seth Godin blogging at http://bit.ly/KCyC9)

Once the product becomes the new Superhero on the Block, we should’t be surprised that a new bunch of ad guys emerged, who want to support clients in coming up with products that stand a chance in dialogspace. Or -- clients unwilling -- who simply will create cool things themselves. Quite a risky idea, as it leaves behind the well-known lakes of the service industry and sails into the torrentous ocean of actually making stuff.

One of those agencies felt so much mental resistance when it started in 2004, its founders named it Anomaly (www.anomaly.com) -- ironically hoping to prove the name wrong. Others who ventured in similar directions: the BBH-supported rulebreaker ZAG (www.zaginvention.com) and the Brooklyn Brothers (www.thebrooklynbrothers.com).

All of these agencies have been brought into this world by hands experienced at making creativity work. All of them must have felt that following the usual agency model would be harder than clearing the path for a new one.

And indeed, the idea of helping nerdy product designers to a healthy dose of creative gut-feeling is not only emotionally tempting, but also convincing on paper. However, results may vary. It has yet to be seen whether this idea has the stamina to make a sustained difference in the real world or whether it spends most of its time writing evangelical press releases.

The incomplete sample is made up of:

• The organic luxury chocolate bar “Fat Pig Chocolate” by the Brooklyn Brothers. Lots of hoopla for the design, but mostly distributed online (really ???).
• “Pick Me” by ZAG, a line of preservative free packaged veggie meals. The healthy fast food is currently listed big time by 600 Tescos in the UK.
• And “By Lauren Luke”, a line of make up products created by Anomaly and named after YouTube phenomenon Lauren Luke who sometimes rakes in over 2 million hits by demonstrating in unedited videos how to copy celebrity looks. Again, the press is all over it, and US cosmetics retailer Sephora has decided to pick up the line in their stores online and offline.

As the first results of the new strategy have hit magazines and shelves, three conclusions can safely be made.

1. It is possible to succeed with niche products.
2. It is possible to succeed with fast products.
3. There is only one Steve Jobs.

Quite unfairly, I won’t show or mention the heaps of excellent advertising done by these companies. Because it just doesn’t follow the “new” model. However, if you have to, here are their websites. It seems, thinking more about what the people out there really want from a product helps make great “normal” ads, too.

http://www.anomaly.com

http://www.thebrooklynbrothers.com

http://www.zaginvention.com

Products:

http://www.fatpigchocolate.com

http://www.pickmefood.co.uk

http://www.bylaurenluke.com