Today it is estimated that the human being receives around 11 million bits of information per second. With the new digital ecosystem, little or nothing resembles the advertising industry to that of a few decades ago. It is not surprising that consumers demand new capabilities from the communication they want to receive from brands.
Years ago, the advertising industry was a sector that directed its communication in a unidirectional way, hoping for a positive response from the consumer with no further interaction than the purchase process. Today, the consumer, in many cases, is a medium itself, an opinion prescriber, an influencer or someone who, with great power, tells brands what they like and what they don’t.
If it does not want to be left behind, this sector has to take an active part in social problems, in such a way that the values it preaches are intertwined in its company DNA. Companies, logically, acquire an economic and social commitment in the territory of the country where they operate, be it local, national, or international, and this implies an imbrication in many vital areas of the citizen.
Advertising is a reflection of society, but it may also have the capacity to shape it positively, it is the spearhead of innovation in many products and services to which this responsibility can and should be applied.
In fact, there are examples of this, but until now we have seen it mostly limited to NGOs and public administrations. The border between communication, commercial communication and advertising is increasingly blurred.
In the last year, brand security breaches increased by 25%
The importance of telling real, moving stories that feel like part of the life of each citizen is a necessary way of connecting brands with each person in particular. Nothing new considering the origins.
But it has to bet on being an involved party adding value and, while offering entertainment, information and competition options and diversity of quality products and services, also being an actor that contributes to solving social problems.
Logically, advertising cannot solve deficiencies that are the responsibility of governments, but it can help to the best of its ability. A sector that contributes 1.31 percent to GDP, with almost 39,500 companies, and with an investment in the media of 12,287.5 million euros, has the capacity to generate benefits for society.
A challenge that the communication industry now has very much in mind is that of fighting for its own dignity. The phenomenon of fake news, which does so much damage for the sake of credibility and transparency, affects the entire machinery of the media and advertising activity is not spared from being affected.
Something is happening and we need to bring order to provide brands with greater security. This is a great concern for advertisers due to the increase in this type of news, which represents a difficult scenario for advertising due to the repercussion of unfounded information and the generation of fraud that generates distrust. In the last year alone, brand safety breaches have increased by 25 percent. Having a safer and more transparent environment is essential.
Technology offers us an immense world of possibilities to be more efficient, artificial intelligence or big data, applied to marketing, oversize this sector, increase consumer knowledge and user experience. But it is necessary to apply a legislative proportionality to this reality and lay the foundations that guarantee us a more enlightening future. A future in which artificial intelligence has to coexist with ethical intelligence, that inner facet that makes us grow in the vision of the world of values and principles.
No one will forget that the main function of advertising is the generation of consumption, which is nothing but wealth generation for the country as well, but in this process there is room to build with purpose and meaning. The models have changed and the real opportunity is to turn communication into value for the human being.
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