Surprising results of a no-ad world
During a CES talk Mr. Marc Pritchard, the Chief Brand Officer of P&G said “I would say that the days of advertising as we know it today are numbered, we need to start thinking about a world with no ads”.
I respectfully disagree. We should never think of a world with no ads.
Several days ago, I claimed that a country with no ads must be full of sad people (read it here). Let me elaborate on that a little, because I think it’s important to understand how a world with no ads would look like.
Let’s assume as of tomorrow, all ads are forbidden. Here’s what’s going to happen.
No more news
Most likely you read newspapers to learn the recent developments in the world. Unless you have a newspaper like Financial Times or The New York Times, you count on advertising budgets to survive. TVs? Same. Radios? Same.
So, no ads means no more news. Only a few newspapers and TVs left, maybe some others like The Guardian survive thanks to donations, but that’s it. Needless to say, you’ll have to pay for that content, and not many of us can afford it.
No more free information
Google ads? Gone. What does Google do? They start charging you for every single search, and they call it IAAS (Information as a Service) model. Think about how many times a day you use Google and do a quick math. Again, the majority of people won’t be able to afford it.
No more entrepreneurship
You’ve created the best product or service on earth, how do you make people aware of it? In a world with no ads, all entrepreneurs must be like Elon Musk — a superstar CEO who uses Twitter to create awareness of his products.
But wait a second, there won’t be Twitter either, as Twitter relies on advertising budgets to survive. Ok, maybe a paid version of Twitter? Yeah, perhaps 5% of its users will pay and use it, so Elon’s tweets won’t make a big impact.
That means, no more Elons.
No more social media influencers
Thank goodness, finally. The only plus of a no-ad world.
No more jobs
How does your company sell products? It advertises. Since there are no more ads, sales drop, your company downsizes, you lose your job.
“Ok but we’re a B2B company”. Well, your client can’t sell and they’re in trouble, they don’t need your product/service anymore.
“Ok but there are other forms of marketing”. Like what? Influencer marketing? Email marketing? SEO? Product placement? You pay for all of them. To me, they’re all advertising, you pay someone and/or some company to show your message to your potential customers. Nobody finds your blog magically, you do a lot of work from content creation to SEO, to promote that content on various channels etc. So, it’s advertising… Word of mouth to some extent maybe, but would be very limited (otherwise why do you pay all those social media influencers right now?).
No more peace
Since many industries are disrupted in a no-ad world, there are few jobs left, and there are plenty of unemployed people. They can’t pay the bills. The ones who have jobs start helping unemployed family members. Governments start imposing birth-controls.
People are on the streets, protesting. You’re one of them. You know what you say? You, who used all those ad-blockers to avoid ads, who found ads irritating? You say: “I want ads!”. You turn your head right, and you see Mr. Marc Pritchard shouting: “We want ads!”
Ok, maybe I exaggregated too much (or did I?). In any case, better be careful what you wish for.
