Advertising Paying Social Media to Dumb Down and Fragment Society

When Advertising Served Democracy

I can remember when I took some pride from being in the advertising industry.? It was advertising that funded independent media, a bedrock difference between democracies and totalitarian governments, be they left wing (Marxist) or right wing. (Fascist).

Some media leaned to the left, some to the right, but overall people could gain a balanced view. Be it TV, radio, print (newspapers & magazines), outdoor – they all existed on the revenue they gained from advertising.

Joesph Goebbels, though a Nazi despot, knew what he was doing with propaganda. In his words: “Tell a lie once and it is a lie. Tell it thousands of times it becomes the truth.” What is left unsaid, there is no counter, no alternative to the lies. In totalitarian regimes there is only government-controlled media.

Because the advertising industry is heavily biased towards youth (not many under 45 working in the industry), very few have any experience of a media landscape without digital I remember the 80s and 90s well.

?Digital and Social Media

Digital hit the advertising industry like a run- away train. There had been nothing significantly new in advertising since TV arrived in 1956. From around the year 2000, virtually every new entrant to advertising wanted to be in “digital”. This was the future.

The term “digital marketer” was coined when “digital” first hit and is still used today. There is much more to “digital” than marketing and advertising – when at Clemenger we launched NSW Lotto Online in 1987. ?No more filling in your entry, you kept a copy and a carbon copy (who remembers carbon copies?) was bagged up and sent to Lotto. Rather than “instant emails” to work colleague, there were hand delivered memos. I could bore the crap out of everyone, me included, listing all the tasks and advantages when a business went through a digital transformation, such as automation of many tasks, cloud (not a cloud as some think, just the internet) for storage, computing and a host of IT needs, paperless offices and remote working and meetings.

But the relationship between advertising and social media was the genesis of what is occurring in the world today.

Media & Advertising Pre-Digital

Though Bolt and Six Degrees are said to be the first social media sites, social media really took off after the introduction of Web 2.0, which allowed “ordinary people” to upload material to the nett, specifically social media.?

The vast majority of people in the industry today would not recall when all large agencies had an in-house media department. (Plan and buy). Called accreditation, it was so demanding of capital on hold, it resulted in smaller, mostly local independent agencies, not having a buying (or planning) media function. (Multi-national agencies had far greater resources, particularly capital).

Traditionally, accredited ad agencies were comprised of – Account Service, Creative, Media, Production (Print & Electronic). ?Once upon a time, account service (who could also be called the strategists), creative, media & production (when appropriate) would all sit together in the same room and discuss a client brief.

Much has happened to the ad agency media function (planning and buying) since the mid to late 80s, where there are now 5 major media agencies in Australia. (I could almost write a book about the evolution of the media business in Australia, from the ditching of the accreditation system to stand alone media agencies, but most is not relevant here).

Suffice to say, there were 2 major events which impacted advertising media in Australia:

1)????? The dismantling of the accreditation system.

2)????? Moving media departments out of agencies (combining many) and forming meg - media agencies for planning and buying. (Currently the big 5 dominate, though there are smaller planning and buying agencies).

(Accenture Song, who bought the ad agency The Monkeys, is going back to the future, bringing media planning and buying back in-house).

Media used to be the lowest revenue generating department prior to the introduction of digital media. This point is vitally important. Traditional media paid 10% commission, the only source of income for media departments and media agencies.

Yet of all departments, media had the biggest operating overheads. They had to pay for online research access to TV, radio, newspaper, magazines, outdoor performance, plus many derivatives such as Roy Morgan Media Index Research – lots of information/data required to ensure the best possible media solutions for their clients.

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It’s The Money That’s The Difference. (Between Traditional and Digital)

Bob Dylan once sang “Money doesn’t talk, it swears”. How right he was.

Along comes digital media, specifically Social Media. Instead of paying 10% commissions to media agencies, they offered 25% to 35% in commissions. (Facebook offered “rebates” to some, on top of these commissions.)

One of the country’s most experienced and respected media strategists said to me:

“When I now get a client brief, it often says: ‘It must be for digital’. (Facebook and Google had spun their story – hundreds of millions of people reached, but unlike traditional media where there is so much wastage, they can target down to almost the individual.) Many marketing directors and managers of significant advertisers had been flown to Silicon Valley, courtesy of large digital media companies, given the VIP treatment, returning to believe nothing matched digital media on cost and precise targeting. This brief will allocate say, $1 million for a media schedule. Even if I could prove say magazines, or any other traditional media, would out- perform a digital schedule, I would not get half- way through my presentation and be shown the door. And why would I? A magazine schedule would give me $100 grand revenue, a Facebook schedule would give me $250 to $300 grand. So why would I argue? ?In fact in an “open brief”, media agencies will respond with a mostly digital schedule, knowing the client will think they are on the ball plus it will pay them 250% to 350% more than a traditional media only schedule.”.

Money talks, ahh, swears.

Impact of Social Media Targeting

?The ability to target much more precisely by social media has been going on since Facebook launched in 2004. We are seeing the upheaval in society this “targeting” has caused over time. (Not just Facebook, all social media).

The content a social media users receives is determined by their previous search history. Recent research has shown the number of teenagers with body image problems and eating disorders has increased by 87% in the past decade. They are “fed” (no pun intended), content about how to address their problems. “Have a dietary product? No worries, we have identified the ideal target market for your product.”

Following is a quote from Bryn Austin, Professor of Behavioural Science at Havard University:

“The amount of time that teens spend on social media—more than usual during the pandemic—can increase their risk of developing an eating disorder, as they compare their bodies to images found online. That comparison creates a downward spiral in terms of body image and self-esteem,” she said. “It makes them more likely to adopt unhealthy weight control behaviours.”

The negative impact of social media on youth, the first generation who “grew up” with smart phones, has been leading news stories in all democracies.

These include:

·?????? Feelings of envy, inadequacy, and less satisfaction with life.

·?????? ADHD symptoms, depression, anxiety, and sleep deprivation.

·?????? Problematic digital behaviours like having online-only friends and visiting sites parents would disapprove of, as well as a greater chance of taking part in online harassment.

·?????? Distracting teens, disrupting their sleep, and exposing them to bullying, rumour spreading, unrealistic views of other people's lives and peer pressure.

·?????? Cyberstalking, cyberbullying, sleep deprivation, lower self-esteem, social isolation, and impractical expectations

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A just published University of Queensland study found 17- to 25-year-olds receive an alcohol ad every 2 minutes and 25 seconds when on social media.

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Eating disorders and alcohol are just 2 of literally hundreds of similar case studies conducted in the last 10 years.

Some research suggested the average teenager spent 7.5 hours a day on their phone. And the time they were not on the phone they were worried about what they were missing.

It is not just teens who are negatively impacted by social media. Of course there are many benign examples. Algorithms can identify people who are keen on fishing, running, surfing, travel, food etc, There is no denying the ability of social media to more precisely target consumers for advertisers But at what cost?

During the 1990’s, no sane person, or political, party with any genuine hope of attracting supporters, would claim to be Socialist, or worse, Marxist. The Berlin wall fell in 1989 and almost immediately after the resulting merging East and West Germany, the lives of East Germans improved enormously. The USSR (Union of Soviet Socialist Republics) fell apart in 1991.Since the end of WW2, particularly from the 1960s on, the West looked on to how people in the USSR lived – food shortages, no free speech or proper elections, persecution of those who dared not comply, drab grey blocks of home units for all (unless a senior communist party member) – it was called “The Iron Curtain” for a reason. In the West we recognised how lucky and so much better our lives were than for those unfortunate to live in countries freed from Nazi Germany by Stalin’s Russia, than by the allies.

We also heard the horror stories from people who had risked their lives to escape to the West. Ahh, Freedom! How wonderful these escapees found it in the west. ?

(It wasn’t just the USSR. Marxism/socialism, wherever it occurred around the world in the 20th century, was a disaster. Around 100 million dead, poverty, no elections or free speech, imprisonment and torture for anyone who dared not comply, food shortages and famine, rampant corruption – the horror list goes on and on.)

But now Marxism is rising its ugly head again. And with it, antisemitism has exploded, all driven by social media. (Look closely at the wide range of demonstrations and you will see Marxists taking pride of place, enthusiastically waving their banners and signs.)

The term “useful idiots” was not first coined, but often used, by Stalin to describe the Hollywood set and academics who would visit the Soviet Union and be shown only how the elites lived and given the impression this was how everyone lived in a communist state. On their return to the US they would sprout how wonderful Communism is.

A degree of irony- it is the same groups of people today who are protesting. One Sydney Sociology Professor recently claimed October 7th was a lie, a huge conspiracy set up by the Israelis. (That Hamas filmed their atrocities is not explained by this Professor).

That Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East, Hamas, Hezbollah and The Hotis are all terrorist groups, proxies of Iran who would execute them, doesn’t get through to them. They call Israel a terrorist state and apartheid, though having never been there – all comes from social media.

Disturbingly now, traditional media often follows in the footsteps of what is “news” in social media. Once reputable organisations such as the ABC and The Guardian talk about the issues and problems with Israel starting after the UN “founded” modern Israel in 1947.? They neglect the history of the Middle East being the Jewish homeland for thousands of years – where the Muslim religion only dates its formation back to the 7th century. ??

The term fake/false news was coined only with the introduction of social media – it was never used during the long reign of traditional media news. No matter what crazy or whacky conspiracy theory you subscribe to, more than likely you will find like-minded supporters on social media.

With AI now readily available, fake imagery of Israeli soldiers engaging in atrocities is very easily done. The use of AI to distort the truth is far wider than just what is occurring in the Middle East. It will add another, potentially more destructive, layer of disinformation to social media.

As well as the damage social media has inflicted on young people around the world, society overall is being split – there is no such thing as consensus anymore, not just in Australia, but across the western democratic world.

In the 1980s, I could feel a sense of pride that in our own small way, advertising contributed to democracy and freedom.

I now feel a sense of trepidation. ?I started writing this article on the 80th anniversary of D Day. We cannot live in the past, yet we should never forget the lessons we are meant to have learned from the past. Gowing up, it was common for kids of my generation to have parents who lived through and fought in WW2. Today, for many, it is ancient history, and it seems the lessons are being forgotten.

I am stunned, saddened and angered all at once at the raging antisemitism sweeping through our universities. (Not just in Australia, but throughout the western world.) ?It seemed to jump out of nowhere

Bob Hawke, one of our greatest Prime Ministers, summed it up well when he said:

“If the bell tolls for Israel, it won’t just toll for Israel, it will toll for all mankind.”

Repeating the mistakes made back then would have far more tragic consequences today. (During the days of the cold war, there was an equilibrium – both sides understood the concept of MAD. Mutually Assured Destruction. Today, there is no such equilibrium.)

Before the internet, advertising could be said to have help pay for democracy - free media and free speech, a corner stone of peace and stability. Now, it is paying for social media, that threatens to undo all the great achievements of democracy. And replace it with chaos and destruction.

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