Advertising’s 80 / 20 Rule is Flipping

It used to be the standard: the 80 / 20 rule of advertising.

• Spend 80 percent of your budget on media — the time or space where the ad appears.
• Spend 20 percent on creative — the ad itself, plus the overhead like account management.

This rule served a mass media model for advertising. A few ads distributed repeatedly through a few media outlets to a large audience. Few to many, over and over.

And it’s not too hard to see why. The 80 / 20 rule worked.

Then the rule started shifting for some campaigns. In some cases, 30 percent of a budget went to creative, or 15 percent. The rule got a little higgledy piggledy — customized for each campaign.

Because mass audiences fragmented into smaller, niche audiences. Cable television, specialty publications, the Internet — all media shifts over the past 20 years have moved from larger, general-interest audiences to smaller, special-interest audiences. From network channels to specialty channels. From LIFE to Fly Tying Enthusiast.

All these changes are well documented and discussed. But I believe the biggest change of all has received no mentions.

Here it is:

Advertising’s 80 / 20 (media / creative) is flipping.

20 / 80 (media / creative) will be the new rule.

And here is why.

If we agree that:

• (a) expansion of media in our lives is ongoing and permanent and
• (b) contraction of mass media advertising is ongoing and permanent

Then I argue the following shifts will be the levers that flip the 80 / 20 rule to a 20 / 80 rule.

1. All media and advertising will be digital.
2. All media and advertising will be connected to the web.
3. All media and advertising will be managed by software.
4. All advertising will become responsive, iterative and generative.
5. Exponentially more advertising creative will be required.

That’s a broad and heady list, so over the next few days I’ll try to unpack those ideas with details to support the 80 / 20 flip.

And since this is an argument, counter arguments and discussion are welcome. Please keep things civil and on-topic, just like you would if we were talking in person.

Bonus: 80 / 20 Rule Flip Backstory. Where the lessons came from to make the 80 / 20 Rule Flip prediction.

Tags:
80 / 20 flip, advertising creative, advertising inventory, arguments, audience fragmentation, creative, evolutionary advertising, Fly Tying Enthusiast, generative advertising, LIFE, media, strategy, Trends, web

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Nice post. What is interesting about the evolution today is not that we are moving from model A of advertising to model B. We are moving to models A through Z, but which one a brand uses depends on what you sell and how you sell it.

I would say all media already is digital. Digital isn’t a thing, or specialization. Or a least we should think that way, just like all media is connected to the web. If something is good, it will find its way to the web, even if it doesn’t have a URL on it. I also add that all media is social, if it’s really good, or really bad, people will talk about it.

Gosh, I sure hope we don’t get exponentially more advertising, just better, more relevant. Sadly, more mediums means more advertising, and usually not the good kind…

Looking forward to more posts in this vein…

Well put. And this is why agencies need to fear not the explosive growth of amateur creators and the fragmentation of media. There will still be lots of dollars left for creative, and smart ad buys to spend the rest on.

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