Listen to Me

Everything around me clamoring for recognition. Screaming banshees of attention-grabbing noise and nonsense. Electric walls of dancing stimuli to glue the eyes to sound and light.

And it’s my job to add to it all.

Ad-man madman enjoying the craft—because if everybody’s doing it, why not do it better? Is it wrong to even attempt to inject a little piece of awesomeness in the middle of the Outbrain maelstrom? To write something worth reading?

I write ads. No one likes ads. I like writing. I write things no one likes.

But why? You should like ads.

No really, you should! I’m not joking, and I’m not just saying this because I work for a marketing agency. I’m saying this because crap advertising is a disservice to everyone. But it doesn’t have to stay this way.

Think about it: if ads didn’t suck, they could provide value by guiding us to the kind of products and services we actually want to find out more about. But on the whole they don’t do this.

Ads suck when they deceive us. They lure us in with flirting and foreplay …and suddenly we’re caught with our pants down in the worst way possible, feeling naked, cheated and exposed.

The business rewards this, apparently. We want this — don’t we?

No.

Write better ads, please. It’s not that hard. Ask yourself what you’re selling and why you’re selling it, do an honest job of research and make something awesome.

I’ll try to do my part. And please call me out if I don’t.