One key axiom of 2.0 thinking is “Shortening the Distance”. Advertising does not support this thinking. It is inefficient. A free-market economy will continuously adjust itself to eliminate inefficiencies. The advertising model will eventually be eliminated or minimized into some other predominant form.

I read models – I’m not prophetic. I don’t know what advertising will be replaced by, nor do I know how soon, but I do know what is more efficient: direct brokering or agents. On the internet today, the model that makes the likes of Google so successful with advertising relies heavily on bots (internet or web robots). This, at least adds some relevancy to the advertising. Bots were purported to be the kind of technology that could better serve our personal needs by delivering more relevant content – instant delivery, replacing the need to ‘find’. But we’re bombarded with these instant deliveries when we’re not ‘looking’ for them. [BTW, to avoid ads during search, I recommend using Clusty -- it was the first engine that helped me understand the power of FAST technology, almost a decade ago.]

In discussing this issue with the lawyer sitting next to me on the plane yesterday, he reminded me of the typical buying scenario: we’re looking to make a purchase, we tap into our net. We either talk to friends or we literally get online and leverage the ‘advisory’ model. On Amazon and other ecommerce sites, we read the ratings/reviews of others. We put those reviews into our own context, and draw our own conclusions. In that way, the collective of reviews serves as a brokering mechanism.

Advertising may incite awareness or interest, but it is no longer the ‘buying’ factor it was during an era of consumption most influenced by a ‘need to belong, fit in’. How many advertisements do you not act on in a day? Whether you acted or not, someone paid for the fact that you ’saw’ the ad — even if you really didn’t ’see’ it. How often are you in a buying/need state? When you are, how often is that act influenced by advertising (either past or current)? Where it may be influenced at all, did advertising cause the act or reinforce it? For all the millions of advertising dollars spent on SuperBowl XLII, how relevant were any of the products to you and did you act on any of the ads?

The only reason advertising continues to survive is that it is ‘familiar’ and it is monetized. Amazon, however, understands the value of brokering. They continue to add more and more infrastructure and facilities/services to provide incentives to those who can facilitate buying directly through their Associates model, or direct brokering. Far more efficient, their model only pays for results.

Even Forrester has been suggesting that marketing is ‘broken’ and that marketers should reinvent themselves. As part of that advice, Forrester suggests that marketing needs to take back control of their investment from agencies:

On average, agencies will influence nearly 60% of the marketing budget in 2007. The combination of anticipated spending on agency fees and measured media cover the bulk of marketing communications activities.

Marketers reported allocating an average of 17% of their budget to ad agency fees and 41% of their budget to measured media.

Advertisers spent a total of $271 billion on domestic US ads across all measured and unmeasured media channels in 2005, a 2.8% increase over 2004.

Marketers aren’t convinced that their agencies can formulate new media strategies, and agencies aren’t fully convinced themselves. Huge gaps exist between marketer and agency perceptions of ability to deal with changes in TV, Internet, and consumer-generated media

Almost all agencies (93%) believe their contributions drive their clients’ marketing success, while only 63% of marketers feel the same.

Despite the fact that agencies wield influence over a majority of the marketing budget, 76% of marketers do not measure the return on investment of their lead agency relationship.

So the majority of marketing dollars are spent on ‘outsourced’ services for which there are limited measures of success? That all sounds pretty inefficient to me.

Amazon even has a book that addresses this subject: Marketing Without Advertising, Inspire Customers to Rave About Your Business to Create Lasting Success. Ah, but if you read the reviews, one individual suggests other guerilla marketing titles.

Guerilla marketing? Described as “an unconventional system of promotions on a very low budget, by relying on time, energy and imagination instead of big marketing budgets”, the term itself seems to be well positioned for the likes of a Consumer Revolution.

P.S. Monetization was a hot topic during table discussions at last year’s FASTforward. I’m looking forward to some of the deepest conversations, with some of the smartest people I’ll get to have all year…see you there. Or, stay tuned on this Bat channel for updates and conversational relics.