The Future of online advertising

The future of online advertising is a topic of heated debate for many Digital profesionals. See an example on TechCrunch — http://tinyurl.com/cu7qdm

So, here is my 2 cents: online overall will prevail. Why? Because of ROI — Return on Investment. It’s already happening in the most developed countries.

But this is not the point. The questions is: what will happen with the online advertising? Well, this is another story.

We just established that online will prevail. But this does not mean that long term, the online advertising will follow the same path. I agree with those who believe that online advertising will shrink — at first, in the most developed countries. On the other hand, the other countries — the countries in which the Internet is now starting to see the light — are going to experience a different curve: at first, online advertising will grow (just like it happened in the developed countries) — people and companies will give it a try. It’s normal. They will see that the ROI is questionable (think CTR for online banners). Then, they will think again. But it will not take as much time as it took  in the most developed countries for this to happen.  The advantage of the late comers (like Romania) is that they can and will learn from their Big Brothers. But this will not happen until online advertising will reach critical mass in Romania. And it will take years until that will happen.

In a way, I predict that the online advertising phenomenon in Romania will be somwhat similar with the Mobile telecom phenomenon in Romania: while in the developed countries the mobile telecom had a long history — while the systems were mainly old and outdated, in the emerging countries, the real mobile telecom came in late (1997 in Romania, replacing the bulky bricks we used to call “mobile phones”) — but the latest and greatest  mobile technology (at that time) was immediately availble.

I still remember 1997 when Connex launched in Romania. I worked on that brand launch.  I was with Lowe Lintas at that time. We came up with the name and the pre-launch and launch strategy. We partnered with McCann to win that pitch. It was big. We did great work (measured by results/sales) and had so much fun doing it.

Nevertheless, while I have no doubt that online advertising will rise and then shrink in Romania (during the next 10 years), online as a platform will boom. Why? The consumers need More, Better and Faster. The only big change will be the Source of the ROI for online. I think that online advertising will be a middle to small size contributor to the online earnings. Unlike now.

The future will unveil the truth. But let’s not sit around and wait: let’s buy computers, get hooked up to the high-speed Internet, explore the World online, learn and push the Internet service providers to offer better services and do more for us, The Consumers.

Only then, we can talk real Internet in Romania. And everything else that comes with it.