In advertising, campaigns – series of messages that share a single idea and theme – have for decades been the central concept for forming promotional activities.

The advertising industry has been rooted in the idea of the campaign – that is what agencies, by and large, do. And campaigns come and go, while a few overarching themes in them are constantly refreshed with new pieces of creative.

Now, even as ad agencies have been migrating into the digital space, most of them have continued to approach what they do through the idea of a campaign. And the idea of a campaign is the idea of ups and downs. For when the campaign is running, there’s media in the market, and the audience grows. But as soon as the media is pulled off, or as soon as all the people have seen the campaign, the audience breaks up and drives off. And then the agency and the client are on to the next campaign again. That’s what the entire advertising business has been about.

But those who see the future of this business in the digital age are starting to see the rise of platforms. Platforms that are built to last. Platforms don’t necessarily go into the market with a bang, with lots of media buy, but they grow over time. Platforms are rooted in utility, and they provide something that the customer, the audience, will feel like using, and using again and again. The best and most pervasive platforms become a part of the audience’s lives. They’re more like services and tools than a 30-second spot or a clever billboard ad.

And the platform, when it encourages the audience to create and distribute their own content, and aggregates it from various sources, then becomes a media engine for the advertiser: the content, the comments, and overall enthusiasm from the audience feeds back into the platform, which can then churn out the content back to the audience again. And that content is much more real, much more authentic than traditional advertising material, because it comes from the audience itself. That content is what is called earned media.

Some examples of great platform ideas are, of course, the Nike+, and, in Europe, the Seppälä Supermodel Search, which I myself was lucky to get to help create back in 2006, and the way that HSL, the Helsinki Region Transit Commission, has sourced both utility and marketing material out of its Journey Planner and Transit Cost Calculator.

The problem with these platforms to many in the advertising and media buy+sell industry is that they don’t match the idea that we’ve had for so long of what is advertising. To envision, design and develop these platforms, it takes a different kind of a team, a different set of talent than what’s been used in traditional advertising. And it takes a different mindset. The way that people consume media, the way that they connect, is now driven much more by technology than it was before. To develop platforms, a new breed of creative technologists need to get a real seat at the creative ideation table. And, perhaps even more importantly, to make sense of all the different connections, links and experiences across different technologies and devices, agencies need Experience Leads to replace the old definition of Creative Directors. It’s an opportunity, rather than a threat, for all of us to grow and explore new things.

Sure, old style campaigns will most likely still be made for a good while, as this giant industry slowly changes, just like VHS tapes were sold for a time after the coming of the DVD, but forward thinking individuals and agencies have started to realize the change that is taking place. And this change is driven by the consumer, the audience, who, ultimately, is our real source of income. If we lose the attention of that group, we lose our business.

Change is often scary, but think about it: wouldn’t it be nice to get away from the ups and downs of the campaign era, and enter a new era of sustainable growth?

Karri Ojanen