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The ad business is facing unprecedented change – the shift to online, the growth of the giant platforms, the explosion in AdTech, the tsunami of data available to marketers. All are an inevitable result of changes in how we consume and measure media.

There have been, and will continue to be, unintended and unwelcome consequences of these changes. People are increasingly bombarded with irrelevant, intrusive ads that don’t appeal and often annoy. Their preparedness to see advertising in any way positively has reduced.

Media used to provide carefully curated ratios between editorial and advertising in order to manage the user experience and to put distance between them. The notion of editing is no longer universal (platforms are at pains to point out they are just that, not publishers) and the balance between editor and advertiser has been lost. This sits alongside the absence of care taken not to bombard or repeat.

How can advertisers be persuaded to fund high-quality media if they currently favour channels that don’t provide it?

How should advertisers think about the ‘right’ combinations of investment choices that provide the audience and results they need as well as the support for high-quality content?

The Advertising: Who Cares? movement was started because we believe that there are many of us who have both the desire and the skills to put the craft back into the ad business, to reclaim primacy for professional skills over machines and to create better advertising; advertising that resonates with the public and which works.

Our aim with Who Cares? is to focus on solutions, on how to improve the industry for everyone involved. We want the industry among other things to help fund great media content and high standards in journalism, which is where many of our aims overlap with those of Impress.

By Pam Vick
Business Development and Marketing Consultant, Impress Board Member

Pam Vick is a non-executive director of Impress and is leading the “Funding High Quality Media” workstream for Advertising: Who Cares?

About Pam Vick

Pam is a highly regarded Chair/NED and commercial business development consultant to boards. She is an Ambassador for Women on Boards UK and one of Boardroom Advisors’ most experienced Advisors, an organisation that provides part-Time CEOs, exec directors and NEDs internationally. Pam is particularly interested in social purpose roles and Chairs the board of Ovation Finance, a financial planning company that is also B-Corp Certified and employee-owned. She is a Trustee of The British Ecological Society and has contributed to advertising effectiveness textbooks and articles, including IPA Advertising Effectiveness Awards.

About Impress 

Impress is a champion for news that can be trusted. We are here to make sure news providers can publish with integrity; and the public can engage in an ever-changing media landscape with confidence. We set the highest regulatory standards for news, offer education to help people make informed choices and provide resolution when disputes arise. 

Media enquiries

Louie Chandler: louie@impressorg.com / 02033076778