The Future of Attention — Advertising from Here On

Last time, we watched advertising, having grown precise, take into itself at once the unease of surveillance, the fraud from within, and the consumer’s distrust. In exchange for convenience, advertising had been wearing down something precious — trust. It was an era that could be seen that way.

In this final chapter, we survey what comes next. Carrying its distrust, on what is advertising now relying as it searches for its next form? As the way data is gathered changes, as the deliverer of the message changes, and as the very way of making it is about to change, where is the relationship between advertising and society headed? At the end of a story spanning more than a century, let us deliberately not rush to a conclusion, but line up a few signs and imagine together what lies beyond.

Toward an age without tracking — where cookieless leads

For a long time, web advertising stood by following the footprints of users. One mechanism that supported that tracking was the cookie, which identified a user across different sites. Yet as concern over privacy rose, the move to rethink this mechanism gained strength.

The major browsers restricted how such cookies are handled, and in the industry the word ‘cookieless’ came to be widely spoken. The road, however, was not a straight one. Google, for example, had signaled a policy of phasing out such cookies in its own browser, but implementation was postponed again and again, and afterward it is reported to have revised its initial policy of a blanket abolition and turned instead toward leaving the choice to users themselves. One can sense that this is a theme where technology and interests are tangled in complex ways and that does not settle easily.

Loosen the tracking, and the accuracy of advertising may fall. Yet as the sense of being watched fades, it may become easier to win users’ acceptance. How to weigh that trade-off looks set to be the dividing line of design from here on.

People and stores become the ad — influencers and retail media

On the deliverer’s side too, change is happening. One is the presence of individuals called influencers.

An individual who gathers wide support on social media introduces products on behalf of companies. Their words tend to be received as more familiar and easier to believe than corporate advertising. That is precisely why they hold strong influence, while, as we saw in the previous chapter, when it is hidden that they are advertising, they invite deep distrust. Promotion through influencers carries at once the power of familiarity and the recoil of when that familiarity is betrayed.

Another major current is the domain called retail media. This refers to the move in which retail companies make use of the purchase data they hold on their own online shops and stores and become advertising media themselves. Because it is based on the firm record of ‘what was bought,’ it is held to be of high value to advertisers, and in recent years the market is reported to be growing greatly both worldwide and at home. That a vast e-commerce operator in particular grew its advertising revenue greatly symbolizes this current. The place where products are sold becomes, just as it is, the place where ads are sold — the boundary between retail and media is quietly beginning to dissolve.

The maker changes — advertising generated by AI

The ‘way of making’ advertising, too, is now about to change greatly. It is the arrival of generative AI.

As AI became able to produce text, images, and video in large volume in a short time, this technology is being rapidly taken into the field of ad production as well. Production that once required much time and cost has been made efficient, and tailoring the expression finely to each individual has, technically, come into view. The base of ad-making is about to broaden as never before.

The easier making becomes, the more we are asked for what and in what attitude we make. Will it be a tool for cutting corners, or a partner that broadens human creativity? Even with the same technology, where it arrives will change greatly depending on how we face it.

Over attention, an unending question

The changes we have seen in this chapter, scattered as they look, revolve around a single scarce resource. The attention of people — attention.

In an age when information overflows and everyone peers into a small screen all day long, the amount of attention a person can direct at anything has a limit. How to draw in that limited attention and how to hold it. The history of advertising began at the corner of a newspaper and has kept pursuing this single point, changing its form — through brands, radio and television, the creativity of Madison Avenue, the giant holding companies, and on to search and data. The form may change, but that it is an endeavor to move the human heart has not changed across a century.

Where advertising heads from here, we do not yet hold a sure answer. Whether advertising without tracking becomes the mainstream, whether AI becomes the center of the maker, whether the trust nearly lost is regained — all lie beyond the accumulation of the countless choices people will make from here on. The one thing that can be said is that advertising is a mirror reflecting society. What we direct our attention to, what we believe, what we permit. That figure shapes the future of advertising.

To the readers who have followed this story, which began from a small boxed item in a newspaper, all the way to here, I give my heartfelt thanks. Desire and creation, prosperity and manipulation, convenience and distrust — if gazing at their light and shadow at once leads to knowing ourselves as reflected in the mirror of advertising, there could be no greater joy. Without rushing to an answer, let us go on questioning together from here.

【The Advertising Century: Agencies and the Business of Desire — End】