The marketing catchphrase of the past 12 months has been ‘big data’. Two simple words that are both daunting and exciting. Daunting in that there are 2.5 quintillion bytes of data created globally every day. Exciting in that it can be a game-changer for businesses, with productivity and profit gains of between five per cent and six per cent better than competitors, according to recent research.

Famous election advertising campaigns have been few and far between.

The 1972 ‘It’s time’ campaign, after Labor’s 23 years in the political wilderness, is Australia’s best example. We also remember ‘Kevin07’, Don Chipp’s ‘Keep the Bastards Honest’ for the Democrats, and to a lesser degree the Liberals’ 1996 call that ‘Enough is enough’ after 13 years of Labor government. In the US, we recall Barack Obama’s ‘Yes We Can’, and ‘All the Way with LBJ’.

Marketers have clamoured to jump on the social media express in the past five years. But now some are questioning the sales and profit results related to social media.

Has the investment been worth the reallocation of their marketing budget from other vehicles?

It’s well known that there has been more change in the marketing landscape in the digitally dominated past five years than in the previous 50.

And while marketers need to embrace that rapidly changing world, they also need to remember the fundamentals learnt over half a century about what gives an advertising campaign the best chance of delivering sales.

Andrew participated in the CEO Sleepout on June 20th 2013, along with some other advertising leaders, and B&T got behind them in one of their columns.