Upping Our Hate Game

As a planner going on 10 years in this industry, I’ve always loved what I do and what we make. Sure, there have been ups and downs - some challenges (and, yes, clients) that made my head hurt - but for the most part, I can happily say: I kinda love advertising.

And that’s a problem. Because loving advertising makes it easier to stop questioning it. We’re not critical enough. We don’t hate advertising nearly as much as we should. And maybe that’s why so much of it just... exists. It’s time we make being a hater part of the job.

Because to anyone outside this bubble, advertising sucks. They despise it. And honestly, they probably despise us for making it too. Rightfully so.

OOH litters our landscapes. Commercials always interrupt us right when things are getting good. And display ads... well, display ads might just be one of the worst things that humanity has ever produced.

Advertising is so hated that people will literally pay to avoid it, even when money’s tight. Netflix didn’t become Netflix just because of Stranger Things or on-demand viewing, it became Netflix because people were fed up with commercials. And then there’s YouTube Premium. A free product that found its business model in people’s desire to escape ads.

Whether you’re agency-side or client-side, we need to recognise the reality of what we’re putting into the world. No amount of self-congratulatory award shows can change this: people don’t want what we make.

And maybe people are onto something. Maybe we should hate it a little more too. Because, let’s face it, 99% of advertising does kinda suck. It’s unwarranted interruptions. It blocks our view of the world. It hijacks the moments we should be living. And it does all this just to hit us with the same key messages for the same products... over and over... again.

It’s time we stop obsessing over the wrong things. Being critical of our work isn’t about Pantone shades, kerning, or whether the logo is 5% bigger. That’s not being a hater. That’s being picky.

Real hating is asking whether this deserves to exist in someone’s day at all? If the answer isn’t a confident yes, it probably shouldn’t ship.

Because we’re not just competing with other ads. We’re competing with cat videos on TikTok. Group chats. Memes. Movies. Life. If our work can’t be funny, entertaining, surprising, or genuinely interesting, then why should anyone pay attention to it?

Attention isn’t free. Every ad takes something from someone - even if it’s just a few seconds they’ll never get back. Being a hater isn’t about tearing each other down. It’s about standing up for the people on the other side of the screen.

We don’t need to make people love advertising. That’s asking too much. But if we want their attention, we need to earn it. And that starts by being way more critical of ourselves, and way more respectful of the people we choose to interrupt.

If people are going to hate our ads anyway, the least we can do is get there first. Be a hater. Call out the mediocrity. Kill the bad ideas. Raise the floor.

We all just need to up our hate game a little. I’m talking a 50 Cent level of hate - relentless, petty, unforgettable. Enough hate to fuel a four-part documentary series.

Here are a few ways I’m channelling my inner 50 and upping my hate game this year:

• I’m judging ideas against entertainment, not other ads. If it can’t compete with what’s already in someone’s feed, it’s not worthy of being in their feed.
  
• I’m way quicker to kill. Some strategies and ideas just don’t have 'it', no more wasting time trying to salvage them.
  
• I’m trying to be on the audience’s side more often than the brand’s. They’re the ones paying the real price, every time we show up uninvited.
  

If we hated advertising half as much as everyone else does, we’d stop making so many bad ads. And the ones that survive would actually be worth watching.