Letter to the Editor
Wellington LIVE – One Network

Dear Editor,

My first income was as a self employed signwriter at 14, then I started a billboard company. My first site was on Cobham drive, St Pats college. I tried to sell it to Saatchi & Saatchi but the buyer said no, come back when you have 50, which I did!

With sales (cash) low, I swapped the site for 30k radio at 91ZM and swapped the 30k radio for a Mitsubishi L300 van, and created the 91ZM – Kirk motors ski shuttle.

Contra was a way to get things done. You could call me a Contrapreneur in those days!

Since then through various media ventures I’ve sold, or my outdoor sites have generated 10s of millions. With one hook up. I like advertising about as much as i like Brian Tamiki!

The thing is not the ads, or the creative. I love creating natural ads and I love the conversion and making the sale happen. I dislike the way media is brought and sold. Largely controlled by META and Google paid ads and young people using the META google tools that make it feel like gambling. With a conversation rate about as high as a skimming stone. 90% of the spend is in their digital hands. And the hands of people that wouldn’t know what an organic natural sale creative is. It’s all templated, slick, fast, same same.

The flair has all but vanished, replaced with energy less blunt templates. Where has the subtle natural ad gone.