Creative or data? Marketing’s new balance

Over the past few years I have been seeing a very clear shift in marketing.

A campaign used to succeed, for the most part, on three things:

A good idea + good design + the right channel.

A much stronger variable has entered that equation:

Data and algorithms.

With artificial intelligence, automation, and more developed advertising platforms, brands can now produce more content, show different messages to different audiences, and optimize campaigns in real time.

Something interesting follows from that.

As making content gets easier, the value of making good content does not fall. It rises.

Technology can speed up production and distribution. Data can show which piece performed better. Algorithms can put the right message in front of the right person.

They still cannot do some things on their own:

They cannot build a brand’s story.

They cannot develop an idea people will actually connect with.

They cannot catch the right cultural moment.

I do not think marketing is moving from creativity to data.

I think the two sides need each other more than they ever have.

A strong marketing approach today has to move without cutting creative thinking off from data, and without putting data in the place of creativity.

Making content has never been this easy.

What still makes the difference is making the thing people stop for, remember, and associate with the brand.

Technology can speed up production. Data can point the way. What is worth saying is still a human decision.