Marketing & Media trends
Industry trends
Sponsors
Marketing & Media trends
Tech democratisation will set the tone for 2021
Andrew Smit and Johan Walters
Agriculture trends
Automotive trends
Construction & Engineering trends
CSI & Sustainability trends
5 sustainability trends that will shape business in 2021
Christelle Marais4 trends set to continue or be re-interpreted in the NGO sector
Innocent MasayiraStrengthening NPO skills and processes
Nazeema Mohamed, Feryal Domingo and Soraya JoonasSustainability is key for social investment in 2021
Keri-Leigh Paschal
Education trends
4 trends in employee skills development and training you need to know for 2021
Siphelele Kubheka and Desikan Naidoo
Energy & Mining trends
Digital solutions need small steps to succeed
Xanthe AdamsMining looks ahead to more Covid risk
Ralf HenneckeMining's year ahead will demand deep innovation
Frederick Cawood
Entrepreneurship trends
Finance trends
10 predictions around fintech
Dominique CollettThe 4 themes for the new year
Andrew Duvenage,3 wealth management trends to watch in 2021
Maarten Ackerman4 strategies to rethink investing in SMEs
Kuhle MnisiMicroinsurance ready to reach new heights
Marius BothaFinding alpha in the age of Covid-19
Nema Ramkhelawan-BhanaPurpose or profit. It's not a choice
Mike MiddletonShifting towards a digital - but still human - approach
Henry van Deventer
Healthcare trends
Healthcare innovation in 2021 and beyond
Reynhardt UysAre day hospitals the new trend?
Lee Callakoppen3 emerging medical scheme membership patterns
Nerine BrinkHealthcare innovations to look out for
Moshe Lichtenstein
HR & Management trends
ICT trends
5G is coming. Here's what it could mean for SA
Samantha Naidoo
Legal trends
3 big issues demanding legal attention this year
Jonathan Veeran, Nozipho Mngomezulu and Burton Phillips
Lifestyle trends
Wine in the wake of corona
Kristen Duff and Gosia Young7 prospects and necessary shifts for the arts
Rucera Seethal
Logistics & Transport trends
Property trends
Auction industry survival depends on going virtual
Joff van ReenenCovid-19 drives new trends in local property market
Marcél du Toit
Retail trends
A bold year for beverages
Alex GlendayAcceleration of digital payments
Jonathan SmitSafety vs sustainability - the packaging industry's key conundrum
Nthabiseng MotsoenengThe evolving e-tail landscape
Vilo Trska
Covid-19
Most Read
#BehindtheBrandManager: Justine Cullinan of Nando's on building an empathetic muscle
In this #BehindtheBrandManager feature, we find out more from Justine Cullinan, GM of marketing and brand strategy and communication at the iconic and well-loved South African fast-food chain Nando's. Ruth CooperThe 5 habits of highly effective advertisers
Kantar's Creative Effectiveness Awards reveals the world's most effective ads of 2020, and what makes them great. Daren Poole, KantarSouth African manufacturer KAS Africa secures $10m investment
Million-dollar manufacturing deal aims to drive industrialisation and economic growth across Africa KAS Africa
- Suidoosterfees to stage productions at Artscape
- Hot 91.9FM gets hotter with new faces and lineup
- Momentum and Brave Group deliver a giant TVC
- #BehindtheBrandManager: Meet Briony Brookes for Cape Town Tourism
- The story behind Daily Maverick's Don't Shoot the Messenger podcast
- Heineken SA appoints two new management team members
- #BehindtheBrandManager: Natasha Mkhize, brand and marketing manager at Curro
Marketing & Media jobs
- Digital Advertising Sales Executive Cape Town
- Account Leadership/Account Executive Cape Town
- Senior Technical Specialist - Digital Cape Town
- Freelance Sales Executives Johannesburg
- Junior Creative/Designer Cape Town
- Structural Designer Johannesburg
- Sales Person Johannesburg, Durban
- Digital Strategy Manager Cape Town
- Creative Desinger Johannesburg
- Data Marketing Strategist Johannesburg
Advertise your job ad on Bizcommunity
#BizTrends2021: Gaining a fullmetal heart
In my adult life, I have never felt closer to the world than I did in 2020. It was utter chaos. But I believe that 7.8 billion of us finally had something in common - a submicroscopic infectious agent allowed us to share the collective experience of shock, disbelief, fear, ignorance, pain, hope and sheer humanity. And we continue to do so.
The creator of manga series, Fullmetal Alchemist, Hiromu Arakawa, said, “It's a cruel and random world, but the chaos is all so beautiful.”
It’s strange to write about advertising trends for 2021 when we’ve just emerged from a year of chaos. But chaos is perhaps, the only thing we can choose to come to terms with – potentially the one thing that our industry needs more than ever.
For years, creatives have been lamenting the fact that the work we do in advertising is slowly having the life sucked out of it by the order of tiny tick-boxes, big data, global mandates, the all-knowing focus group, heat maps and oh – the holy grail called the “key visual”.
Advertising has become formulaic, safe and boring. Yet, what we’ve always known about creativity is that it’s at its brightest when it is born out of tension. All the greatest stories come from that place far beyond the guard rails and the safety blanket of predictability.
Martin Weigel of W+K Amsterdam and Rob Campbell from R/GA London – joint founders of the School of Strategic Arts – explain that “chaos is the critical element to enable creativity to go to interesting places.” They believe that in a world of parity, we spend too much time honouring best practice and that all best practice does is lead to sameness. Weigel and Campbell say that “in a quest to succeed there has to be a gap for possibility and one of the ingredients to make for possibility is chaos.”
Maybe the trends for 2021 are not trends but rather, tiny prayers to the gods of advertising:
The media landscape, they say, is always changing. And here we are again. We’re in our homes and sometimes we’re outside but then we’re in our homes again. Media should be more personal but still never invasive. Everyone’s lockdown looks a little different and everyone’s mental state is part firm, part fragile. The 8-year-old is online and so is the 80-year-old. We’re loving local hard and Netflixing to survive not just to chill. These must make for new storytelling opportunities and new media moments.
It’s scary to launch a new product in these times. It’s hard to make brand plans and map out budgets. It’s tricky to produce communication in the real world, when we’re all skirting around an ear bud up a nose that says ‘Positive’. So maybe we don’t plan too hard. Maybe we go in small increments, in small numbers. Maybe we’re radical instead of cautious. Maybe we produce in ‘shoot from the hip’ style. Maybe we find fascination in fear and see what innovation it births.
Ludicrous – when you can’t even trust the air you breathe. But when we’re all just trying to keep going and stay alive, surely we can trust each other to do what we do best? Lean on creatives for our well-tuned guts and instincts. Trust us to find an alternative, a strange solution – a possibility in a haystack because that’s what we’re good at.
No one’s pure truth lies in an LSM breakdown or in a PowerPoint study of consumer behaviour. Truth lies in contradictions, lived experiences, anomalies, people who beat the odds, surprising things a Muslim and a Jew have in common, awkward conversations, heated dinner-table debates and deep in a comments trail on Insta. These are where our stories are born. And if we’re too scared or too lazy to seek out the truth, then our stories will never reach the hearts of the people we serve as advertisers.
Because we’ve all felt more feelings than we’ve ever felt. Because we’re all learning to live with pain. Because we’re finding joy in random things like “You’re on mute” jokes and a 70-year-old learning guitar through YouTube. Because we have no idea what’s coming. Because we’re still here. And that matters.
Covid stole people we loved from us, mid story. We are now all affected even if not infected. This is the pain we all live with. Hiromu Arakawa says, “A lesson without pain is meaningless. For you cannot gain anything without sacrificing something else in return, but once you have overcome it and made it your own...you will gain an irreplaceable fullmetal heart.”
I hope that in 2021 and beyond, we will all find footing in our new paradoxes. I hope that will be better humans and better advertisers. May we never doubt creativity again, or the idea that Anchor’s Yeast is a precious commodity. May we will finally see that it’s our duty as advertisers to be creative, and that we can leave science to the scientists who are saving lives. And I really, really hope that we can gather up enough material to build fullmetal hearts that carry our bravest stories.
Suhana Gordhan executive creative director of the DUKE Group |
It’s strange to write about advertising trends for 2021 when we’ve just emerged from a year of chaos. But chaos is perhaps, the only thing we can choose to come to terms with – potentially the one thing that our industry needs more than ever.
For years, creatives have been lamenting the fact that the work we do in advertising is slowly having the life sucked out of it by the order of tiny tick-boxes, big data, global mandates, the all-knowing focus group, heat maps and oh – the holy grail called the “key visual”.
Advertising has become formulaic, safe and boring. Yet, what we’ve always known about creativity is that it’s at its brightest when it is born out of tension. All the greatest stories come from that place far beyond the guard rails and the safety blanket of predictability.
Martin Weigel of W+K Amsterdam and Rob Campbell from R/GA London – joint founders of the School of Strategic Arts – explain that “chaos is the critical element to enable creativity to go to interesting places.” They believe that in a world of parity, we spend too much time honouring best practice and that all best practice does is lead to sameness. Weigel and Campbell say that “in a quest to succeed there has to be a gap for possibility and one of the ingredients to make for possibility is chaos.”
Maybe the trends for 2021 are not trends but rather, tiny prayers to the gods of advertising:
May we forget what we know
The media landscape, they say, is always changing. And here we are again. We’re in our homes and sometimes we’re outside but then we’re in our homes again. Media should be more personal but still never invasive. Everyone’s lockdown looks a little different and everyone’s mental state is part firm, part fragile. The 8-year-old is online and so is the 80-year-old. We’re loving local hard and Netflixing to survive not just to chill. These must make for new storytelling opportunities and new media moments.
May we walk alongside fear
It’s scary to launch a new product in these times. It’s hard to make brand plans and map out budgets. It’s tricky to produce communication in the real world, when we’re all skirting around an ear bud up a nose that says ‘Positive’. So maybe we don’t plan too hard. Maybe we go in small increments, in small numbers. Maybe we’re radical instead of cautious. Maybe we produce in ‘shoot from the hip’ style. Maybe we find fascination in fear and see what innovation it births.
May we learn to trust
Ludicrous – when you can’t even trust the air you breathe. But when we’re all just trying to keep going and stay alive, surely we can trust each other to do what we do best? Lean on creatives for our well-tuned guts and instincts. Trust us to find an alternative, a strange solution – a possibility in a haystack because that’s what we’re good at.
May we seek out truth
No one’s pure truth lies in an LSM breakdown or in a PowerPoint study of consumer behaviour. Truth lies in contradictions, lived experiences, anomalies, people who beat the odds, surprising things a Muslim and a Jew have in common, awkward conversations, heated dinner-table debates and deep in a comments trail on Insta. These are where our stories are born. And if we’re too scared or too lazy to seek out the truth, then our stories will never reach the hearts of the people we serve as advertisers.
May we tell the best damn stories of our lives
Because we’ve all felt more feelings than we’ve ever felt. Because we’re all learning to live with pain. Because we’re finding joy in random things like “You’re on mute” jokes and a 70-year-old learning guitar through YouTube. Because we have no idea what’s coming. Because we’re still here. And that matters.
Covid stole people we loved from us, mid story. We are now all affected even if not infected. This is the pain we all live with. Hiromu Arakawa says, “A lesson without pain is meaningless. For you cannot gain anything without sacrificing something else in return, but once you have overcome it and made it your own...you will gain an irreplaceable fullmetal heart.”
I hope that in 2021 and beyond, we will all find footing in our new paradoxes. I hope that will be better humans and better advertisers. May we never doubt creativity again, or the idea that Anchor’s Yeast is a precious commodity. May we will finally see that it’s our duty as advertisers to be creative, and that we can leave science to the scientists who are saving lives. And I really, really hope that we can gather up enough material to build fullmetal hearts that carry our bravest stories.