The box is broken: it's time advertising caught up with culture

"The advertising world is obsessed with boxes. By boxes, I mean predefined formats - like a 30-second TV slot, a radio jingle, a digital banner, or a billboard - created by entertainment platforms for advertisers to place their messages within. While these boxes offer clear advantages - such as consistency, interoperability, and simplicity - their very design reflects a one-way dynamic: the industry pushes adverts to consumers in return for their engagement with content. The intent and direction are entirely industry-led."

"But increasingly, consumers are taking greater control. The fragmentation brought on by the digital revolution has created diversity of choice - consumers are no longer confined to a few content channels where advertising is fed to them. Instead, they are liberated to find, create, and engage with content on their own terms. This is most pronounced on social media, where the line between marketing, influence, and persuasion is increasingly blurred."

"The advertising industry has struggled to keep pace. Historically, rigid creative production processes made it difficult - and often too expensive - to tailor messaging and formats to specific platforms. As a result, many environments where consumers actually spent their time were overlooked. AI is rapidly changing that. It's making it easier and more efficient for advertisers to adapt creative across formats, languages, and cultures. In-platform AI is also driving optimization, fast becoming one of the most powerful levers a brand has to stay relevant."

"But there's a bigger challenge: the mindset is still stuck in the box, trapped in an old paradigm. The thinking remains rooted in a legacy, ad-centric approach, tweaking old models to fit new consumer behaviors. This misses the real shift: it's not just about refreshing what we put in the box, it's about recognizing that the box itself no longer applies. The real question isn't: 'how do we evolve our model,' it's:"

Advertising has long relied on predefined formats that favor industry-led, one-way delivery of messages, offering consistency and simplicity but restricting direction to advertisers. Digital fragmentation and social media empower consumers to choose, create, and engage with content, blurring lines between marketing and influence. Historical production processes were rigid and costly, causing many consumer environments to be ignored. AI lowers barriers by enabling efficient adaptation of creative across formats, languages, and cultures, and in-platform AI drives optimization. The prevailing mindset remains stuck in old ad-centric paradigms, requiring a fundamental rethinking beyond merely updating the existing box-based model.

Read at The Drum