26th of September 2024
White Paper On The State Of The Australian Advertising Industry And The Role Of Education
Fifty years ago, the first ever complaint about an ad was made to the newly formed Advertising Standards Council. At least three-quarters of the Australian advertising business was owned by American agencies, necessitating an Australian voice and the formation of the Advertising Federation of Australia in 1974. And in the same year, the first Advertising major was launched at the Queensland University of Technology, with the University of Technology, Sydney, following 16 years later and most of the other universities within the next decade (Kerr, Waller and Patti, 2009).
Thirty years ago, Rust and Oliver (1994) proclaimed the “death of advertising”, predicting that by 2010, advertising courses would be replaced by “not advertising” courses teaching subjects like the “Design of Interactive Databases.” They reflected, “Never has advertising appeared so pale and lifeless. Advertising agencies are in a state of siege, as billings shrink, layoffs abound, and accounts are lost to nontraditional players.” The Wall Street Journal concurred, “”The $138 billion advertising industry seems unprepared for an interactive future” (Smith and King 1993).
And now, in 2024, it’s time to once again check our pulse. To see if Rust and Oliver were right. Or if the industry is still breathing. And our university courses are bringing new life and new ideas for future growth. The purpose of this White Paper is to bring together the insight and experience of industry leaders and the research and rigor of academics to examine the current state, and imagine the future, of the advertising industry and the role of advertising education. Drawing from both secondary and primary research, it provides an important benchmark and develops a number of predictions for the industry and advertising education.
