Oh my God…I’ve just realised why ‘conversations’ are complete and utter bollocks.

This isn’t going to be one of those pisstakey posts where I mock the wankarama use of the word ‘conversations’ in advertising agencies.

I think it’s a fine word for describing something that is a back-and-forth dialogue, as opposed to a one-way monologue.

But I’m wondering how much we really prefer a conversation over being the recipient of a single communication.

It seems to me that we have almost taken for granted the idea that the two-way is best, as it gives us the chance to have some power and some say in the relationship. But the problem with that is that we already had all the power we needed, because we’re the ones who have always been able to choose whether to buy or ignore.

Isn’t a conventional advertising message just like a beggar on the street? An entity that wants something from you and has to approach you cold (you might say that the advertiser gives you something but the beggar does not, however, I think the beggar gives you the opportunity to feel good about yourself for just 20p – darn cheap if you ask me)? So we then choose whether or not to give a shit, so the power is all ours.

Every ad we experience is like that: ‘please do/buy/be interested in this thing’.

Now, with conversations, we actually lose some of that power by engaging with companies and products a little more closely so that they can draw us in a bit further in order to get us to buy what they are selling.

So why would anyone want that to happen? Of course, plenty of people do for the (very few) right brands – you only have to look on the fan pages of Facebook to see that – but the idea that we would automatically prefer a two-way chat with the companies that advertise to us seems to make no sense whatsoever.

When Nike offers you an online game or a chance to take part in a fun run, it’s just like letting the traveling salesman into your home and allowing him have a firmer opportunity to sell you something. You are on the back foot in the relationship, feeling somewhat beholden to him because of all the effort he’s made in persuading you. Fine, if that’s what you want, but most of the time it isn’t.

Most of the time you want to do what the hell you like, and very rarely is that having a conversation with a teabag manufacturer.

I appreciate that this flies in the face of current bullshit, and therefore might need a little help embedding itself into the current debate, that’s why I have condensed the above into a handy rhyming couplet:

We have no time or inclination

For advertising ‘conversation’.