The Broken Promise of the Internet

"As an advertising medium, the web is like communism. It's never very good right now, but it's always going to be great some day."        Bob Hoffman, The Ad Contrarian

The promise of the web is intense, amazing, awe-inspiring, breath-taking, mind-blowing, [insert wonderment adjective of choice here].  The reality of the web depends on who you are and what you hope to get out of it.

To the casual user who likes that disputes can be instantly settled with a Google search on their smart phone, the internet meets its promise and then some.

To the teacher who is looking for new tools to excite his students with, the internet meets expectations, even though bandwidth doesn't always.

To my Dad, who knows that he would enjoy the wonders of the internet, but he is a little afraid of doing something wrong and breaking something, the internet represents a tantalizing mystery.

To businesses, who are trying to figure out how to use it as a promotional tool, the internet is often more than a little frustrating.  Banner ads and pop up ads don't usually live up to their promised effectiveness.  Facebook page "likes" and Pinterest "pins" often (usually) don't translate into sales.  

For a business, its all about generating sales.  For businesses born in the time of the internet, like Netflix and Amazon, the internet has been awesome.  For most businesses that had a brick and mortar existence before the era of Google and You Tube, the internet, while awe inspiring, has been less than awesome.

Many companies that were around before 1980 that have had financial success on the internet have basically moved their catalog operation online (think Lands' End).  A few industries have transitioned to providing their services online (such as H&R Block).   

Regardless, the internet hasn't been the land of milk and honey that so many were predicting in its infancy.   It HAS transformed business and the way we communicate and gather information.  It HAS transformed whole industries and created new ones.  It just hasn't been the advertising panacea that some were claiming it would be in the 80's.    

And it certainly hasn't proven itself as an advertising powerhouse as many expected and some promised.  Clicks and likes haven't translated to dollars and cents.  For many, if not most online advertisers, the promise of internet advertising appears to be a broken promise.