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Alex, our Director of Growth, discusses the importance of understanding audience data over chasing latest fads…

Reading this thought piece again from 2018 in The Drum from the brilliant @tomfgoodwin, Making Sense of 2018 – What Could Technology Bring? – it’s striking how much of the industry panic he called out has proven correct. It’s also weirdly comforting that all the things we were panicking about in 2018 weren’t really that much of a deal. We were terrified of chatbots that nobody wanted, obsessed with AR and VR that still hasn’t arrived, and convinced that every new shiny object would fundamentally rewire consumer behaviour overnight. AI is mentioned of course.

Funny to think that all the while, the largest consumer shift in behaviour was coming up in the form of a worldwide virus! Fast forward to today, July 2025, and in amongst the fear that Google’s own AI will be hammering digital industry; we’re also talking about YouTube’s ability to become a leading broadcaster on the good old TV set! Ofcom Media Nations Report 2025

At Mostly, this is precisely why we’ve always championed data and audience consumption patterns over chasing or fearing the latest fad. As Tom mentions, during 2006-2010, we saw genuine platform shifts – smartphones, social media, the foundational stuff that changed how people consume content. Since then? Mostly iterations, not revolutions. Surely Google will continue to enjoy making money from PPC? VR and AR is still not really a thing.

Tom’s commentary around the interpretation of data from 2018 is also strangely comforting to read today. “We use poorly sourced, poorly analyzed data all the time. We take it from companies with agendas and from companies who lazily interpolate data into the future as we treat it as fact.”

We see this constantly; brands drowning in metrics but starving for understanding and luckily that’s why we have such an important role to play; it’s why I often see Mostly as a Business Development company. The skill is not in the data collection; it’s in the understanding that data stands for something more than a validation of using someone else’s system that may provide an unlikely answer to an impossible equation.

Tom’s call for focus over faddishness has aged brilliantly. The brands that thrived weren’t the ones jumping on every new platform – they were the ones that understood their audiences deeply enough to follow them to the right places at the right time. That’s the equation that scales: audience insight + strategy + execution. Fear might sell headlines, but preparation and planning deliver sustainable growth.

Credit: Alex Pilkington, Director of Growth