Are we planning for culture, or just chasing it?

I would argue that there are fewer words that have dominated conversations as heavily as culture has across the past few years in the media world. Brands want to be in it, agencies want to tap into it, platforms want to own it and media plans are increasingly expected to demonstrate how they will make a brand “part of the cultural conversation”.

But somewhere along the way, I think we may have started to confuse cultural relevance (which may seem to dominate conversation one day before the next big thing takes over), with being culturally significant. I would suggest that the pace at which culture moves on means that longer lasting cultural significance poses a different opportunity entirely.

That distinction was made clear when we were presented with Thinkbox’s Cultural Advantage research, which looks at what cultural influence actually means to people. Rather than defining culture simply as whatever is trending, the research identifies seven different cultural entry points, including continuity, purpose, bonding and currency.

The finding that stood out to me was around continuity. By continuity Thinkbox is referring to the things that stay relevant and influential over time. For UK adults, they noted continuity as the biggest driver of cultural importance, accounting for 22%. By comparison, being part of the cultural moment (currency) accounted for just 9%.

That feels significant for an industry which is increasingly focusing on the cultural moment rather than cultural legacy. We hear a lot about the speed of culture and observe brand after brand becoming obsessed with jumping on the latest trend in real time, a concept seen regularly across social platforms in particular. Meme hijacking is a prime example of this and is being executed by major mainstream brands on a daily basis.

There is undoubtedly value in capitalising on these moments. But perhaps we have allowed immediacy to become a proxy for importance?

So, what do we actually mean when we say we want to be part of culture? If the answer is being present in the right conversation at the right time, then we are effectively optimising for currency.

However, if our objective is bigger than the moment itself—and we want people to remember the brand, associate it with something meaningful, or become part of a shared experience—a different approach could be necessary. Thinkbox argued that these two approaches should require us to think differently about the environments in which advertising appears.

Their research shows that different media outlets have different cultural signatures. TV was presented as having the broadest cultural footprint, while social platforms are particularly strong in their role in building currency and bonding.

Considering the above, TV could be viewed as a more continuous form of building culture, while social presents a more immediate form of cultural currency. Perhaps the question should therefore be led by “What kind of influence does a brand want to create?” rather than “What medium is most culturally relevant?”

By breaking down how culture presents itself, the question shifts from “How?” to “Where?”

For JAA, working across charity and commercial accounts, it’s clear that cultural impact doesn’t mean the same thing for every advertiser. For a charity, it might mean taking an issue people understand practically and evoking emotions to build care.

The RSPCA provides a great example. As part of their rebrand, they partnered with Channel 4 and Gogglebox to challenge perceptions of the organisation and encourage people to think differently about their relationship with animals. The power of the idea wasn’t simply to access a large audience, but instead use a familiar, shared viewing environment to make the message feel more relevant, authentic and engaging.

Here, the media format wasn’t simply a vessel for the message, it helped to determine how that message was experienced. By aligning itself with Gogglebox, this campaign tapped into a predictable and established cultural moment and therefore was able to capitalise on this. As ThinkBox demonstrated, the beauty of TV lies in its predictability around culture, and RSPCA clearly demonstrated how this can be harnessed.

The same principle can be seen in a very different category with John Lewis. For more than a decade, their Christmas advertising has become something bigger than a series of individual campaigns. People wait in anticipation for the next advert, discuss it, share it, and the characters, stories and songs become part of the wider Christmas build up.

The IPA’s effectiveness analysis of the 2010 to 2019 period estimated that John Lewis’s Christmas advertising helped the retailer grow 4.4 times faster than the average non-food retailer, generating £411m in incremental profit.

John Lewis didn’t simply buy into a cultural moment. Over time, they have created it in their own right and for many, Christmas doesn’t really begin until the John Lewis Christmas advert lands.

That’s continuity. And it demonstrates the difference between being present in culture and becoming part of it.

From an AV perspective, we are focused upon measuring the impression by reach, frequency, cost, attention, completion etc. All of course are important to our work. But if two impressions deliver the same audience at the same cost, should we assume they have the same cultural value? One might be delivered while scrolling through a rapidly changing feed. Another might sit within a programme that becomes tomorrow’s water cooler conversation. Both are objectively equal impressions, yet they may have very different implications for memory, meaning and therefore culture.

Thinkbox found TV to be the UK’s most culturally significant medium overall, accounting for 21% of cultural impact, compared with 14% for social media. To simply say “TV wins” feels lazy. The more telling interpretation is that the value of the media environment can’t necessarily be understood through delivery metrics alone. It’s also important to think about what happens after the impression. Does it become part of a conversation, was it memorable, and has it made a place for itself within culture?

Cultural currency is about being part of the moment. Cultural continuity is about building something that has value beyond the moment.

Brands, of course, need both depending on the objective. There will always be moments worth chasing, and there will always be cultural conversations that brands should consider participating in. But if every brand is chasing the next one, eventually the moments become the sole strategy. I feel that is when we risk building brands that are constantly present but rarely remembered.

The opportunity for media is not to decide which channel “owns” culture. It is to understand the different cultural roles that media can play. Social platforms can help a brand participate in the moment, creators can help it connect, TV and cinema can create shared experiences, and partnerships allow brands to contribute to environments people already care about. The most effective campaigns will often combine several of these roles.

The above feels particularly relevant to JAA as an independent agency. We are not tied to one platform, one broadcaster or one definition of what effective media planning looks like. We are able to be flexible, reactive and act in the best interests of each client’s specific needs.

For one client, that might mean getting behind a cultural moment. For another, it might mean building a longer-term association or legacy. The answer will, of course, be different for each brief.

Ultimately, the challenge for media planning is not simply to find where culture is happening, but to understand what role we want a brand to play within it. If we can find solutions that balance the value of being present in the moment with the legacy of creating something that lasts, we can help brands move from simply chasing culture to genuinely becoming part of it.