Quote from James A.Hart on July 16, 2025, 9:17 pm

Many marketers still believe they’re competing with other businesses in the same niche or city. That may have been true in the Yellow Pages era. But in today’s digital economy, that mindset is dangerously outdated.

In 2025, your real competition isn’t another local service provider or ecommerce store.
It’s Netflix, YouTube, TikTok, and the endless scroll of dopamine-packed content.

Welcome to the Attention Economy

We live in an era of unlimited options—but limited attention.

Every time you run an ad, you’re not just fighting competitors in your vertical. You’re fighting:

• 6,000 Netflix titles
• 700,000 active podcasts
• 29 million episodes
• 2 million articles
• 5 billion videos
• Plus Slack messages, group chats, and 42 open browser tabs

Your audience has more entertainment and information choices than ever before. Which means grabbing attention is no longer optional—it’s the first transaction that happens before any sale.

Attention Is the First Sale

Marketers often think a “conversion” happens when someone fills out a form or clicks “Buy Now.”

But in reality, the first conversion happens when someone chooses to stop scrolling and give you their attention.

That’s the moment they decide your message is more valuable than:

• A trending tweet
• A podcast from their favorite host
• Or an autoplaying TikTok full of cat videos

If you lose that battle, you’ll never even get a chance to sell your product.

The Harsh Truth: Boring Brands Don’t Survive

When your ad shows up in someone’s feed, you’re not following their browsing pattern—you’re interrupting it.
You’re showing up between viral memes, celebrity gossip, and personalized algorithmic content engineered to keep them hooked.

That’s why playing it safe is actually the riskiest move.
If your message is generic or your brand looks like everyone else’s, it disappears instantly.

Dopamine Wins Attention. Then Comes Value.

The modern consumer is bombarded with content that stimulates their brain’s reward system.

You’re not just competing for time—you’re competing with platforms built to hijack human behavior.
If your ad doesn’t deliver something visually or emotionally compelling, it gets ignored within seconds.

But if you can hijack attention first, then you earn the right to retain it with real value.

This is not about clickbait—it’s about understanding the true stakes of digital marketing today.

So What Should You Do?

• Stop writing ads like you’re in a vacuum.
  You’re not just speaking to a niche market—you’re shouting in a noisy stadium.
• Make your first impression unforgettable.
  The creative (image or video) and headline must interrupt patterns and spark curiosity.
• Think in terms of dopamine and delight.
  What can you say or show that makes someone pause, laugh, feel, or wonder?
• Respect attention by delivering immediate value.
  If you win the scroll, don’t waste it with fluff. Say something that matters.

Bottom line? You’re not in the mattress business, the agency business, or the supplement business.
You’re in the attention business.

And the brands that understand this—who treat attention like the scarce, valuable currency it is—will always win.