Ad Age is marking Black History Month 2025 with our fifth-annual Honoring Creative Excellence package. (Read the introduction and all the essays here.) Today, guest editor Lucien Etori turns the spotlight to Roger Caruth, professor of communications at Howard University, who writes about how “regressive representation” puts campaign effectiveness at risk.
When corporate gatekeepers come from varied backgrounds, they infuse different cultural insights into how brands speak with audiences. This allows advertising campaigns to accurately match the diverse customer base of that brand, as opposed to being influenced by a narrow or homogeneous view.
Lived and learned experiences of diverse leadership coupled with a culture of corporate responsibility shapes how brands interact with internal and external stakeholders. The recent shift in corporate culture—particularly a retreat from diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives—may have broad, long-term economic impact for some companies. These recent developments underscore the notion that underrepresentation in the upper echelon of corporate offices will significantly contribute to low consumer confidence.
A change in corporate culture could make a meaningful difference in how advertising campaigns evolve. Companies with diverse leadership are more open to understanding the value of inclusive storytelling and the intricacies and nuances of cultural representation. From casting and creative direction to messaging and media buying and placement, this ensures representation and that campaigns are both true and genuine to their target audience.
Consequently, given corporate America’s dramatic shift away from advancing DEI, there is a genuine chance that advertising campaigns will cease to be representative of the target audience and trend toward regressive representation, or fail to reach particular buyer blocks in a coherent manner.
A similarly important factor is understanding the value of Black media and other minority-owned platforms through key financial investments. Brands that have traditionally invested in Black media buys did so knowing that Black consumers are almost always the ones who drive cultural trends, and possess immense purchasing power. But if companies deprioritize diversity initiatives, advertising dollars may get diverted away from Black-owned and multicultural media, resulting in less content that genuinely resonates with these consumers. The question then becomes whether brands will continue to meet diverse audiences where they are—or if media buying decisions will become default, one-size-fits-all strategies that do not resonate with key demographics.
The future of advertising will be shaped by whether—and how much—diversity exists in corporate leadership. If they stay committed to authentic representation, inclusive storytelling and intentional media investments, they will create even deeper connections with their audiences. But if diversity continues to be deprioritized on the corporate side of businesses, then you can expect that shift to show in advertising deliverables, resulting in a disjoint between the brands that companies are representing versus the diverse consumers that brands serve.
These dynamics have far-reaching implications, as media representation can shape consumer behavior, particularly spending habits, while simultaneously mirroring and perpetuating larger societal narratives around identity, inclusion and belonging.
