A few years ago, a copywriter starting out in advertising was given but one charge; to come up with the big idea. “What’s the big idea?” the creative director would ask as he pushed a couple of papery layouts around with his foot.

Everyone’s favorite self-promoting adman of that era, Donny Deutsch, still calls his CNBC program The Big Idea. But the days when an agency and client could foist their big idea onto the public have long since past. We are no longer the arbiters of size, the consumer is. The consumer will decide whether you have a big idea or not – by ignoring it or by passing it around. They will decide whether your advertising idea is worthy of repeat viewing - not your media buy. They will decide whether the product is any good, not by buying it once, but by reading web reviews from other consumers. Burger King’s Subservient Chicken wasn’t a big idea until 14 million visitors decided it was.

So where does that leave an industry who is used to tying the size of its ideas to the size of the media budget? An industry that is fueled by big ideas and even bigger egos? Getting a decreasing amount of attention, money and responsibility from their clients.

In his book, the Long Tail, Chris Anderson argues that the internet creates a mass of small markets. And small markets demand not one big idea that means little to many, but many ideas that are relevant to a few.

Most clients intuitively understand the changing environment. You see it in the infinite array of niches now available. Did you ever think there’d be a market for reduced-fat fresh garden herb, hand cut and hand-cooked potato chips? When you stop caring about the size of your ideas you also find the time to have a lot more of them: and having a lot of ideas is key to building a brand these days. Media selection becomes irrelevant because you create ideas for all media. Forget being media-neutral, be media-comprehensive.

Small is practical as well as beautiful. A small idea doesn’t need as large a budget as a big idea. Which means your idea is under less scrutiny from the lawyers, accountants and naysayers. You don’t need to perfect a small idea. If 80% is good enough for a Microsoft, it’s certainly good enough for an ad. You don’t need to focus group a small idea: you can afford to test it in the real world. If it works, you’ll have achieved something spectacular at a fraction of the cost. And if it doesn’t, you won’t have blown the GDP of a small African nation on a single initiative - and no-one will be any the wiser.

Producing a lot of small ideas has only been possible because of two key changes in the last few years. The fragmentation of media and the technology revolution in production.

Most agencies and clients bemoan media fragmentation - they see dwindling audiences as a threat. And it’s definitely of concern if you believe in the world of the big idea – a big idea needs a big audience. But think small - as VW once asked us to do - and you can take advantage of the startling price decreases that have taken place over the last years. A spot on some cable TV networks these days will set you back a whopping $25. Still too rich for you? Then you can upload to youtube for nothing. The cost of production has come down just as dramatically. These days, a short film will cost you what used to be spent on the craft service table.

James Collins, in the book Built to Last: Succesful Habits of Visionary Companies, talks about the tyranny of ‘or’ and embracing the genius of ‘and’. The combination of media fragmentation and decreases in production costs allows us to try out different things. Why choose between ideas when you can choose all of them?

The big idea, today, is small ideas.