A (Very Badly Done) Illustration Of Accounting For Marketing

I am not an artist in any way. Given this I’m not an ideal person to illustrate ideas. That said, I wanted to quickly (sadly not as quickly as it looks) get across the message that accountants really aren’t doing enough on the reporting of marketing assets. Considering how financial accountants report on marketing assets you get the impression that many accountants have just given up. Ash is, therefore, my stick figure accountant who helps illustrate this point about how accountants treat marketing assets. So this is my (very badly done) illustration of accounting for marketing/

I’d love some feedback (neil.bendle@uga.edu). It can be — “you illustrate like a four year old” — but I’d be especially keen to hear if the cartoon makes sense. Does the point come across quickly?

Thanks for your attention. Here is the cartoon.

Ash the accountant values a firm

A Childish Illustration Of Accounting For Marketing

While the art is clearly not very good, I hope the point makes sense. Some assets are really rather hard to value. This presents a challenge for financial accounting. The current solution is largely to pretend the problem does not exist. One can always argue this is the best we can do marketers but I hope we can try a bit harder.

Want to Know More?

For more on accounting for intangibles see here, here and here.

For some reading on the topic see Capitalism without Capital: The Rise of the Intangible Economy by Jonathan Haskel and Stian Westlake here. See also the work of Baruch Lev and Feng Gu The End of Accounting and the Path Forward for Investors and Managers here.