Self-seeking. Self-regarding. Self-serving. It was entirely consistent with the theme of his address that a man by the name of Self should attempt to expose the shallow pretensions of us marketeers at our annual beanfeast - the Marketing Society dinner - last month.

Will Self's brand of selfhood, however - just as self-opinionated and self-promoting as his audience - differed only inasmuch as it borrowed the clothes of varsity elitist revolutionary-Marxism rather than those of David Ogilvy or Richard Branson.

Self's harangue of his audience was all about preserving the integrity of his brand. Like it or not, he is yoked to the base ideologies of his sponsors - publishers, editors, journos and hacks who are out to sell product. Which, I guess, makes him,

like us, a fully signed-up member of the chattering classes - and in the pay of his commercial masters.

At the Marketing Society dinner, Self was the spectre at the feast and he played the part as if born to the bully-pulpit. He was supping with the devil and his audience was the spawn of Satan.

It's a feature of Self's oratorical style that he avoids taking the poisoned dart approach to his victims. Instead he fires off a volley of insults with the ferocity and intensity of an Uzi sub-machine gun.

His audience was guilty. Guilty of paying to hear him speak. Guilty of issuing seductive price points to people who can "barely walk and chew gum at the same time". Guilty of eulogising insanity. Guilty of having dinner suits and Cartier cuff-links. Guilty of not even reading Naomi Klein's No Logo but no matter - having it on display is enough for us. Guilty of bibulousness (yes, I was a little the worse for wear). Guilty of kidding ourselves - "we are the California of Europe", having elevated meaninglessness to iconic status.

Of course, at the root of Will Self's rabid invective is his own internal insecurity and the tension that comes with knowing that the marketing construct he is attacking is the same one that has created him and given him a voice. Even his sentences are constructed in soundbites - and we all know that breaking down thought into digestible units is the common currency of an industry skilled in the art of persuasion and spin - or, in other words, "marketing".

This tension made Self into a vulnerable and lonely figure at the lectern. He failed to bring a largely sympathetic audience with him. An audience that is a great deal more humane, sensitive and sophisticated in its respect for and understanding of humanity than his hectoring and student debating style allowed. He consequently lost his audience to barracking and shouts of "boring" - an audience that was way ahead of him in the self-knowledge stakes.

Dan Douglass is managing director and executive creative director of direct marketing agency DP&A, and vice-chairman of the DMA creative council

dan.douglass@dpa.co.uk