Attention metrics are not the be-all-and-end-all when it comes to understanding media channel effectiveness, instead the “ad receptivity” of channels should be the “great equaliser” of media planning, according to new research from Atomic 212°.
The media agency believes its research, revealed at a breakfast event in Sydney yesterday, provides a more holistic and rounded view of channel effectiveness. It also believes that rolling in ad receptivity into media planning will unlock the harder-to-reach demographics that are proving elusive to advertisers in a more fragmented media ecosystem.
“In the same what that not all reach has been created equal… we also know that not all channels provide the same levels of ad receptivity,” said Asier Carazo, Atomic’s chief strategy officer.
“There are some channels that were historically analysed from attention research. Out of home was decimated in terms of attention because people are only looking at out of home for a couple of seconds. But those channels are the least avoided,” he said.
Atomic’s research found that while SEO, cinema and SVOD rank highest for attention, and online, social and radio rank lowest the picture becomes muddle when “ad avoidance” is factored.
Podcasts, social and video streaming, for instance, are the most-avoided by consumers, while cinema, out of home and radio are the least avoided.
This channel nuance, it believes should be a game-changer for media planning.
“Planning for ad receptivity is actually the great equaliser in this discussion. Attention metrics as we currently know them are favouring some ads but not accounting for ad receptivity, we get a fuller picture of the the attention conversation and the attention economy,” said Sam Bessell, Atomic’s strategy director.
To be clear, Atomic said Amplified Intelligence had done “a phenomenal job” with its work on attention and that attention metrics played a “massive role” in its planning.
Ad receptivity and ad avoidance are driven by different consumer behaviours, as well as demographic factors.
“Cinema ad avoidance is usually because people are late, visiting the restroom. But the reasons for people not paying full attention to ads is because people are either talking or using their phone during the ads. That’s not too bad if you consider the role of audio. Does your brand have a sound signature? A lot of brands still don’t. Is there anything that we can still do from an audio perspective to build those memory structures,” said Carazo.
“It makes cinema even stronger,” added Bessell, “because the two top avoiding behaviours are, in fact, ones that we can look at just making better advertising.”
Ad avoidance tactics change by channel. Consumers mainly avoid ads on social media by skipping the video ads or scrolling quickly past sponsored posts. With TV and BVOD, consumers physically leave the room—going to the dunny or putting the kettle on, for instance. But they might also mute the content or switch to another device.
Nearly two-fifths of its surveyed consumers change radio station when the ads come on and some 45 per cent of podcast listeners skip through the ad breaks. Some 43 per cent of music streamers pay to miss the ads entirely.
Physical ads, such as out of home and print, it said are harder to avoid entirely, though people still try.
These avoidant behaviours, Atomic found, are split into four main categories, what it calls content controllers, space evaders, focus shifters and ad-free subscribers.
Content controllers use the media environment’s features to skip ads, space evaders physically remove themselves from ad exposure, focus shifters remain present but turn attention elsewhere. Ad-free subscribers is self explanatory. The first two are both proactive and reactive avoidance tactics, while focus shifters are reactive and ad-free subscribers are proactive.
These behaviours also change by demographic, too. Older consumers, for instance, it found have the most negative perceptions of advertising, while nearly three-fifths of 18-34 year olds have a positive stance towards advertising. Mean also have a slightly more favourable stance towards advertising than women, as do metro audiences compared to regional audiences.
However, the picture is complicated slightly when ad avoidance tactics are considered. While the younguns are more favourable towards advertising as a whole, nearly three-quarters of 18-24 year olds “always or often actively avoid ads” compared to around half of those older than 45. Carazo told B&T that this is due to younger consumers being more tech-savvy, employing ad blockers and declining cookies in digital and skipping through other ads, for example.
This understanding of media consumption, Atomic believes, should have an impact on creative planning and execution.
“I’ve seen way too many times in creative conversations and the agency presents a 60-second TV ad with an amazing script and everyone in the room thinks it’s amazing, then we’ll make sure it works across every channel. But that needs to be a forethought rather than an afterthought. Yes, you can have an incredible narrative that is going to work very well in your 60-second TV ad. But how is it going to work everywhere? How are you going to bring content creators into the mix? On social, we still see a lot of cut-down versions of a TV being put on Stories or Reels. Social media users are very reactive and well-trained [to skip ads],” Carazo said.
Bessell and Carazo pointed to Geico’s YouTube ads as particularly well-suited to YouTube, for instance, as they fit into the six-second format.
“In Australia, there’s so much opportunity because we are not thinking about best practice. We still get a brief where it’s very traditional. But what is your audience doing?”
