Change is Good

What can neuroscience teach us about designing a good campaign? QMS and Neuro-Insight have the answer.

This week Australian digital outdoor-media company QMS and Neuro-Insight released a report on changing creatives in OOH advertising can help with brand recognition, and the overall impact of a campaign in the minds of consumers. But what does this mean for digital advertising and branded content?

The research ran over 3–5 days, with 235 volunteers shown 30 creatives across 15 categories. Their responses were measured, and ultimately the report concludes that long term memory encoding, something which is critical for the effectiveness of a campaign, continues to grow in viewers if a campaign is continuously evolving.

The study worked by continuously analysing a selection of OOH advertising, both static and digital, with those that changed frequently and evolved achieving a 38% higher impact than that of static creative.

QMS Chief Strategy Officer, Christian Zavecz points out how important this data is — “Now, for the first time, we can quantify what we have always intuitively thought about the medium. Incorporating the strategic use of creative evolution into a brand’s campaign is now proven to increase its effectiveness.”

“The study also uncovered some important lessons about frequency and the role that DOOH, through its breadth of capabilities, can play in being able to maximise effective OOH campaign reach.”

The study additionally concludes that while a static campaign can do wonders for brand recognition and continuity, updating a campaign with new information is one of the best methods to ensure that all information is absorbed by viewers, rather than trying to release it all in one go. — “For the first time, we can now scientifically prove that static images on OOH or DOOH do a great job at reminding audiences. But with evolving creative, campaigns can start to maximise their frequency with small changes to the creative helping to establish or build new memories to enhance a campaign’s performance. These changes can be as simple as a colour change, or copy updating each day.”

While this study is specifically relating to OOH and DOOH advertising, the applications for this seems especially pertinent for online advertising and branded content. While many online advertising platforms already work in a way that promotes changing up advertising formats regularly, such as the Google Display Ad model, which takes a selection of assets and copy and assembles them in a variety of ways, changing them up depending on performance and audience, campaigns themselves are not often designed with evolution in mind.

In the short term, this can be as simple as planning to adjust a campaign mid way through — switching to focusing on new information, or moving to a different set of visuals, for example. But with digital advertising, the ever evolving state of the Internet is something to consider too. Some of the most successful digital branded content campaigns work by capitalising on the hottest online trends — something that can only be achieved by keeping a close eye on said trends, and being willing to change up content with very little notice. On the internet, slang, memes, and popular visuals can change in the blink of an eye, leaving advertising that has been designed even a few months before seeming out of touch and stale, especially to younger markets.

Take this particular blunder by Subway Canada in 2018, for example. The brand asked followers to vote for their ‘bread bae’ — their favourite bread. Despite Subway having a huge online following, absolutely no one voted on the poll, according to Insider because of the extremely out of date slang ‘bae’.

Currently, QMS’ focus is on DOOH, with this study being the 3rd instalment in a series designed to understand the neuroscience behind the medium, but it will be interesting to see what other studies may come out of similar principles, especially in relation to the fast moving Gen Z world. This may encourage even more agile campaigns, ones that are unafraid to totally change their messaging, or just make subtle changes to spark a neurological response in viewers, with scientific backing.