“Attention please!”: How people engage with ads in the ‘Age of Online’
We asked 3,800 people worldwide how they engage with advertising, and what they want from brands competing for their attention.
The advertising industry is changing. Online spend surpassed TV for the first time in 2017, and marketing budgets are shrinking.
Now, it’s more important than ever for brands to invest funds in the right areas. So how do they do it? Streetbees spoke to 3,800 people around the world to understand their attitudes to advertising, and what they mean for an industry in flux.
What platforms do consumers respond to best — and why?
For all the talk of a shift to online, UK consumers still feel more exposed to TV ads than any other medium (although the margins are extremely fine, as the graph below shows). The US and China, the two biggest advertising spaces in the world, lean more towards online ads — with consumers in the US being particularly respondent to social media.
This split can be put down, at least in part, to what consumers in each market consider to be an ‘effective’ ad.
In China, 8 in 10 view creativity to be the most important attribute — twice as many as in the UK. This reflects the fact that windows for attention are much smaller online; as a result, there is a greater pressure to push the boundaries. In light of this, Chinese consumers are more likely to want an advert to be memorable (18%); in the US, for example, just 8% find this important.
As for TV-centric British audiences, they want their attention grabbed (62%), but they also want to be amused; 1 in 5 selected ‘funny’ as an key factor in advertising, more than in the US (13%) and considerably more than in China (4%).
The results show that, for consumers that engage with adverts in a more traditional sense (i.e. designated commercial breaks), the relationship is different. Creativity is sacrificed for more ‘human’ qualities, such as humour or authenticity — perhaps a reflection of the typical environment in which these adverts are consumed: at home, on the sofa.
Do consumers view the shift towards online as a worthwhile one for businesses?
In short, the answer is no: in six of the seven markets included in the study, 1 in 3 see TV ads as the most effective form of advertising, the highest scoring medium from the shortlist.
The exception is China, where just 1 in 5 see TV as most effective. Perhaps these consumers don’t feel that current TV ads are able to tick the right boxes — hyper-creative, energetic, memorable — compared to the competition seen online.
As a result, a higher percentage believe social media (32%) and online ads (27%) as more powerful — which is why companies are investing big in new ways to reach as many eyeballs as possible across the country.
So what does this mean for brands?
Regardless of region, the infomercial model is dead. With under 1 in 5 people worldwide saying they want to be informed by adverts, the pressure is on for brands to delight through attention-seizing campaigns across all platforms — not simply explain a product’s plus points.
In China, where the switch away from TV is more pronounced than the West, the stakes are even higher: huge numbers demand their attention to be grabbed, but also to be stimulated through creative micro-campaigns delivered online.
With 1 in 4 people unable to remember the last ad they saw, the lesson for brands is clear: all over the world, consumers are more precious with their attention than ever — it’s time to stand out, or stand aside.
***
Streetbees can help your business understand markets in real time. Get in touch to find out more.
Follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.
A quick word on our methodology: The figures in the article are taken from Streetbees global community of members, carried out in June 2018. All of the data was collected by mobile and web surveys, and is accurate to within 3 percentage points 19 times out of 20.
