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How Attention Prevails In The Future of Advertising Report With ExchangeWire

Research
2
minutes
Technical Level
May 16, 2023
2
minutes
May 16, 2023
Technical Level
Frank Maguire
VP of Insights, Strategy & Sustainability
As ad spend continues to grow and CTV is poised to have the greatest growth, advertisers and brands are searching for ways to grab consumers’ attention in an increasingly competitive landscape.

But what drives attention in advertising? How are media buyers thinking about attention and how do they approach it in advertising? In this new research report, produced with ExchangeWire, we take a closer look at attention in advertising. 

You can find the full report at the end of this post, keep reading for a summary of the report.

Attention in Advertising

Between increased competition, more content to consume and general daily distractions, a consumer’s attention is scattered everywhere. Yet 66% of media buyers in the UK consider attention as a KPI in their media strategies. The reason why, is the relationship between attention and ROI is relatively clear in the UK market, with nearly 75% of media buyers stating they are willing to pay a premium for ads that improve attention towards their ads.

Agencies are the most likely to pay a premium for ads with better attention outcomes.

So how can media buyers improve attention in advertising? Although a wide range of factors are at play when consumers are exposed to advertising, ad formats had the greatest impact at nearly 25% of the total factors. So what can media buyers do to improve the attention towards their CTV, video and display ads?

Ad placement is the second highest factor on consumer attention.

We tested a range of Sharethrough’s Creative Ad Enhancements, specifically designed with how consumers interact with content to improve attention, against the original, control creative to compare performance. Here’s what we found.

Sharethrough Ad Enhancement Testing

Based on our previous research study that revealed a majority of consumers keep their devices on mute, we developed Sharethrough’s Dynamic Captions, a video ad enhancement that automatically adds human-verified subtitles in the headline space. The last time we tested Dynamic Captions, consumers were able to comprehend the ad on par with editorial content. In our research study with ExchangeWire, we found that Sharethrough’s Dynamic Captions were able to capture attention up to 80% more than the control creatives.

Brand marketers had the highest attention rates with Dynamic Captions.

You can find the full results in the Attention in Advertising research report.

We’ve seen the success QR Codes on TV commercials, but how do our CTV ad enhancements stack up against the control creatives? If CTV is to be the largest market for advertising, then it’s important for advertisers to capture consumers’ attention. With the help of ExchangeWire, we tested Sharethrough’s Sports Ticker compared to the control creative and discovered that attention improved by up to 45%.

Our previous research uncovered a 14% lift in viewers’ likelihood of comprehending an ad when including the Sport Ticker enhancement.

Attention as a Competitive Advantage

Learn more about how you can use attention as a competitive advantage in our new Attention in Advertising research report produced with ExchangeWire.

To view the free infographic, fill the form below.

As ad spend continues to grow and CTV is poised to have the greatest growth, advertisers and brands are searching for ways to grab consumers’ attention in an increasingly competitive landscape.

But what drives attention in advertising? How are media buyers thinking about attention and how do they approach it in advertising? In this new research report, produced with ExchangeWire, we take a closer look at attention in advertising. 

You can find the full report at the end of this post, keep reading for a summary of the report.

Attention in Advertising

Between increased competition, more content to consume and general daily distractions, a consumer’s attention is scattered everywhere. Yet 66% of media buyers in the UK consider attention as a KPI in their media strategies. The reason why, is the relationship between attention and ROI is relatively clear in the UK market, with nearly 75% of media buyers stating they are willing to pay a premium for ads that improve attention towards their ads.

Agencies are the most likely to pay a premium for ads with better attention outcomes.

So how can media buyers improve attention in advertising? Although a wide range of factors are at play when consumers are exposed to advertising, ad formats had the greatest impact at nearly 25% of the total factors. So what can media buyers do to improve the attention towards their CTV, video and display ads?

Ad placement is the second highest factor on consumer attention.

We tested a range of Sharethrough’s Creative Ad Enhancements, specifically designed with how consumers interact with content to improve attention, against the original, control creative to compare performance. Here’s what we found.

Sharethrough Ad Enhancement Testing

Based on our previous research study that revealed a majority of consumers keep their devices on mute, we developed Sharethrough’s Dynamic Captions, a video ad enhancement that automatically adds human-verified subtitles in the headline space. The last time we tested Dynamic Captions, consumers were able to comprehend the ad on par with editorial content. In our research study with ExchangeWire, we found that Sharethrough’s Dynamic Captions were able to capture attention up to 80% more than the control creatives.

Brand marketers had the highest attention rates with Dynamic Captions.

You can find the full results in the Attention in Advertising research report.

We’ve seen the success QR Codes on TV commercials, but how do our CTV ad enhancements stack up against the control creatives? If CTV is to be the largest market for advertising, then it’s important for advertisers to capture consumers’ attention. With the help of ExchangeWire, we tested Sharethrough’s Sports Ticker compared to the control creative and discovered that attention improved by up to 45%.

Our previous research uncovered a 14% lift in viewers’ likelihood of comprehending an ad when including the Sport Ticker enhancement.

Attention as a Competitive Advantage

Learn more about how you can use attention as a competitive advantage in our new Attention in Advertising research report produced with ExchangeWire.

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About Behind Headlines: 180 Seconds in Ad Tech—

Behind Headlines: 180 Seconds in Ad Tech is a short 3-minute podcast exploring the news in the digital advertising industry. Ad tech is a fast-growing industry with many updates happening daily. As it can be hard for most to keep up with the latest news, the Sharethrough team wanted to create an audio series compiling notable mentions each week.

As ad spend continues to grow and CTV is poised to have the greatest growth, advertisers and brands are searching for ways to grab consumers’ attention in an increasingly competitive landscape.

But what drives attention in advertising? How are media buyers thinking about attention and how do they approach it in advertising? In this new research report, produced with ExchangeWire, we take a closer look at attention in advertising. 

You can find the full report at the end of this post, keep reading for a summary of the report.

Attention in Advertising

Between increased competition, more content to consume and general daily distractions, a consumer’s attention is scattered everywhere. Yet 66% of media buyers in the UK consider attention as a KPI in their media strategies. The reason why, is the relationship between attention and ROI is relatively clear in the UK market, with nearly 75% of media buyers stating they are willing to pay a premium for ads that improve attention towards their ads.

Agencies are the most likely to pay a premium for ads with better attention outcomes.

So how can media buyers improve attention in advertising? Although a wide range of factors are at play when consumers are exposed to advertising, ad formats had the greatest impact at nearly 25% of the total factors. So what can media buyers do to improve the attention towards their CTV, video and display ads?

Ad placement is the second highest factor on consumer attention.

We tested a range of Sharethrough’s Creative Ad Enhancements, specifically designed with how consumers interact with content to improve attention, against the original, control creative to compare performance. Here’s what we found.

Sharethrough Ad Enhancement Testing

Based on our previous research study that revealed a majority of consumers keep their devices on mute, we developed Sharethrough’s Dynamic Captions, a video ad enhancement that automatically adds human-verified subtitles in the headline space. The last time we tested Dynamic Captions, consumers were able to comprehend the ad on par with editorial content. In our research study with ExchangeWire, we found that Sharethrough’s Dynamic Captions were able to capture attention up to 80% more than the control creatives.

Brand marketers had the highest attention rates with Dynamic Captions.

You can find the full results in the Attention in Advertising research report.

We’ve seen the success QR Codes on TV commercials, but how do our CTV ad enhancements stack up against the control creatives? If CTV is to be the largest market for advertising, then it’s important for advertisers to capture consumers’ attention. With the help of ExchangeWire, we tested Sharethrough’s Sports Ticker compared to the control creative and discovered that attention improved by up to 45%.

Our previous research uncovered a 14% lift in viewers’ likelihood of comprehending an ad when including the Sport Ticker enhancement.

Attention as a Competitive Advantage

Learn more about how you can use attention as a competitive advantage in our new Attention in Advertising research report produced with ExchangeWire.

About Calibrate—

Founded in 2015, Calibrate is a yearly conference for new engineering managers hosted by seasoned engineering managers. The experience level of the speakers ranges from newcomers all the way through senior engineering leaders with over twenty years of experience in the field. Each speaker is greatly concerned about the craft of engineering management. Organized and hosted by Sharethrough, it was conducted yearly in September, from 2015-2019 in San Francisco, California.

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Frank Maguire
VP of Insights, Strategy & Sustainability

About the Author

Frank has spent over a decade at Sharethrough conducting research to better understand how humans respond to advertising to help brands and agencies adapt their unique advertising challenges to ever-evolving media consumption behaviors. In order to accelerate sustainability initiatives at Sharethrough and across the advertising industry, he recently completed his “Sustainability in Business” certification from Harvard Business School. He has also led multiple sustainability initiatives, including helping to launch the ad industry’s first Green Media Product “GreenPMPs,” hosting the advertising industry’s first Green Media Summit and speaking at Climate Week NYC. He is a digital advertising industry veteran, beginning his career working for clients including Nestle, Pfizer and Wyndham on the agency side and then opening up and growing Sharethrough’s East Coast headquarters in NYC.

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