July 21st, 2021, Frances Johnson
Challenge
Develop an ad effectiveness testing framework that could be used to pre-test advertising campaigns.
Solution
Multiple surveys were run to find the highest performing ad and the underperforming ad.
Results
A framework was created to use on an ongoing basis to pre-test and improve advertising campaigns prior to launch.
Business challenge
One of the top social media brands in the world reached out to YouGov for a rapid research project that would be tested on a first party panel.
The key objective was to optimize internal advertising effectiveness tracking on the client’s platform, within a highly competitive market. The client focused on two key metrics (brand linkage and memorability) by testing ads and asking for these metrics in different ways, such as: forced exposure, prompted with full ad, prompted with ad stills.
Solution
Using YouGov Surveys: Self-serve, our rapid self-serve research tool, 12 different surveys were created (6 for brand linkage and 6 for memorability) and respondents were shown a clutter reel including the 4 ads. The ads in question had previously run on the client’s platform with varying levels of effectiveness.
By looking at the top line results for each question type, the client was able to identify distinct winners and losers based on the score distributions for the top, mid, bottom and control videos.
The client also ran a survey on brand perception based on video ads they were running. They were specifically looking at respondents’ perceptions of their platform and if they are seen to be a place that promotes a sense of community. The YouGov Direct A/B test functions have allowed the client to expose respondents to a full ad and answer corresponding questions.
Results
As the client makes the majority of its money from advertising placements and user data, optimizing their process of identifying ad effectiveness is critical. Having a better process to identify good vs poor performing ads gives valuable insight to their clients as well as their internal stakeholders that manage these campaigns. The background data that YouGov holds on our panel members allows for further segmentation of the data analysis.
The projects are still ongoing and soon the client will utilize YouGov Surveys' re-contact feature to test brand linkage and memorability over the course of 24hrs+ to see if the results are more polarizing after a longer period of time from exposure. The most polarizing question structure will be used in their internal tests for upcoming ad campaigns to better determine the effectiveness of the advertising.