What makes TV commercials effective?

As a marketing research company, we don’t just conduct studies for clients. We use our research to learn from our own insights. Over the years, we have tested hundreds of TV commercials. Together, they provide a tremendous amount of information. That’s why we decided to carry out a meta-analysis with our TV copy testing database. A meta-analysis is a research where the results of previous studies are collected, in order to achieve a general conclusion.

The meta-analysis

With this study we wanted to validate DVJ’s copy testing tool. Our copy test helps us understand to which extent a tv commercial is effective or not. To find out what drives whether a commercial is effective or not, we tested different dimensions that influence the two brand impact scores: unaided brand recall and message clarity. Prior research showed that these two scores are the most important KPI’s for the success of a commercial: they drive and predict in-market success. So, we took dimensions which are divided by engagement, associations and direct response, and measured what effect they have on the two brand impact scores. These dimensions represent themes we use in our copy testing tool. We took the themes which can be taken into account when creating and optimising a TVC.

We used commercials from different European countries for our meta-analysis. We looked at commercials from The Netherlands, The UK and Ireland, Germany, Poland and Switzerland.

Engagement

The analysis showed that the following dimensions as shown in Figure 1, have a significant positive influence on the message clarity and the ability to unaidedly remember a brand.

Figure 1

Associations

The following dimensions related to associations as shown in Figure 2 that are marked bright green, have a positive influence on both unaided brand recall and message clarity.

Figure 2

In addition, the percentage of positive associations has a positive influence on message clarity.

Direct response

The following dimensions as shown in Figure 3 that are marked bright green, have a positive influence on both unaided brand recall and message clarity.

Figure 3

The dimensions that are marked light green have a positive influence on the clarity of the message.

Copy-testing tool

We’ve learned the different dimensions from TV commercials that contribute to achieving good brand impact scores. It’s impossible to measure everything, so we measured the elements from our copy testing tool which can have a direct impact on making a TVC more effective. The elements which media agencies can instantly act upon before launch. Because these dimensions contribute positively to the brand impact scores, we validated that our copy test is a good predictor to finding out whether a TVC will be effective or not.

Our TV copy-test

DVJ Insights’ TV copy-test takes into account the way in which people look at advertising as well as the role of emotions in advertising. Pre-testing your TV commercial is crucial when optimising and increasing your ad. Because media investments typically constitute the largest costs associated with a campaign, pre-testing prevents you from wasting your advertising budget. Our copy-test combines registration, and implicit and explicit research techniques, to expose the full potential of the TVC. By comparing this with a robust benchmark, every advertiser immediately knows whether and how improvements are possible.

Contact us for more information about our copy-test.