Why attention strategies must vary by brand

The amount of attention required to make a campaign successful is dependent on factors including the profile of the advertiser in question, and the brand’s desired outcomes, according to a new report.  

What’s happened?

Marketing consultancy Ebiquity has announced the creation of an innovative media trading currency based on attention. The composite metric – dubbed ‘aCPM’, or cost per thousand seconds of attention – integrates media cost data from Ebiquity with digital and TV advertising attention data from Lumen and TVision respectively.

However, the report warns that brands should not amend media plans to simply pursue the cheapest aCPM, as they often have done with audience-based media buying.

Two hypothetical scenarios

• Advertiser ‘A’ is a new brand with a complex new product to communicate to the market. This requires an “absolute minimum” of five seconds’ average dwell time across different media. The report recommends TV media as a cost-effective way to deliver the required attention.
• Advertiser ‘B’ is a well-established brand with extremely distinctive assets. Its task is to trigger and reinforce existing memory structures to build mental availability. As such, it does not need to impose a minimum attention time threshold on media buys. Social media may be a more cost-effective option.

Key quote

“The better you understand your communication task and the amount of attention required to get the job done, the more likely you will be to develop the optimal attention strategy” – Ebiquity, The Challenge of Attention.