Advertising Research

Ad Testing, also known as advertising research, is designed to improve advertising effectiveness. Companies often test their advertising with a subset of a target market before rolling out a campaign to a broader target market. The goal is to save money by optimizing both the message and calls to action before spending advertising dollars.

Ad testing allow us to:

• Determine which market segments to target
• Give input to ad creators to better understand the audience
• Make an informed go or no-go decision
• Evaluate the performance of an ad agency
• Get the highest ROI out of your ad spend

Ad tests work best when you have a clear expectation of the purpose of the ad. Some advertisements are designed to promote awareness, while others look to build a brand or drive behavior. Regardless of the intent, it’s important to define the goal of the advertisement before running tests.

Three commonly performed ad tests include:

Recall: Companies need to be memorable if customers are going to consider their products or services. In a recall test, participants see an ad and then wait a specified amount of time before being asked whether they are able to recall a particular ad or product

Persuasion: A test for persuasion determines the effectiveness of an ad in changing attitudes and intentions. This test assesses brand attitudes before and after ad exposure. Participants first answer a series of questions before seeing the proposed advertisement. Then they take a second test to assess how the advertisement changed their attitudes and intentions.

Response: Many ads are designed to drive an action or a conversion. This is especially true of online businesses that rely on click-through and conversion to drive revenue. In a response test, participants receive an ad with a unique identifier (URL string, promo code, phone number, etc.) to track how well the advertisement performs in converting interest to action.