What’s the difference between an ad that’s noticed and one that’s remembered? Attention.
Understanding Attention Metrics: The Key to True Engagement
In today’s noisy world, attention is the secret sauce that turns good campaigns into great ones. But how do you measure it? And more importantly, how can you use it to supercharge your results? Let’s break down the key attention metrics that can elevate your strategy and deliver the outcomes you’re aiming for.
Why the Focus on Attention?
Back in 2015, researchers and ad tech vendors had a problem: viewability metrics were being gamed into oblivion. So, they turned their attention (pun intended) to a better question—how much attention are people actually paying to ads, and what impact does that have? The results weren’t exactly shocking: campaigns that captured more attention delivered better business outcomes. Study after study confirmed the same thing—ads that held attention longer consistently performed better across the board, from driving awareness to boosting sales.
This led to a natural focus on duration-based attention metrics (or DBAMs for short). These metrics measure or predict attention in seconds, potentially giving marketers a much clearer view of what’s working and why.
The Metrics That Matter
So how can we measure attention? Multiple media platforms are currently testing attention-based metrics. For example Meta is testing “attention impressions“, Snapchat has been testing attention metrics for some time, TikTok have explored some interesting correlations between engagement and how much an ad “resonates” with their target audience.
More hands-on research by the likes of Amplified Intelligence has demonstrated that attention can be a really powerful measure of ad effectiveness, with an attention time of as little as 2 seconds having a demonstrable impact on ad recall.
Can Passive Attention Help Campaign Performance?
Even if a user isn’t fully “locked in” on your ad then their peripheral attention, also known as “passive attention” has also been proven to count. Passive attention helps reinforce brand awareness—especially for established names. It’s like a subtle reminder that keeps your brand in the picture, even in a busy world.
Why Are Attention Metrics Are Useful?
Attention metrics aren’t just another data point—they’re your competitive edge. Here’s what they can do for you:
- Boost Brand Recall: Active attention helps people remember and connect with your brand.
- Drive Conversions: Focused viewers are more likely to act, whether that’s clicking a link or making a purchase.
- Maximise ROI: Identify your best-performing placements and double down where it matters most.
How Can I Increase Attention On My Campaigns?
Ready to turn insights into action? Here’s how to get started:
- Optimise Your Creative: Bold visuals, early branding, clear messaging, and strong storytelling are the keys to standing out.
- Prioritise Performance: Use attention data to identify underperforming placements and shift budget to what’s working.
- Align with Your Goals: Focus on active attention for short-term wins and passive attention for building long-term brand awareness.
Beware The Attentive Audience Paradox
Attention metrics are more than just a trend—they’re a game-changer when it comes to helping brands understand the impact of their campaigns. However, we still need to use attention metrics alongside some of our more “traditional” metrics like CTR, viewability and for performance advertisers, conversion rates!
To expand on this further, some users of DBAMs (Duration based attention metrics) quickly discovered, there are several ways to increase the duration of attention that aren’t always in the best interest of advertisers.
When advertisers focus on boosting how long people pay attention to their ads, it’s not just the media placements that get affected—creative choices and audience targeting often shift as well, sometimes without anyone realising.
Optimising creative to grab attention can lead to favouring flashy, clickbaity content that might not actually deliver the best results. Thankfully, most advertisers don’t use dynamic creative (where ads change in real-time), so the risk of harming a campaign by tweaking creative purely for attention is fairly low.
Audience targeting, however, is a trickier issue when using duration-based attention metrics (DBAMs). If you optimise for impressions that hold attention the longest, you risk introducing some odd—and potentially unhelpful—biases. For example:
- People over 25 spend 70% longer looking at ads in their social feeds than younger audiences (Meta research).
- Attention to TV ads increases with every repeat exposure, up to 25 times (TVision data).
- Intoxicated individuals take 7–33% longer to process content (based on studies by Sobell and Maylor).
So, if you’re targeting impressions with the longest attention spans, you could unintentionally lean towards an audience that’s older, overexposed to your ads, and possibly tipsy. Probably not the dream demographic for most campaigns!
What Does All Of This Mean?
Attention measurement is certainly a space to keep a close eye on. Including these metrics as part of your campaign optimisation and post-analysis is going to become a really valuable exercise for some advertisers. Watch this space!
