"Really Talk to Me" -- A+E Networks Examines the Potential of Total Audience

To craft such an important analysis Marcela Tabares pictured at top senior vice president research ampamp strategic insights AE Networks sought data and trends from many sources and parsed the results in a way that compared behaviors across a range of ages quotWe didn39t set out to do one specific studyquot she explained quotThere were a couple of different components One aspect of our approach is that we designed it across mutually exclusive demographics like 1834 3554 and 55 so we could really understand how the different demographic cohorts perform across the funnelquotTotal Audience MethodologyquotWe looked at top level ad awareness and receptivity purchasing poweramp160and spending across key consumer verticals and we commissioned campaign effectiveness studies so that we could ultimately size the impact of conversionquot she continued quotWe set out to understand how they are actually responding to advertising if there are meaningful differences and what is the real magnitude and opportunity within these different age cohorts We really wanted to understand it to maximize the potential of our audiences and optimize the partnerships we have with our clientsquot To that end Tabares and her team quotapplied an integrative multimodal research strategy to quantify how key demo cohorts within Adults 18 behave in the marketing landscapequotWhy Total AudienceWe know that the US population is aging Older adults comprise the fastest growing age group in the last decade and are projected to be in the next decade quotIgnore this demographic group at your own perilquot Tabares warned quotIt39s time to temper our fascination with youth culture and embrace this massive opportunity right in front of us It39s time to be more inclusive and expansive in our marketing strategiesquotTo many who have grappled with how to demonstrate the value of reaching older adults to advertisers the study revealed some fascinating surprises in addition to some fairly logical insights Using AE39s Precision and Performance platform for advanced targeting and datadriven linear analyses as well as an attribution backend David Ernst vice president advanced television and digital analytics noticed that quota large portion of the people that were outside of the buying demographics tended to contribute an awful lot of the performance as much as 50 and even morequotThese older prospects Tabares explained were being left out of the buying equation quotbecause they were being narrowed down into specific demographic groupsquotTotal Audience TakeawaysThe results of the Total Audience study underscore the value of the return on investment when you expand the age target to include all adults There were quite a few surprising results For example ad receptivity was higher among older adults than among younger ones quotReally Their attention message memorability and likeability are all higherquot Tabares asked rhetoricallyTara Lantieri senior director primary research ad sales strategic insights AE Networks delved deeply into this subject by researching a year39s worth of data that included 20000 different TV ads from over 1600 advertisers and more than 50 categories quotWhat we saw was that brand memorability actually grows as viewers agequot she revealed quotIt39s twice as high for adults 55 versus 1834 yearolds When we look at message memorability we see the exact same pattern where it is twice as high Likeability follows that same stepwise pattern where it grows by age It39s about 71 higher overall than it is for younger adults And that pattern is consistent across categories 47 out of 58 examinedquotWith advertising creative in addition to ads specifically built around authentic portrayals of older protagonists Lantieri found that multigenerational ads did particularly well among adults across the age spectrum In some casesamp160these ads performed twice as high in memorability and likeability metrics among older adults likely because they were viewed as respectful and realistic and nonstereotypical In addition ensemble cast ads also did especially well quotwhen the ensemble cast specifically included and spoke to people who are older in a realistic and nuanced wayquot she saidAliza Wechsler director advanced advertising and attribution analytics AE Networks conducted proprietary research with NCSolutions and 605 Impact to examine actual TV campaigns to ascertain the impact on conversion across demographic cohorts With the NCSolutions CPG study for example Wechsler found that heads of households age 55 represent 53 of the spend amp160200 million more than the two younger demo breaks combined 1834 3554 The Auto study with 605 Impact showed similar results quotThis shows the huge spending power of 55 When you add their scale it magnifies their potential And they are not even being spoken to correctly Imagine how much more of their dollars you could get if you spoke to them correctlyquot Wechsler notedAuto conversion rates among Precision targets were also impressive Wechsler found that quotstrategically targeting across the total audienceamp160lifts the conversion rates up unilaterally across all of the demographics Purchase rates in our network group were 11xamp160higher when you targeted those particular behaviors than those who fell outside of the behavioral targetquotWhat About AdvertisersquotAdults 55 are driving economic growthquot Lantieri statedamp160quotFor every dollar spent in the economy Adults 55 account for 41 cents and they spent 34 trillion last year alonequotamp160This compares with 18 of spend coming from 1834s If you are ignoring older adults quotyou are leaving a lot of money on the tablequot One would think that targeting older adults in a way that resonates with them would be a nobrainerBut the old canard that advertisers get 55 viewers anyway persists quotWhat does it mean to 39get them39quot Tabres asked quotThis is not a monolithic demographic This is a very diverse demo with diverse interests perspectives experiences and behaviors If you are not speaking to them directly reflecting their lives and interests then you are missing the opportunity to capture their interest in you You are just getting them demographicallyquotquotYou might be getting an impression but are you really communicating with themquot Ernst pondered quotMessages that resonate with people are going to motivate them to actionquotChanging advertiser minds when faced with entrenched beliefs is no mean feat but Ethan Heftman senior vice president ad sales precision performance AE Networks sees opportunity quotTotal audience buying is starting to gain traction with the agenciesquot he said quotThey seem to come around quicker as they see market realities and there39s no way to control CPM inflation without itquotHave advertising partners changed their target because of the results quotThis research study is just one of the building blocks of selling Total Audienceamp160it rolls up into a larger conversation with many different tentaclesquot Heftman explainedamp160adding quotThe right combination of education and our creative solutions has led to a few instances where our partners have gone back to reevaluate their target We now have a few attention guarantee deals in the works with clients across a variety of categoriesquotNext StepsTabares is hopeful that quotalthough age is still left out of the conversationquot and older audiencesamp160quotare not being spoken to directlyquot there is a real opportunity here to change the dynamic quotIf we see that ad receptivity is so strong that they have the spending power across the majority of categories and that they are responding to advertising with sales what would happen if you actually talked to them in a more meaningful relevant wayquot she askedNext steps in this process will include a major cultural insights study working with sociologists and cultural anthropologists to more fully dimensionalize and quotget into the layers of what representation meansquot to this audience quotNow is an important time to know their values beliefs aspirations and attitudes so that we can better tell their stories and make them feel seenquot she concludedClick the social buttons to share this story with colleagues and friendsThe opinions expressed here are the author39s views and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillagecomMyersBizNet

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"Really Talk to Me" -- A+E Networks Examines the Potential of Total Audience

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Charlene Weisler

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