Shorter ads can be more effective: study

By Fareeha Khalid Jun 28th, 2012 ( No Comment )

Shorter ads may be more effective in grabbing the attention of the viewers, a NeuroFocus study reveals.

The study suggests that in most of the cases a 30-second ad can be cut in half and prove to be more effective.

NeuroFocus, a Nielsen-owned research facility, used a method called neuro-compression to extract the most effective parts of an ad by measuring a viewer’s brain activity, Mashable reports.

The company has been working with CBS TV at its lab in Berkeley, California to determine what really connects with viewers when it comes to ads.

Researchers measure three types of brain activity associated with what they call the “buying brain” — attention, emotion and memory.

By identifying the scenes in a commercial that trigger the biggest changes in your brain activity, they can edit an ad to half its original length.

Head of NeuroFocus, Dr. A.K. Pradeep, said, “Our brains are so smart, they retain the key pieces of logic, the key pieces of the flow. If you threw out all the fillers … and got to the core, it’s a lot more effective.”