Insight from RAMetrics
The evolution of news brands has been one of growing visual excitement. From infographics to photojournalism, insightful editorial is increasingly accompanied by informative and visually appealing images. Advertisers are innovating too, finding evermore eye-catching ways of communicating brand and price messages.
Consumers have come to expect appealing visuals, with engaging images going viral on social media and image-based ads taking home industry awards. But a serious message is often best conveyed through text. Specsavers and Aviva have made effective use of text-based ads in recent months.
Using the RAMetrics data, we looked at the impact of three types of ad: ads that are mostly image-based, ads that are mostly text-based and ads that are a mix of both. Given that most ads make use of both, these have the largest representation in the databank. However, separating out the instances that make use of just one give a glimpse at where each format’s strengths may lie.
For both digital and print news brand campaigns, image-based ads outperformed text-based or mixed ads for recall and recognition. Image-based ads or those which mix text and image also have higher recall and brand recognition than text ads.
For both digital and print news brand campaigns, the presence of imagery certainly makes a difference when it comes to ad recall and brand recognition. Purely image-based ads outperform mixed and text-only campaigns, but even print mixed-campaigns outperform text by 11 percentage points in ad recall and by 5 percentage points in brand recognition.
However, the reverse is true for engagement and action, with the direct approach of text ads pushing up performance in both print and digital spaces. The strong performance of text-based ads across almost all engagement and action metrics shows there is scope for well-crafted text ads in the engaging, quality editorial spaces offered by news brands. This is particularly the case with action metrics: text outperforms images by 6 percentage points in both digital and print.
For more detailed breakdowns across all four metrics, check out our deck.
More RAMetrics analysis
Does size matter? Is bigger better? We’ve always known, always had a gut-feeling about the answer to this question – but now we have proof.
In an increasingly digital world, the fate of print advertising is often called into question. Does the rise of the internet mean the death of newspaper ads?
Does size matter? Is bigger better? We’ve always known, always had a gut-feeling about the answer to this question – but now we have proof.
