The case for a cumulative attention metric

Cumulative attention is eight times better than frequency at predicting brand outcomes, according to research by Lumen.

The study showed that frequency accounts for just 1% of brand lift effects. Cumulative attention, which is defined by Lumen as ‘the total seconds of genuine viewer engagement accrued across all ad exposures’, accounts for 8%.

Lumen’s research also identifies the thresholds of attention required to affect specific brand outcomes.

For example, it takes an average of 21 seconds of cumulative attention to increase brand awareness. This figure rises to 30 seconds for favourability, 39 seconds for consideration, and 47 seconds for purchase intent.

But brands should be aware that ‘higher frequency without sufficient attention quality is negatively associated with brand outcomes,’ according to Lumen, ‘reducing brand awareness by 4%, favourability by 7%, and consideration by 6% across the duration of a campaign.’

On the other hand, combining TV and digital formats in a single campaign amplifies the effects of cumulative attention. Within the study sample, campaigns that delivered ads through Prime Video and open internet channels were 3.8 times more effective at lifting brand metrics than those — with equal amounts of cumulative attention — that only used open internet channels.

The order in which the ads are delivered also matters. Campaigns that lead with streaming TV ads on Prime Video before activating open-web ads deliver 30% more brand lift on average than those that do it the other way around.

Lumen conducted the research with Amazon Ads and Cint, a research company. The results were based on 270 campaigns delivered through Amazon Ads across the US, UK, Germany, France, Italy and Brazil, as well as brand survey responses from 191,239 people.

Cint collected data on the variety and frequency of ads delivered to each respondent in the brand survey, and Lumen applied average attention scores to the data to estimate the cumulative attention figure.

The research presents an interesting corrective to the primacy of reach as a brand building metric, as well as the understanding of how frequency works. However, there are several caveats worth noting.

First, as a company that sells eye-tracking services, Lumen has a vested interest in findings that emphasise the importance of measuring attention. And even if you take the study results at face value, cumulative attention’s influence on outcomes is still modest, explaining just 8% of the difference in brand lift metrics. By comparison, things like creative execution are far more impactful.

Also, Lumen by necessity had to estimate — rather than observe — how much attention the respondents paid to the campaigns, and the study was also not able to measure the impact of cumulative attention on actual sales.
Nonetheless, the findings about cumulative attention chime with other research done in the same field — by the likes of Professor Karen Nelson-Field — and merit further consideration and, if possible, corroboration.

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