Joining us at Spark North, Katie Hartley, product partner, Dentsu Data Labs, introduced results from an extended research programme conducted by Dentsu Aegis Network that used eye-tracking technology to identify attention levels across video platforms.

The work has been carried out on the basis that reach and opportunities to see are in abundance thanks in part to the immense scale of digital but that there is an “uncomfortable truth” that favourability of advertising is comparatively low.

“There’s never been a more pertinent time than now to move beyond the headline reach figure,” said Katie. “Attention is a metric that matters.”

There is potential, she said, for agencies to use a deeper understanding of consumer engagement to move towards planning, trading and reporting on attention, and also filtering attention into the creative process, adding that magazines presented an attractive blend of “attentive reach”.

They found distinct differences between attention types and lengths across the three channels measured, demonstrating that not all impressions are equal.

And crucially, it proved that attention drives outcomes which were a key step for the programme.

Check out all the pictures from Spark here.

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