Measuring the Emotional Impact of Branded Storytelling

The biggest challenge facing marketers these days is not getting their message out – it’s being heard at all.

At a time when the average time spent on digital content is 8 seconds, capturing the scarcest commodity – human attention – is getting harder and harder. But with the number of connected devices now far exceeding the number of people on the planet, just how do brands get heard above the din of an increasingly noisy and fragmented media landscape?

Choosing how to communicate what they are trying to say plays a huge role in breaking through. But what kind of content moves the needle on key brand KPIs like favorability and purchase intent and does branded content foster a deeper emotional response with audiences than traditional ads?

Branded Content vs Traditional Ads

Turner Ignite partnered with Realeyes to analyze the video-content marketing methods that are the most impactful, particularly comparing Turner branded content video solutions with more traditional 30-second video ad formats.

For the purposes of this paper, branded content is defined as professionally produced video that often includes recognizable talent and is designed to be invitational, not interruptive – that is, to present stories that people want to seek out and share.

Branded content can be further divided into two groups: custom content that deeply integrates the brand into the story or sponsored edit, which introduces the brand as the presenting sponsor of the video.

For this study, Realeyes examined the second-by-second emotional responses of 4,824 individuals watching branded content videos produced by Turner, and 4,202 watching traditional 30-second ads. Each respondent viewed one video. All data was captured within the respondent’s home via a webcam on their mobile or desktop.

• To what extent do branded content videos generate strong emotional reactions among viewers?
• How do these reactions compare to those that emerge from viewership of traditional advertising?
• How do these reactions translate into rational concerns like brand favorability and purchase intent?
• What can be learned from the research regarding creative execution that might offer guidance to bolster the power of future branded content efforts?

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