Have you ever wondered why a certain advert grabbed your attention and why it remained in your memory for such a long time? We are exposed to adverts from a very young age; you can find yourself remembering an advert that was aired 5 or 10 years ago or even an advert from the 90s or 80s.
If you are about to come up with an idea for an advert, you have to think of every angle of the idea and if it will expose you to any backlash. Some adverts are remembered for the controversy they made but you don’t want your advert to be remembered for this, you want it to be remembered for the positive effect it had on the viewer.
When copywriters start to work on an idea for an advert, they consider many factors to include in the copy so the advert succeeds and be remembered.
The Attention Economy
Customer attention is finite and fleeting. It’s always difficult to capture and even harder to keep.
With customer interactions occurring increasingly on the internet, the amount of time that brands have to capture attention in an advertisement is incredibly small. The average ad on Facebook is viewed for only 2.5 seconds by desktop users. On mobile, that number drops to a mere 1.7 seconds.
The most engaged and loyal customers are those who develop an emotional connection with a brand. According to Harvard Business Review, these emotionally connected customers have about twice the value to brands compared to customers who are simply satisfied with their purchase.
The AIDA Marketing Model
The AIDA model is an acronym – it stands for attention, interest, desire and action. It is a model used in marketing that describes the steps a customer goes through in the process of purchasing a product. The AIDA model has been in use since the late 19th century.
There’s a principle in marketing AIDA is a marketing, advertising and sales approach methodology designed to provide insight into the customer’s mind and represent the steps needed to cultivate leads and generate sales.
AIDA stands short for:
- Attention
- Interest
- Desire
- Action
This article will primarily focus on the first ‘A’ of the formula – attention.
1- Visuals and Colors
The first thing that will grab the viewer’s attention in any advert is the visuals and colors. Colors are huge factors because sometimes they have an effect on the psychology; the more the advert has bright colors, the more it will affect the viewer and might even put him in a good mood.
Also the Visuals, people admire visuals that can show huge effort; visuals will leave the viewer impressed and will be one of the reasons that will make the advert memorable.
2- Trending Topics
Using trending topics in an advert can be a plus since it can help deliver the advert’s message easily. If you were to look back at the advert’s you have watched, especially in the past couple of years, you will find that a number of them are inspired by a topic that was viral on social media platforms.
3- Something People Can Relate to
One of the important factors that can grab the attention is building your idea around something the viewer can connect to. In other words, people love to feel that they all go through the same experience, when you put that factor in your advert, it will impress the viewer because you triggered an inner feeling of “We’ve all been there”.
So, including situations that we all experienced or a common feeling towards something, will guarantee you the viewer’s attention.
4- Triggering Emotions
This is one of the most common factors, triggering people’s emotions through your advert’s idea or theme will grab all the attention to the advert, especially if you trigger happy emotions. This is why some adverts depend on the element of nostalgia to remind the viewers with the good old days, and others use the nationalism element to remind people of the greatness of their country.
Other adverts trigger sympathy emotions to serve the purpose of donation to help charities. So, triggering emotions can be a strong factor to include in your advert to make people actually want to watch it.
5- Catchy Jingles
If you were to remember adverts from the 90s or 80s, you will find that most of the ones you remember include jingles; this is why they are stuck in your head. Music is easily remembered, so when you create a catchy tune and include it in an advert, it will stick to people’s minds very quickly.
We bet that if you thought about it for a couple of minutes, you can remember almost 10 adverts with jingles over the past years, even the ones you heard when you were around 5 years old.
These are only some factors that adverts include to grab people’s attention, you will find more than these.
Also, here’s something you can try; try searching for any advert right now to watch and then tell us which of these factors were included.
