Creative challenges and opportunities in a mobile first world

Sponsor content

Video and high impact display creatives can help brands to capture attention and drive brand awareness, as well as conversions. But in order for your ads to be most effective on mobile, they need to be optimised for that environment. Taking simple steps can take an advert from noise on a web page to thumb-stopping content in just a few seconds. By Amy China Wire, Head of Teads Studio UK

There are no immutable laws governing advertising. Broad sweeping statements don’t help anyone. What we do at Teads is create guidelines to help with individual strategies.

In my opinion it’s far too reductive to call out “wrong” behaviour as if marketing should always follow a simple set of norms. All advice should be given against the backdrop of what the brand is trying to achieve and how they are going about it.

But what we can say is that good creative works. Nielsen Catalina showed that creative is still the most important element across all media. In fact, 50% of sales uplift is being driven by creative across the board – and that rises to 60% when looking at digital only.

This isn’t itself surprising. Therefore, it makes sense that brands invest time and money in creating memorable, standout campaigns. But grabbing the attention of the user, especially online, is a battle we’ve all been fighting for a while now.

P&G’s own research showed that the average view time for a social newsfeed ad is just 1.7 seconds. Each of us scroll through the equivalent of the height of the Empire State Building each day. So what are two of the key problems we encounter from a creative perspective?

Firstly, 85% of videos running on a small, vertical device are created for an extra-large panoramic screen. And secondly, Safari and Chrome block videos that autoplay with sound – so that fact, combined with intuitive consumer behavior, means we know that most mobile video is viewed with the sound off.

As I said at the start though, these aren’t errors called out in order to chastise our industry. Rather, they are considerations to be aware of and countered for when planning for the online world. Indeed, there are simple tweaks to address both these issues, and they can make the world of difference to a digital campaign’s success.

Firstly, seeing a brand’s imagery can create an immediate connection and reference to your brand even as someone scrolls past. Adding static branding – a ‘skin’ – can increase brand awareness by up to 150% versus not framing the content, even with the sound off.

Secondly, if you assume people have their sound off, then there is a simple work around. Captions. We tested 240 ads on the Teads platform and found that, when captioned, the sound off versions performed just as when the sound was on.

Quick note, we aren’t recommending full subtitles, but rather thoughtful captions. Captions, done elegantly, can deliver a key message from the campaign much better than subtitles which run the risk of distracting from the video themselves.

So those are some simple tools for video, but what about display?

Often considered the least desirable form of online content, much display creative is basically thinly veiled desperation begging for clicks and sales, rather than presenting any level of entertainment or building any real brand engagement.

It doesn’t have to be that way.

Users have now had nearly 15 years experience using touchscreen devices to swipe, scroll and tap. It’s part of the joy of using a smartphone, so why don’t more ads tap (pardon the pun) into that intrinsic behaviour as well?

By leveraging the tactile nature of the device you can suddenly elevate display from ‘something users lean away from’, to ‘something they want to lean into.’ If display becomes something users can actually enjoy playing with, then you’re building a real value exchange. People are getting something fun from your brand and are therefore willing to give you their time in return.

And for those of you saying, “But we don’t have time nor budget to craft such nuanced or different assets.” I would say, “Then find a partner to support you.” For example, Teads Studio is a team of creative strategists and designers who can take anything – from print to OOH assets – and recraft them so that they are purpose-built for mobile.

There is no doubt that we are in a wonderful age of content creation. And that doesn’t seem to be changing anytime soon. But, if content is king, then mobile optimisation is right alongside. Indeed, you might say, mobile optimisation is queen.