Mark Ritson: We know what distinctive marketing looks like. Now let's agree what to call it

"Earlier this year, Andrew Tindall shared remarkable data with me. He'd linked System1's creative library with the Effies database to produce the mother of all effectiveness datasets. When you have creative effectiveness inputs and business outputs for thousands of campaigns, you can draw very interesting conclusions about what delivers results."

"That last factor surprises many marketers. After all, isn't the brand behind the ad bleeding obvious? But clients and agencies lack market orientation. They forget the mismatch between how ads are made - with focus, attention to detail, over many months - and how they're consumed by audiences over a few seconds, paying little attention, and already deluged with ads from every other direction. And the divergence matters. Most studies conclude that less than half the ads audiences see can be attributed to the correct brand after the ad ends. An astonishing failure rate."

"The fix is relatively simple. You need to repeatedly brand your ad so consumers know that it's you. Tindall's data is fantastically clear. The magic number is seven. On average, if you brand your ad with recognizable references seven times during a thirty-second spot, brand recall rises to 100%."

A linked dataset of creative inputs and business outcomes shows that advertising succeeds most when it evokes emotion, runs for years, and is explicitly and repeatedly branded. Audiences often consume ads with little attention and in just seconds, creating a mismatch with how ads are produced over months. Most studies find fewer than half of ads are correctly attributed after viewing, a major failure in brand recognition. A practical remedy is to include clear brand references repeatedly; data indicates roughly seven recognizable brand cues in a thirty-second spot drives near-total recall. Multiple names for the same concept create unnecessary confusion.

Read at The Drum