Using Benchmarks to Cut Through the Christmas Clutter
Cutting Through Christmas Clutter with OOH Benchmarks
Lucy Baumgartner, Senior Effectiveness Executive at Talon shares the need to know on Talon’s OOH Christmas Benchmarks.
Christmas is, for many brands and advertisers, the most important time of the year. Media spend increased +14% between Q3 and Q4 2022, and similar trends are expected this year (Nielsen). With this huge increase in ad spend, the market can feel like a battleground with brands fighting for dwindling consumer attention. This highly cluttered environment produces the issue of Christmas message fatigue amongst consumers, causing campaigns to be lost.
While this time of the year can pose problems for many brands, benchmarking analysis demonstrates that Out of Home (OOH) offers a unique opportunity to cut through this Christmas clutter and stand out from the crowd. Talon benchmarks show that OOH campaigns which run in the lead up to Christmas deliver an uplift of +23% in ad recall, versus +18% for campaigns running across the rest of the year.
But why, in the period when consumers feel most bombarded by advertising, does OOH deliver stronger levels of ad recall? A big part of this is down to OOH’s ability to subtly blend into the surrounding urban environment with 62% agreeing OOH adverts fit into their environment, ensuring brands and messaging are reaching consumers when they are actually receptive to that advertising.
This is closely linked to recent Kantar research which has shown that consumers are enjoying going out more than ever, solidifying the position of outdoor channels as more relevant, useful and entertaining. Talon benchmarks reinforce this notion, highlighting that over 5 in 10 consumers agree OOH Christmas adverts reached them in the right mindset, at the right time and with relevant messaging.
This ability of OOH to be less intrusive whilst still delivering big impacts allows the channel to captivate consumers at a time of the year when they are most difficult to reach – driving brand metrics. Analysis has shown that brands who use OOH during the Christmas period see uplifts of +11% in unprompted awareness (versus +4% across the rest of the year), +9% in the perception of ‘a brand for me’ (versus +5%), +7% in consideration (versus 4%) and crucially during this period +9% in purchase intent (versus +7%). Results also demonstrate OOH is particularly effective at influencing 18-34s, with 62% of this audience feeling positively towards OOH Christmas campaigns (versus norms of 59%).
OOH is a fundamental part of the media mix, captivating audiences, providing cut through and offering brands the chance to overcome those classic Christmas hurdles. OOH enables brands to target consumers during this festive period at the point of purchase, as well as with contextual messaging which drives consumer engagement on average +14%. Through using OOH advertisers can capitalise on the unique context, emotions and activities associated with these special times.
Want to know more about using OOH to cut through the “Christmas Clutter” this year? Get in touch with your Talon representative or alternatively, drop us an email.
