Cute stories and a charismatic personality can go a long way towards making a sale; people like to feel good about their purchases. At the same time, solid facts are pretty convincing, and Google and WPP intend to collect more of these concerning the power of online ads.
With $4.6 million behind it, a three-year program sponsored by the two powerhouses will look at “how ads in traditional and digital media work together to influence consumer choices,” according to Emily Steel. Huge corporations like Ford and Unilever will supply some of the data that’ll be studied.
Steel continued, “Several of the studies will try to determine the best ways to allocate ad spending between traditional and digital media, as well as how online ads affect a company’s sales and brand image. Another will use psychology and neuroscience to analyze how the brain determines whether Web ads are relevant. Still another will examine how Chinese Internet users respond to different online-ad formats, such as display and search ads.”
Google and WPP seem to be hoping that the research will prove online advertising’s value and convince businesses to spend a little more on it. Another goal is likely to involve making the advertising more effective, since this is a lot of effort to put into the creation of just a few static charts and graphs.
Google and WPP should soon start accepting proposals for a round of research funding if you feel like investigating any of these issues for them.
