Study: Bringing sense of touch to mobile ads raises awareness, recall
The results of a recent A/B trial commissioned by outstream video advertising firm,Teads and developers of touch feedback technology, Immersion Group, suggest that haptic technology is the latest way to boost audience engagement and stand out in a crowded ad market.
Most mobile devices have haptic technology – the term is derived from the Greek ‘haptesthai‘, meaning ‘to touch’. It’s the technology that makes a mobile device provide physical feedback, such as vibrate.
Haptic ads use that technology to physically engage an ad viewer. While watching an ad for an auto brand, haptic feedback could imitate the rumble of a car, or the vibration of a food processor for a kitchen implement ad. More than 75% of participants in the Teads/Immersion-commissioned study agreed that touch made ads more attention-grabbing and more than 70% agreed that touch made ads more interesting.
Furthermore, bringing the sense of touch into play resulted in improved ad awareness (75%) and a 41% uplift in purchase intent.
Another study, this time from IPG Media Lab (in conjunction with Immersion), found that haptic ads led to a 62% increase in feelings of connection with the brand advertised compared to standard video ads.
More users felt that the brand itself was exciting or happy,” says Grace Franz, marketing services manager at Immersion. “This leads researchers to conclude that TouchSense Ads create a halo effect on brand perception, and improve brand favorability – a 50% lift when comparing TouchSense Ads to static ads, and a 68% cost saving in increasing brand favorability, based on cost of standard video ads compared to cost of haptic video ads.”
