A recent study by Razorfish and covered in depth by MediaPost revealed that half of Americans would do just about anything but watch an advertisement.
On television, that means changing to a channel that isn’t on commercial break or only watching recorded television so they can fast-forward through commercials at will.
Other countries are not as opposed to advertising as Americans are. That same study also looked at the behavior of Brazilian consumers, of whom, only 49% wanted to buzz through commercials, as opposed to the 50% of Americans who felt the same way.
83% of the Brazilian respondents also said that advertisements help them find items to purchase. Only 58% of UK respondents felt that way about the ads they see. With a relatively high number of consumers preferring no advertisements at all, there has been a surge of premium channels and content carriers that are cutting advertisements.
What’s the best way to get consumers to engage with advertising? According to those surveyed, some sort of value exchange would make marketing more effective.
Essentially, consumers have figured out much their attention is worth and are now looking to be compensated for that attention. Americans, Brits, and Brazilians all think that compensation in the form of loyalty programs, free content, or valuable information and tools should now be the norm in advertising.
The bottom line? The vast majority of consumers have no problem viewing an ad as a sort of gateway to gaining access to free content online.