How To... Pack A Digital Emotional Punch

We've all seen them. Those ads that stop you in your tracks because they invoke such a strong emotional response. Maybe they directly refer to something that feels very relevant to you, or the feeling they prompt is something that chimes with other things happening in your life. 

Either way, these are the ads that stick in our minds and change the way we behave. As media professionals, these are the pieces of marketing communication we spend our careers trying to create. 

Psychologists have identified seven basic human feelings that are recognised by all people, regardless of culture – sadness, anger, contempt, disgust, happiness, fear and surprise. These lie at the heart of all our thoughts and behaviour. Economics expert Daniel Kahneman has demonstrated that 95% of consumer decisions are rooted in these primary emotions – it's not a great leap to imagine that these are also the feelings that powerful pieces of marketing communication will be tapping into. 

I'm interested in the part that media plays in this process. I'm willing to bet that if you are currently thinking of an ad that has elicited this strong emotional response in you, it's something you saw on TV. Cinema, with the immersive physicality of the way it is experienced, can also be very arresting. Size and contextual relevance can bring a similar effect to a poster. 

But what about digital? This is a medium that has spent too long regarded as creative’s poor relation. Marketers know that digital can deliver fantastic scale for campaigns; however, I believe that many are missing a trick by underestimating digital’s potential to host ads with great emotional appeal as well. 

Part of this potential can be attributed to the ubiquity of reach of today's digital campaigns. Brits love their devices. Research last year by Adobe found that we own on average 6.3, and use three of them each day, often simultaneously. Planned with precision, we can target consumers on different devices at different points of the day, with a wide variety of formats from videos to GIFs. This gives us the ability to plan a campaign that employs a multitude of different creative executions that, for example, match what the consumer might be doing at that point or where he or she is located. Relevance is a significant element of the armoury in devising creative that drives powerful emotional responses.

As such, it's important that we devise our creative in parallel with a media plan that considers how best to use the unique opportunities of digital. Online ads have historically been a bit of an after-thought, with spots derived from the TV ads seen as the campaign's heart. But if we think about creating work that specifically takes advantage of the way that digital ads are experienced, we have the chance to allow the medium to play to its own strengths. 

The 360° ad format is a great example of this potential. It allows viewers to explore an entire scene either by dragging the camera angle or moving their phone to change perspective. Depending on the context, this format can prompt authentic emotional responses from an audience. 

We worked with Emirates on a digital 360° ad, which invited viewers to explore the interior of one of its airliners. By tracking audience reactions, we found that those exploring the scene were far more emotionally active than during more static ads. Happiness and surprise were the most common responses, seeing the plane’s features in real-time and spotting things they hadn’t expected. Being in control of the experience, deciding what they want to see in what order, dramatically increased their engagement with the ad. 

The interactive element of digital advertising has many avenues we can explore. Accelerometers in smartphones for instance, when used creatively, are great for inspiring primal emotional responses. We helped The X-Files promote a new show by crafting a mobile-optimised magic-8 ball. Users shook their phones to see the ball rotate and offer new and exciting messages. Depending on the message, their emotional responses ranged from surprise and happiness to fear – all while engaging directly with The X-Files’ brand. The creative possibilities of this format, as Fox Mulder might have said, are literally endless. 

The creative challenge with digital does require a shift in thinking though. Much of the potential for the emotional punch that we are looking for relies on either the technological elements of the format (i.e. the X Files and Emirates ads), or the context of where/when the slots will be seen by users, combined with strong creative and design. So it means that creative teams need to be working closer than ever with their media colleagues to devise work that taps into these elements.

But the rewards of arranging these integrate teams are potentially great. Look out for a new wave of emotionally-arresting ads, coming soon to a phone near you.