Survival of the Fittest Impressions

Octopus logo next to competing OOH companies

How to capture consumer attention in a rapidly evolving environment.

By Brad Sayler, April 30, 2019

An epidemic is underway. It is killing 99.5% of advertisements. It’s happening on mobile. It continues on desktops. The root cause – competition, evolution of content, and natural selection of consumer attention.

Without engagement, an ad dies a quick death. Yes, it may achieve brand awareness, but viewer engagement provides it with a much longer, meaningful life. While marketing spend has risen in recent years, engagement has decreased. Advertisers have become complacent with click-through rates in the thousandths. Most LinkedIn ads see 3 clicks per 1,000 impressions, Facebook ads see 9 clicks per 1,000 impressions and the saving grace for many brands has been the 10 clicks per 1,000 impressions on Instagram.

The ever-growing competition for consumer attention has brought on this alarming trend. It’s a survival of the fittest content. Colorful videos of influencers’ exotic vacations act like a great white shark and consume clicks in quick, powerful bites. Text messages and emails flood the waters like schools of jellyfish. Click-bait media’s sole purpose is to lure, distract and feed content-hungry consumers. It’s no surprise that digital advertising has had trouble keeping up.

Sure, sophisticated marketers will gravitate toward native, run continuous A/B tests or buy millions of impressions at the right time, to the right (oversaturated) consumer. But in the booming digital ecosystem, all these efforts pale in comparison to the ever-evolving content generated and shared by billions of friends, influencers and new media companies.

So how does an advertiser rise to the top of the food chain in a fiercely competitive environment? They change the environment. They leave the feeding frenzy and head for the open seas.

Savvy advertisers are shifting budgets from the mobile craze to new screens altogether. Octopus is an interactive video screen platform in rideshare vehicles. Our reactive video ads are seeing a nearly 3% click-through rate on average. That’s right, 30 clicks per 1,000 impressions on video ads, a success level typically reserved for paid SEO. Rather than standing face-to-face with the competition, Octopus catches consumers in an entirely new environment where they can freely enjoy content and interact with brands. No enticing vacation pictures, no blinking notifications, and most importantly, users have no predetermined agenda other than to have fun and explore.

CTR performance rate chart show Octopus has 2.6% CTR compared to 0.9% on Facebook

Octopus embodies a trend in video advertising which is newly possible with smart, connected screens that attract a captive, public audience. Placed within easy reach, the ad impressions thrive. In between games and original Octopus content, non-skippable ads enjoy unrivaled engagement: clicks for more info, entries for special offers, answers to surveys and more– all welcomed by consumers when pulled out of their natural habitat.

For more information on how Octopus can help your brand survive and thrive, please visit www.playoctopus.com/advertisers.