You have a great ad with an amazing creative concept, shiny visuals and attention grabbing voice-over. Somehow, viewers still do not get your main message, they do not pay attention to your packshot and forget your story right after the next (creative and shiny) ad. Due to the strong competition, engaging your audience until the end is a must. And the best way to do it is supporting understanding. This is the way to be outstanding and memorable. 

The stronger the story turns your audience on, the bigger chance that they will pay attention to the most important, branded part of the ad - the packshot. 

But why do people lose interest?

Many potential mistakes come up when it comes to talk about “involving ads”. Small things like a frustrating storyline, a confusing visual, rapid flow or fast cuts can all lead to confusion, and the more hard-to-understand a story is, the more difficult it is to transfer that intended AHA moment. Due to the millions of stimulus people have to process on an average day, putting energy to understand an ad is luxury - most of the viewers give it up quickly, especially when a story lacks a key insight.

Harmonized visuals and voice-over - the key

But there is a way to support your audience’s understanding: simply try to be simple. How can you do that? Harmonize your visuals with your voice-over. Watching a flow of visuals while processing a different voice-over is overloading for the brain, it eventually results in discomfort or misunderstanding. When you use distant associations, different messages and storyline on the screen while trying to transfer other messages with your voice-over, it will only drop interest.  Consistency between the shown visual and the narration can turn your audience’s engagement with 180 degrees. 

Let’s see, how

Being consistent does not mean you have to create your ad in a dull way lacking creativity. The important thing is to harmonize your story with the narration, thus to make it less confusing. Especially when it comes to branding - your offer will be more memorable and easily processable if you support the shown information, tags, logos and used animation verbally. Just like that: when you show your brand, mention it. When a “now it is free” tag swims to the screen, say it. When you animate your price, support it. Time shifted appearance would only cause confusion. 

Yes, the solution is this easy: let your target group sit back and enjoy your ad without using too much effort to understand what is happening.

Written by Petra Varhelyi