Advances in technology are helping brands and agencies take the guesswork out of advertising, but what better way to hone those creative instincts than to predict ad effectiveness ourselves? To put these skills to the test (and in the absence of many new compelling game show formats), VideoWeek teamed up with System1, an ad effectiveness platform for predicting the commercial impact of ads, and asked three senior creatives from UK agencies to predict the scores the platform gave to five different TV ads.
System1 uses three key metrics to forecast creative effectiveness. The Star rating (1.0 to 5+) predicts long-term brand growth based on an ad’s creative quality, and is calculated by measuring viewers’ emotional response. The Spike rating (1.0 to 1.33+) predicts short-term sales effect over the 8-10 weeks post-airing, derived from the strength of branding and the intensity of emotional response. And finally the Fluency score (0 to 100, with anything below 72 considered low) measures the strength of branding in the ad, based on the accuracy and speed of brand recognition.
Our contestants are Mark Beaumont, Founder and Chief Creative Officer at Dinosaur; Ben Stump, Executive Creative Director at isobel; and Adam Hoskin, Senior Creative at Walker Agency. Time for the first ad – let’s play The Spike is Right! (Title subject to change if any TV commissioners are reading this).
Yorkshire Tea – Where Everything’s Done Proper (Lucky Generals)
Mark Beaumont said:
“System1 have proven that when ads deliver happiness and surprise, then you’re probably in the better area, unless it specifically needs to be something that is heartbreaking, for example. So I’m going to say it has solid long-term growth potential, and strong short-term sales effect.”
Star: 4.0
Spike: 1.25
Fluency: 91
Ben Stump said:
“I’ve always liked that campaign. The branding is straight out front, so I know the Fluency is going to be good. And then you’ve got good writing, good jokes and a famous actor as well, so I would imagine the Spike is pretty good too.”
Star: 4.6
Spike: 1.42
Fluency: 90
Adam Hoskin said:
“Fluency is going to be through the roof on that one; you’ve got the branding on multiple mugs, you’ve got him drinking from a mug at the end, you’ve got it right on the front of the table. And for the Spike rating, he does shout at one point, “Do it for Yorkshire!” It could get a lot of people switching brands.”
Star: 3.0
Spike: 1.15
Fluency: 95+
System1 said:
“Celebrity appearances work best when stars play to their strengths and have an opportunity to really perform. Yorskhire Tea land a ‘Strong’ 4.6 Stars and ‘Exceptional’ Spike rating by driving lots of positive, intense emotions among viewers and leaning into humour and consistency.”
Star: 4.6
Spike: 1.55
Fluency: 98
Aldi – I Like Gin (McCann)
Mark Beaumont:
“I remember this was talked about endlessly at the time. Maybe we were going through quite a safe period, so I think the old lady drinking gin was really unexpected, whether it was quite cheeky for its time or because the category of supermarkets would never usually do something like that. So I think the Spike will be really high because it’s got that intense emotional response at the end.”
Star: 4.0
Spike: 1.33+
Fluency: 83
Ben Stump:
“The brand fluency is probably not amazing, because you’ve got other brands competing in there. The Spike rating is tricky, because I feel like you get a really high spike when she says “I like gin” at the end, but I think the start wouldn’t be as high.”
Star: 4.2
Spike: 1.30
Fluency: 80
Adam Hoskin:
“It didn’t have me until the end! I think it will have a strong Spike rating because it has a bit of humour at the end, but the Fluency might be slightly lower because of the mix of brands.”
Star: 4.0
Spike: 1.30
Fluency: 90
System1:
“‘I like Gin’, which originally aired in 2011, is a great example of creative wear in, with audiences nearly a decade later still enjoying the humorous advert in System1’s 2020 re-testing. Not every ad can land the element of surprise, but by revealing that the grandma actually loves gin, rather than tea, Aldi subvert expectations. This delights viewers, resulting in intense, positive emotions that support both long-term brand building and short-term effects.”
Star: 5.4
Spike: 1.45
Fluency: 88
McDonald’s – Order Like Stormzy (Leo Burnett)
Mark Beaumont:
“It’s a big piece, it’s a big brand, it’s a big personality, it’s got lots of things to enjoy. They show the products, there’s a driving track and it has Stormzy in the middle of it. My guess would be exceptional across all three metrics.”
Star: 5.0
Spike: 1.33+
Fluency: 95
Ben Stump:
“The Fluency has got to be really high on that, you see McDonald’s all the way through. I mean you can’t mistake it! You’ve got Stormzy, Alison Steadman and gags all the way through it that take you to a place that you didn’t expect.”
Star: 5.2
Spike: 1.55
Fluency: 98
Adam Hoskin:
“For the Spike, I think you probably get a lot of people wanting to try that meal with the endorsement of the big name celebrity. It’s a tough one though because Stormzy at the time had made a potentially controversial post on his Instagram, which also created a lot of negativity.”
Star: 4.8
Spike: 1.45
Fluency: 98
System1:
“The Famous Orders concept is a perfect example of the multiplier effect in action. It’s a short-term, social media-oriented, buzzy idea but one that would be impossible to execute if McDonald’s wasn’t such a strong brand already. It’s only when a brand is so deeply rooted and familiar that the concept of celebrities having favourite meals starts to make any sense.”
Star: 2.8
Spike: 1.56
Fluency: 97
IRN-BRU – Nessie Nectar (Leith)
Mark Beaumont:
“I’m thinking this one will have got a mixed response, because it brings in levels of weirdness, which can work brilliantly, but I think it’s driving towards disgust. And it does go on for a long time, so I think the Star rating will be low. The Spike rating might be higher because it stands out, it’s not run of the mill. That emotional response is intense, but is it the response that we really look for?”
Star: 2.0
Spike: 1.18
Fluency: 94
Ben Stump:
“It’s a fun one but I think it could polarise, which isn’t a bad thing because it probably does well in their core market. But I find it’s quite complicated and meanders a bit. It’s not that clear on what it’s trying to communicate or tell me.”
Star: 2.9
Spike: 1.30
Fluency: 75
Adam Hoskin:
“I probably like that one the most out of all of them personally. I think it was going for sensationalism and it fits with IRN-BRU because it’s seen as more of a silly brand.”
Star: 3.5
Spike: 1.20
Fluency: 94
System1:
“While a lot of brands couldn’t risk making their audience feel a strong negative emotion, IRN-BRU has won permission to push the envelope further and get away with it. The result is an ad which actually performs well on the long-term Star rating metric, but look at the Spike rating, our predictor of short-term sales, and you see the ad’s real value.”
Star: 3.4
Spike: 1.46
Fluency: 89
LYNX – Lower Body Spray (LOLA MullenLowe)
Mark Beaumont:
“LYNX have a long-standing reputation for pushing the envelope a bit. They’ve had to move on from the sort of styles that they used to do a decade ago through the shifting patterns of what’s acceptable and what’s not. So I think they’ve found a new way in there.”
Star: 4.0
Spike: 1.32
Fluency: 94
Ben Stump:
“My kids have seen this quite a few times on TV and they think it’s hilarious. But I think the Star rating is tricky because some people might find it a bit odd or horrible.”
Star: 3.7
Spike: 1.39
Fluency: 89
Adam Hoskin:
“Star rating is an interesting one, because I think a lot of people might be grossed out about it. I think LYNX is one of those brands that usually pushes the envelope a bit. And then Fluency will be high because you have the product all the way through.”
Star: 4.5
Spike: 1.5
Fluency: 95
System1:
“If you look at this ad purely through the lens of positive emotion it looks like LYNX is making a mistake here; the ad scores only 2 Stars for long-term effect and its Disgust score is way over the norm. But it also gets Exceptional ratings for brand Fluency and for short-term Spike rating, our predictor of sales impact. This is an ad designed to grab attention, get people to notice or remember a brand and generate a sales boost, and it does exactly that.”
Star: 2.0
Spike: 1.37
Fluency: 97
Final thoughts
Mark Beaumont:
“Interestingly the hardest one for me to get has been the Star rating each time. I felt the IRN-BRU one was a long way away from me feeling like I wanted a refreshing beverage from IRN-BRU after that! Whereas the LYNX one I didn’t find that disgusting, I liked its edginess. The safe territory is to make everybody really happy and try to surprise and delight them; you’re taking a risk when you go into those other territories.”
Ben Stump:
“I found the McDonald’s ad’s lower Star rating interesting because it is quite slow and quite laboured; if I wasn’t looking at this properly I don’t think I’d bother sticking with it. That’s interesting because the pace of something like that is worth bearing in mind.”
Adam Hoskin:
“I’m going to get everyone else to have a go to see if I’m as terrible as I fear! I don’t think I did a terrible job, but I think it’s also taught me to not overthink as much, because I was trying to second guess some of them – when actually if a guy is pretending to tug on the Loch Ness Monster’s udders, it’s going to do pretty well on a Spike rating!”
System1:
“As marketers, we’re naturally biased when it comes to creativity. Work we love doesn’t always land with real consumers, while ads that bore us can genuinely resonate with our audience, which is why exercises like this are so valuable. They push us to step outside our own preferences and try to see creativity through the customer’s eyes.”
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