Interesting Results

Repeating and Fast-Forwarding Advertisements

Many people record television programmes, and then fast forward through the advertisements when they watch the programmes. A 2003 study¹ investigated how this, and seeing the same ad a second time, influence viewers’ ability to recognise ads they’ve seen before and recall the content of the ads. The results showed that the ability to recall advertising content and recognise previously viewed ads diminishes when ads are viewed fast-forwarded rather than at normal speed; however, the rate of recognition does not diminish as significantly as the rate of recall does. One of the objectives of the study was to see whether repeating the ad would compensate for this. The results showed that repetition did improve ad recall, but not ad recognition. They also showed that viewing an ad twice while fast-forwarding does not produce as strong recall as watching it once at normal speed.

¹ Martin, Brett, Vicky Thuy-Uyen Le Nguyen, and Ji-Yeon Wi (2003), “Remote Control Marketing: How Ad Fast-Forwarding and Ad Repetition Affect Consumers”, Marketing Intelligence & Planning, 20(1), 44-48.