• Brandweek, Monday, October 29, 2007 12 PM

Advertisements that tell a branding story work better than ads that focus on product positioning, according to an intensive three-year study conducted by Advertising Research Foundation and American Association of Advertising Agencies.

The report contends that, in many ways, advertising is stuck in the 20th century, which was dominated by a one-way transactional focus. Today, consumers interact with ads to "co-create" meaning that is powered by emotion and rich narrative.

For the study--titled "On the Road to a New Effectiveness Model"--33 ads across 12 categories from brands like Budweiser, Campbell's Soup and MasterCard were analyzed by 14 leading emotion and physiological research firms. The research tools varied from testing heart rate and skin conductance of the viewers to brain diagnostics.

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