Why attention is advertising’s most valuable currency

For advertisers, getting someone to notice an ad is becoming harder.

Consumers move quickly between social media posts, videos, messages and advertisements. The challenge for brands is no longer only reaching a large audience – they need people to stop, pay attention and remember what they have seen.

Research from Amplified found 85 per cent of digital advertisements received less than 2.5 seconds of active attention – the amount of time needed for memory to start to form.

thebox Director Scott Robinson said the problem was linked to the amount of content people now consumed.

“The world is just faster now and there’s so much more content,” he said.

Social media content creator Aria Savage-Helenbright said attention had become like a currency which companies were fighting for, with social media having increased the pressure to capture attention quickly.

“If you can’t capture the attention, you can’t persuade people, you can’t get leads and you can’t drive sales,” she said.

According to Mr Robinson, the first few seconds of an advertisement matter more on platforms such as Meta and YouTube, where users have control over what they watch.

Ms Savage-Helenbright said she estimated that the opening seconds of a video accounted for about half of viewers’ decisions to keep watching, meaning content needed to show relevance and create curiosity.

The attention economy is also changing how advertisers measure success. Views and clicks do not mean much if they fail to produce enquiries or sales.

However, attention alone does not guarantee an effective campaign – brands need to give people a reason to remember them after initial attention disappears.

“There’s a risk that businesses become so focused on getting attention that they lose sight of the actual message or brand,” Mr Robinson said, adding that strong branding and storytelling remain important.

The scroll may only stop for a few seconds, but the strongest brands make those seconds stick.

Author bio: Ellie Palmer is a Bachelor of Journalism and Broadcast Media student at Edith Cowan University with a passion for TV journalism and live broadcasting. She enjoys telling engaging stories, speaking with people and bringing important issues to life.