Yep, you read that right.
TMW Business client, IAB UK, has received a nomination for ‘Best Custom Media Research Project – Trade Body’ at the Mediatel Media Research Awards.
As the industry body for digital advertising, IAB UK keeps a finger on the pulse of the latest trends, brings audiences within the industry together, and provides guidance on how to practice and succeed in all things digital.
The background
Conducted in partnership with our sister research and human understanding agency, Walnut Unlimited, this project sought to understand if ‘Digital’ truly had the hearts and minds of the industry.
Digital has seen huge market growth in the last two decades, but there’s an underlying narrative that it cannot deliver the fame, creativity or long-term results that other forms of media are known for. Instead, it has been billed as a functional, direct response channel, fueled by short-term thinking.
The research
Leading the way on the research front, Walnut Unlimited put the hypothesis to work and conducted discourse analysis to understand the language marketers were using in relation to digital. Through a mix of qualitative interviews with leading marketers and semiotic analysis, the key emotional drivers that underpin their relationship with digital were identified and unraveled.
But then we went deeper.
We needed to understand how marketers subconsciously felt about digital.
How could we be sure that what they were saying was how they actually felt?
Reaction time testing. That’s how.
Marketers were given an extensive series of statements, all positioned around “I would love digital more if” and these were intended to address both functional and emotional areas of the subject matter.
The marketers’ responses were analyzed, alongside how long it took them to answer. The length of response indicated how convinced the marketers were of their answers – providing a truer indication of how they actually felt.
The end result? An insight-driven understanding of what marketers really think about digital – helping to inform the way the IAB UK speaks to the industry.
The shortlist
With the awards taking place on the 2nd March 2023, stay tuned to find out how we get on.
Interested to know more about the nominees and event? You can do so here