Paying (for) Attention: Using Eye Tracking at Scale to Put a Price on Visual Attention

Summary

Attention to advertising has an impact on ROI. Lumen measures what people actually see vs. what they say they see across a wide range of media. Opinion is not the same as actual engagement. Use eye-tracking to see how people actually interact with ads and what they do as a result of those ads.

This presentation focused on desktop display ads and their impact. This study utilized panel research to monitor passive attention tracking for desktop display ads. Passive attention tracking monitors what people actually see. Lumen then developed models based on this data.

There is an enormous difference between opportunity to see ad and actual seeing it. Just because it is viewable, does not mean it will be seen; e.g., 76% of ads that could be seen, get ignored. The average engagement with viewable ads is 22%. Not everyone looks at everything, just because they can.