How does roadside out-of-home earn attention? We're about to find out.

Out-of-home is 100% viewable and 100% human in its reach. What hasn't been properly understood in this market is how the channel earns attention at the moment it reaches people. This study sets out to change that.

It will be the first New Zealand-based body of research into how in-vehicle audiences here behave, and therefore how roadside out-of-home earns their attention. It will also explore how that attention connects to short-term advertising strength.

Why attention, and why now

Too often, out-of-home is bought and judged on metrics that don't reflect what the channel is actually worth.

"We want to produce a piece of work to help guide brands and buyers away from metrics that don't reflect what the channel is actually worth. CPM tells you what a placement costs, not how it performs. This work is about demonstrating what actually earns attention in our channel, and what brands stand to gain when they use out-of-home well." — Jack Plowright, GM of Platforms and Partnerships, LUMO

For OMD NZ, the study extends a multi-year investment in attention as a core planning and measurement discipline, taking work the agency has already done across video, social and digital into out-of-home for the first time.

"OMD's focus on attention as a core planning and measurement discipline has already transformed how we approach video, social, and digital and now we're extending that rigorous methodology into out-of-home for the first time. New Zealand will benefit from locally grounded research which is needed to unlock out-of-home's true attention potential." — Rachel Stewart, Managing Director, OMD New Zealand

Who's running the research

Founded in 2017, Amplified is led by globally recognised media researcher Professor Karen Nelson-Field. The company works with media owners, agencies and advertisers internationally on attention measurement across video, social, digital and out-of-home.

The study is made possible by OMD NZ clients 2degrees, AA Insurance and McDonald's. As Rachel Stewart puts it, "Their support is helping build a body of research the wider market will benefit from."

How the study works

The fieldwork is designed to mirror a real journey as closely as possible:

• Participants drive safely along a curated route, without knowing the study's specifics.
• They wear eye-tracking glasses throughout.
• Inward-facing cameras record their eye movements, while an outward-facing camera maps that gaze onto the street.
• This lets attention be attributed to what drivers actually look at during the journey.

While the findings will be grounded in ad effectiveness, the insights into how driver attention interacts with roadside environments may also be relevant to future sector work on attention in road safety contexts.

Putting motion to the test

This will also be the first study to unpack how motion-enabled digital out-of-home affects attention thresholds, testing static, Subtle motion and 3D motion side by side.

LUMO was the first operator granted Subtle motion capability on New Zealand roadside out-of-home. Including it in the study will help show whether motion-enabled creative earns proportionately more attention than static formats, and whether that converts into stronger outcomes for the advertisers using it.

"Testing Subtle and 3D motion, and their impact on attention thresholds, is something we've not unpacked before. We'll be able to show not just whether out-of-home works, but how creative choices make it work harder." — Professor Karen Nelson-Field, CEO and Founder, Amplified

What happens next

Initial results are expected in the coming months, shared first with OMD NZ clients before a wider market release.

The findings will be set against Amplified's New Zealand benchmarks for cinema, television, social and digital display, giving out-of-home a comparable position in cross-channel planning conversations. In Rachel Stewart's words, it's a chance to set "the benchmark for how agencies and brands can confidently orchestrate attention across all touchpoints."

We'll share what we learn here as soon as we can.

Want to know more?

If you'd like to talk about attention, measurement or what motion-enabled creative could do for your brand, get in touch with the LUMO team. Contact us

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