Millward Brown: Knowledge Point

While at an overall level, men and women give similar ratings to ads, they

respond differently to individual ads. Men are more likely to enjoy ads featuring

humor, distinctive creative styles, and sexual imagery, while women are more

likely to enjoy ads featuring children or a slice of life.

Do men and women respond differently to ads?

Overall, ratings are similarAt an overall level, we observe little difference in the way men and women respond to advertising. The following chart looks at key TV Link measures (enjoyment, active involvement, branding, news, credibility, difference, and relevance) for U.S. English ads for which the test sample consisted of both men and women; there is little difference in the scores given by men and women.

Similarly, looking at emotional responses generated by advertising, the overall pattern between the sexes is similar.

These findings are backed up by analysis from our tracking database, which finds no difference between the average Awareness Indexes for men and women. After advertising, increases in TV ad awareness and brand measures are similar among both groups.

Men and women enjoy different thingsHowever, behind these averages, it is clear that there are real differences in the types of ads that are enjoyed by men and women.

We took data from a set of 1200 U.S. ads that were tested among samples including both males and females and examined the ads that were in the top 10 percent for each group on enjoyment. This analysis showed that men are more likely to enjoy humorous ads - particularly those involving spoofs. (However, it is worth stressing that there are also many humorous ads that do perform well among women).

April 2011

0

2

4

6

Men versus Women: No real differences

Enjoyment

(1338) (1329) (456) (447)

Invo lvement

(1332) (1323)

Branding

(1287) (486)

News Cred ib i l i t y

(443) (434)

Di fference

(1285)

Relevance

Female

Male

3.55 3.54

5.035.32

4.01 4.04

2.65 2.64

4.03 4.09

3.58 3.60

3.02 3.04

0

5

10

Comparison of male and female – negative emotions

Repel led

(1277) (1268) (1277) (1268)

Inadequate

(1277) (1268)

Sad

(1277) (1268)

Annoyed

(1277) (1268)

Hat red

(1277) (1268)

Disappointed

(1276) (1267)

Gui l ty

(1276) (1267)

Unimpressed

Female

Male

1.66 1.761.08 0.85 0.63 0.71

3.03 2.94

1.42 1.29 1.42 1.29

7.978.42

8.889.24

0

5

10

15

Comparison of male and female – positive emotions

Att racted

(1277) (1268) (1277) (1268)

Exc i ted

(1277) (1268)

Confident

(1277) (1268)

Contented

(1277) (1268)

Affect ionate

(1277) (1268)

Surpr ised

(1277) (1268)

Proud

(1277) (1268)

Insp i red

Female

Male

11.8

10.3

8.1 8.1

7.26.2

13.3

14.5

9.4

10.5

2.63.1

2.21.6

8.4

10.7

Male Female

Funny 47 28

Light hearted 36 38

No Humor

--------------------

17 34

Spoof/Parody in ad 12 2

Base (ads) (114) (135)

Base

HUMOR

Millward Brown: Knowledge Point

©2011 Millward Brown

2

A Spanish ad that features a humorous scene in a slaughterhouse provides an example of humor that appeals more to men than women. Men better appreciated the intended black humor; it kept their attention. However, the somewhat violent nature of the ad put off the female target, who did not enjoy the ad.

While men enjoy a distinctive creative style, women on the whole are more likely to enjoy ads featuring a slice of life, or children. There was no significant difference in messaging style between the most enjoyed ads for each group.

Male Female

Distinctive creative style 36 22

Slice of life 32 47

Children 9 36

Emotional 41 50

Rational 16 14

Both 37 33

Base (ads) (114) (135)

Response to sexual imageryAds that feature sexual imagery can also elicit distinctly different responses from the two sexes. Some ads are enjoyed by both sexes, but for different reasons. For example, a deodorant ad featured a girl preparing for a date while her boyfriend is coming up in the lift. It was an entertaining ad that performed well overall, but men and women found different parts interesting. Women followed the main elements of the story, while men showed peaks of interest only when the woman appeared in her underwear.

Other ads may actually alienate women. For example, one German ad for a chocolate brand targeted at young adults featured a teacher behaving in an erotic, flirtatious manner in front of her young adult class. Responses to the ad differed substantially by gender. Men enjoyed the woman’s behavior, while women increasingly lost interest as the ad progressed.

VISUAL

MOREINTERESTING

MOREBORING

30 SECS

Scale:Standard

German Chocolate ad

Male(50)

Female(50)

Femalelegs on

high-heelsgoing ina hall

A gradeof school

with youngadults

Womanenters

the roomand startsa lesson

Shetranslates

words Man eatsa piece of

the product

Woman takesas well a pieceand eats it with

indulgence

Product described,

woman only in the background

Woman comesagain to the fore.

She licks off somecrème from her finger

Product shot andslogan

Zoom onto thewoman’s face and

further on the mouth

Productdescription

Base: Total

-10

10

20

30

0

-20

-30

0 54321 10 9876 1514131211 20 19181716 2524232221 29282726

More than twice as many men as women said they would enjoy watching the ad (52 percent versus 24 percent). Over half of the men liked the woman in the ad while only 14 percent of women did. Almost a quarter of the women disliked the ad for being sexist or erotic. Given that women were an equal target for the brand, this represented a major problem.

So while at an overall level there may be no differences in responses to advertising between the sexes, there are clearly differences in response to individual ads.

AUDIO

VISUAL

MOREINTERESTING

MOREBORING

21.5 SECS

Scale:Standard

Romanticscenery

Product usage

Product demo

Cut & Change of scene:in the slaughtery

Packshot &Slogan

The ad fails to engage women

MaleFemale

Knowledge Points are drawn from the MillwardBrown Knowledge Bank, consisting of our databasesof 132,000 brand reports and 70,000 ads, as wellas 1,400 case studies, 900 conference papers andmagazine articles, and 350 learnings documents.

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