Dr Nelson-Field is a media science researcher who has revolutionised global media measurement. As an advisor to global brands, she is a sought-after speaker and author of bestsellers, Viral Marketing: The Science of Sharing, The Attention Economy: How Media Works and The Attention Economy: A Category Blueprint. Her work has been featured in publications including Bloomberg Business, CNBC, Forbes and The Wall Street Journal, says the group.

Robert Grace, Co-Founder and Chief Strategy Officer of The Up&Up Group, says the partnership is aimed at pursuing clarity for clients when it comes to the money they spend. "Across The Up&Up Group, our strategic focus is one of driving absolute clarity in the solutions we deliver, and this partnership with Dr Nelson-Field sets to bring about clarity to one of the opaquer areas of marketing spend: digital advertising. While platforms can deliver reams of digital metrics, it falls significantly short on human metrics."

Martin MacGregor, CEO of The Up&Up Group's media business, Connect, says that attention metrics are a much-needed part of the media solution that advertisers look for. "This important partnership both follows on the work Amplified has done globally and aligns with the questions advertisers are asking. This survey is set to bring much-needed disruption to the digital media landscape by giving advertisers the first ever attention benchmarks for our market."

Commenting on the vital importance of human metrics, Dr Nelson-Field says, "At its most fundamental, if your campaigns aren't gaining attention, no impact can be gained either. Our work across markets and billions of human data points show that on average, between 70-80% of an advertisement has had no active attention paid to it at all."

The attention survey, which will be produced because of the partnership, will be collecting human data that analyses three levels of attention: inactive, passive and active, as well as people's emotional response to campaigns. "This not only gives the advertisers an understanding of what has been seen versus served (impressions), but also the drivers of attention at both a platform and creative level," says Nelson-Field.

The data from the South Africa survey will form part of Amplified's attention dataset, the largest in the world with data collected from over 1.35-million humans, across more than 59-billion human data points which has enabled the optimisation of over USD$1.3-billion in ad spend, adds the group.

With this first-ever benchmark study in place, advertisers can implement both immediate and longer-term strategies to achieve greater levels of attention, says Grace. The study is being done in collaboration with Standard Bank, MTN, Woolworths and Spur Corporation. The study is currently in-market, with the findings to be released at the end of August, concludes the group.

For more information, visit www.theupandupgroup.com. You can also follow The Up&Up Group on LinkedIn.

*Image courtesy of contributor