In its new media trial – Skipping Around The World – it found differences between countries in the rates and reasons for skipping. The rate in the UK was 52% (the same as Canada) but lower than the US where it was 57%.

It also found that people in most countries don’t wait long before skipping, with the UK waiting, on average, only 2.4 seconds after the skip button appears. However, 72% of ad skippers in the UK said they skip not because the ad is too long or irrelevant, but because it is now habitual for them to skip ads. 

In contrast in Asia, people skip to avoid  the  atypically  long  ads  shown  in that region.

The study found that better targeting cannot curb skip rates but using a logo more consistently throughout the ad can help ad recall and branding early, within first five seconds of ad, is recommended. This early branding boosts ad recall and perceptions that the ad is informative.

It also found that 27% of those who skipped the ad were still able recall the brand unaided, rising to 40% for aided recall. 

Other results included: consumers completing a skippable ad are more likely to view the brand positively compared to those forced to complete a non-skippable ad. They are not only more likely to view the ad as trustworthy ( 62% vs. 56%) and informative ( 60% vs. 55%), but also exhibit a stronger increase in brand favourability.

Kara Manatt, senior vice-president, intelligence solutions & strategy, Magna, said: “Ad skipping is essentially a universal behaviour – it happens on all devices equally and advertisers need to not combat it but learn from it instead.

“Even though we’re talking about fairly new formats, our research reiterates and re-validates the fundamentals of successful advertising. Emotional ads that organically weave the brand into a story generate the most impact with consumers.”

The media trial involved more than 20,000 consumers across 10 countries with participants selecting a range of content based on their interests from a mocked-up version of YouTube.  Once they selected content, they were randomised to see a control ad (public service announcements) or one of the many test ads, followed by the content.