Commercial Radio & Audio joined forces with the U.K.’s Radiocentre, Radiocentre Ireland and the U.S. Radio Advertising Bureau to present new research on audio advertising effectiveness at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity. Professor Mark Ritson presented the findings during a session titled “The Secret to Profit and Trust: Audio.”
The study analyzed 1,262 advertising campaigns spanning 17 years using the Effie x System1 global databank — a research initiative and dataset combining Effie Worldwide’s database of award-winning advertising effectiveness cases with System1’s emotion-based creative measurement — to examine audio’s contribution to marketing performance.
According to the organizations, campaigns that included audio outperformed those without audio across several business measures. They say campaigns with audio delivered 75% higher profit, 81% greater trust, 81% stronger price insensitivity and 19% higher customer acquisition. Across 14 performance measures, campaigns that used audio achieved an average uplift of 22% compared with campaigns that did not.
The organizations also say emotionally driven campaigns generated almost twice the profit when they included audio. They add that combining emotional creativity with distinctive sonic branding and consistent campaign activity further improved results.
CRA originally commissioned the research in Australia, where Ritson and independent marketing consultant Rob Brittain analyzed Effie Awards data from the Advertising Council Australia. The organizations say researchers then validated the findings against a broader international databank covering campaigns from the U.K., the U.S., Ireland and other European markets before presenting the results at Cannes Lions.
Across the globe, the data consistently proves emotional audio campaigns roughly double their profit
Andrew Tindall, System1 chief growth officer
Audio the catalyst
Lizzie Young, chief executive officer of CRA, said, “In a competitive landscape where advertisers need their campaigns to work even harder, the evidence again points to the power of audio. For brands, the Effie and System1 data is clear: audio drives significantly stronger profit, deeper trust and the price resilience that protects margins. That a case first built on Australian Effie data now holds across the UK, US and Ireland only shows how universal audio’s advantage is as a catalyst in the media mix.”
Ritson said, “This is yet more beautiful data. The case for audio’s effectiveness is unequivocal; in every market we’ve studied globally, audio is the catalyst that makes your whole campaign work harder. For a relatively modest investment, it’s an unfair advantage hiding in plain sight. It’s the kind of evidence you cannot unhear.”
Andrew Tindall, System1 chief growth officer, said, “Across the globe, the data consistently proves emotional audio campaigns roughly double their profit. Pair that emotion with distinctive sonic brand assets and run it consistently, and the effect compounds again. It’s simple, yet sound advice.”
You can read or download more findings from the “The Secret to Profit and Trust: Audio” report below.
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