From Citigroup’s Mark Mahaney, via SAI:

1) The Click Isn’t Everything - Currently, rich media CTRs average about 0.1%, with entertainment sites having the highest CTRs at 0.17% and Fin. Services having the lowest at 0.06%. Also, 80% of display ad clicks come from less than 20% of the Internet population, indicating that clicks are not necessarily as relevant to brand advertisers.

2) Display Impacts Search 4 Weeks After Exposure - According to comScore’s analysis, there was more than a 50% lift in ‘Net users conducting a query on a brand term one week after exposure to the display ad. After four weeks, the lift was around 38%, which is still significant. Indeed, a month after viewing the ad, 30% of ‘Net users actually visited the advertiser’s site.

3) Branded Display Improves Advertiser Site Engagement - Those who viewed a branded ad in this study spent around 34 minutes per unique visitor on the advertiser’s site, which was a 55% lift in time spent vs. the 22 average minutes per unique when they were not shown the ad.

4) Branded Ad Campaigns Improve eCommerce Spend By An Average Of 7% - When comparing the users who were exposed to the branded ads vs. those not exposed, comScore found a 7% lift in average eCommerce spend per ad site visitor. Specifically, travel spend was 9% higher among exposed users, CPG spend was 14% higher, and consumer electronics was 22% higher.

The So-What? Efficacy Of Branded Advertising Is Material - When exposed to branded ads, the impact may not be direct or immediate, but there appears to be strong evidence that users engage better and transact more with brands once they’ve been exposed to them. With new/larger ad formats, and the potential for richer ad formats in sponsored search results, this efficacy should improve.

Read more on Mahaney’s comments on SAI or read our earlier post called Search captures intent, display captures interest.