By Parker Herren. Published on October 11, 2024.

Emotional targeting is playing an increasingly important role in advertisers’ battle for consumer attention in the fragmented media ecosystem. Media behemoths such as Disney and NBCUniversal, for example, are using tools to show how pairing ads with content that drives specific emotions could be more effective.

Topgolf tested targeting its media buys earlier this year based on replicating the feeling of joy experienced when playing a round of golf at its locations. Its agency IPG’s Mediahub worked with GlassView, a neuromarketing company, to measure, target and optimize media based on data collection from the brain activity of Topgolf customers.

“With a lot of digital campaigns, you’re optimizing and placing media based on digital metrics [such as click-through and impressions], and you’re implying what the person actually felt based on that digital engagement,” said Laurel Boyd, chief creative media officer, Mediahub. Boyd said partnering with GlassView “was a way to really get at the root with empirical data to know how people were feeling.”

To accomplish this, GlassView utilizes high-tech headbands created by Cogwear, a brain technology company. The halo-shaped devices measure the wearer’s brain activity while interacting with a brand, product or piece of content. Typically, brands have primarily partnered with GlassView to use its neurological technology for finding new insights into marketing responses, or determining which ad inventory is most conducive to consumer behaviors such as sign-ups or clicks.

The company’s partnership with Mediahub and Topgolf was the first in which it measured a specific emotion to serve and optimize media in real time against that emotional state, said Tristan Gambuti, VP of media partnerships, GlassView.

The initial test, conducted at a Topgolf location in New Jersey, found that players experienced a 180% increase in joy while playing Topgolf, and also identified additional key emotional states including relaxation and collaboration. They wanted to find media that elicited the same type of joy in those watching.

Based on GlassView’s data analysis and panel of participants who also wear Cogwear’s headpieces while consuming media, Mediahub was able to identify media inventory within its network to place Topgolf’s ads. The most successful spots, per Boyd, were served on connected TV during prime time hours when viewers are more often watching together with friends or family. Specific content in the sports, food and music genres aligned with the joy and relaxation emotions felt while playing Topgolf. The ads were also served on digital billboards in multiplayer video games.

“Our collaboration with GlassView has led us to rethink the way we position certain advertisements given the insights we’ve garnered around co-viewing and entertainment environments and how people consume information in those settings," Kara Berry, VP, brand and marketing communications, Topgolf, said in an email.

To this end, Topgolf has since used findings from the partnership to inform ad placements during Fox’s coverage of the 2024 COPA and Euro tournaments and on Peacock during the 2024 Summer Olympics.

GlassView monitored channels in real time that best matched Topgolf’s joy metrics throughout the campaign’s run from February to March of this year. Gambuti said that in addition to specific content, GlassView will optimize media for the time of day that performs the best against goals, such as selecting the prime time hours over morning tune-in, or determining the number of times a consumer can see an ad before those target metrics start to decline and adjusting frequency on a platform.

As a result of the collaboration, Topgolf’s ads saw a 193% increase in engagement and a 13% lift in brand favorability compared to its typical campaign. And certain spots, such as the 15-second version of “Better Days” (above), increased levels of joy 38% above the campaign’s weighted average, the brand found.

While Mediahub’s Boyd declined to specify pricing for the partnership, she noted that the additional research and targeting won’t stand in the way of replicating the partnership with other clients, as much of it was included in the price of buying the media through GlassView’s ad network.

“As media people, we’re always looking for ways to amplify impact, and in this world we’re living in where everything is so fragmented and you only have people’s attention for a split second, you want to stack the deck in your favor,” said Boyd. “We know people feel this amount of joy, and this was a way to then find environments and show up in the places where they’re feeling that same amount of joy. So we know that when they see the ad, it will have the maximum impact.”