The role of ad likability in predicting an ad's campaign performance

The Advertising Research Foundation's (ARF's) influential Copy Research Validity Project (CRVP) endorsed ad likability, L-ad, as the single best copy-test predictor of campaign sales results, and L-ad scores are now widely used by practitioners to approve or reject ads for campaigns. The CRVP's findings are based on a between-groups experimental design and are incapable of proving whether L-ad causes purchase, because individuals who like the ad could be different individuals from those who purchase the product. The present study is an individual-level, quasi-experimental test in which four ads for new brands of different products were copy tested and then "tracked" in simulated campaigns and posttested on brand-based communication effects. The CRVP's favorable findings for ad likability were not confirmed in these individual-level tests. For each of the four ads, L-ad in the copy test significantly predicted brand attitude (A(b)) in the copy test, but failed to predict campaign-induced A(b) in the posttest.