TV-news programs are some of the most-watched in a fragmented media ecosystem, but advertisers have increasingly shied away from the medium in recent years, fearful that polarized audiences will associate their pitches with hot talk and tough stories tied to politics, climate change and cultural debates.
They may be making a poor decision.
A new study from Mediaprobe, a company that measures real-time physical and emotional responses to media, finds that news programs generate better response and recall than many primetime TV shows. The company examined data that involved the viewing of 11 networks, covering 41 shows and involving 671 brands, spanning a period from November 2023 to September 2024.
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The company found that commercials appearing in news and political content spurred stronger emotional responses compared to ads that aired during primetime slots. Brands featured adjacent to news and political programs generated a 5% increase in viewer recall over ads that ran alongside primetime shows.
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The Mediaprobe study also found that brands appearing in commercials that were the first to run in an ad break were 2% more likely to be recalled over those in primetime.
“The heightened memorability and emotional impact can be attributed to the engaging nature of news/politics, where viewer involvement is typically higher due to the relevance and timeliness of the content,” the company said.
As more viewers move to streaming services and away from traditional satellite and cable subscriptions, ad dollars are seen migrating to digital venues and away from linear TV. Ad dollars are expected to fall at CNN, MSNBC and Fox News Channel in 2025, according to data from Kagan, a market-research firm that is part of S&P Global Intelligence.
While the percentage differences between recall in primetime and news are relatively slight, they represent tens of thousands of consumers, Mediaprobe said, that can make a difference to any marketer’s bottom line.
“The strategic implications of these findings are clear: placing ads in news/politics content not only increases the chances of viewer engagement but also significantly boosts brand recall,” Mediaprobe found. “The emotional engagement fostered by these programs doesn’t just stay with the content; it carries over to the ads, making them more impactful and memorable.”
Mediaprobe has also worked with Westwood One to test news programming on radio and found that “AM/FM Radio News was the genre with higher emotional engagement.”
