You hear it everywhere these days.  No one has any attention span anymore, especially young people, so get your message out and get it to them quickly.  

At Incremental Media, we wanted to put this to the test in our offline marketing world.  So, what you’re about to read are anonymized results of brands who did A/B tests of our two panel piece, which is a postcard size format with a front and a back, against a four-panel piece, which is essentially taking a piece of computer paper from your printer and folding it in half so there is a front, two inside panels, and a back.  In other words, a small format versus a large format.  

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To Four Panel or Not To Four Panel? That is the question…

We work with a large premium Cookware Brand who ran an A/B test of a two panel versus four panel insert.  Generally speaking, if you are a more considered purchase or a subscription brand, the four panel format can be useful to help explain your full value proposition.  Like our SVP of Marketing and Media always says, “Use the format you need to tell your story.”.  

Here are the results of their test:

To my surprise, the two panel was the winner.  Even though the brand does have a lot of unique differentiators, the two panel was best at ultimately driving orders and a more effective CPO.

On the contrary, let’s look at a Dog Food Brand.  They have a similar story to the Cookware Brand.  They are a premium brand with a high price point for their category, so telling a complete story about why you should pay more for them than traditional kibble led us to think the four panel would outperform the two panel.  In this case, our theory was correct:

Would you look at that?  The larger ad format won, and it didn’t just win.  The four panel crushed the two panel with nearly a third of the cost per signup (i.e. cost per order).  

With that being said, there are a lot of other factors.  For example, the Cookware Brand mentioned earlier had a Super Bowl ad, and the Dog Food Brand, while having significant ad budgets, did not have a Super Bowl ad, so that general awareness may have affected the performance of the two ad sizes.  

So what is the verdict?

I know if you’ve made it this far in the article you want a definitive answer. I wish it was that easy. What I can say is this: The jury is still out, but the smaller, more concise ads certainly aren’t always winning, especially with younger audiences.  The best way to learn what will work best for your brand is simple: Test both formats and see how much space you need to properly communicate your messaging.  

Eric Smith is the President and COO at Incremental Media.  Want to share your thoughts or pick the brain of the author of this piece?  Email Eric Smith at esmith@incrementalmedia.com.