Fact, is, people still trust advertising

We live in the age of ad blocking, where people can download special software for their laptops or iPhones to avoid ads or even skip them entirely with their DVRs.

So it may come as a surprise that, despite our penchant for avoiding ads, we actually still put a great deal of trust in them.

That’s according to a new report from Nielsen, which examines the most trusted forms of advertising.

Although there have been many methods developed to block ads in recent years, the level of trust in advertising has remained high around the world, and it’s also steady from past years.

More than half of those surveyed say they trust traditional forms of paid advertising, including TV, magazines, billboards and radio.

In fact, trust in TV advertising has actually increased 1 percentage point since 2013, the last time this survey was taken, with 63 percent saying they trust TV advertising somewhat or completely.

“Despite continued media fragmentation, the proliferation of online formats has not eroded trust in traditional (offline) paid channels,” notes the report.

What this suggests is that people don’t block ads because they mistrust them. They block them because they either find them annoying or don’t want to be distracted from the content they are consuming.

The right ads, the survey suggests, can still cut through the clutter to deliver effective messages.

“There isn’t one simple rule for maximizing advertising effectiveness in such a saturated market,” notes the report.

Traditional media has a much higher trust level than online. All seven offline ad formats included in the survey rated higher than digital ads.

Among online formats, video had the highest rate of trust, at 48 percent. Text ads on mobile phones had the lowest at just 36 percent.

Perhaps the most interesting nugget from this report: Millennials had the highest level of trust in advertising for 18 of the 19 categories surveyed, including TV, magazines and newspapers.

This is unexpected.

Millennials are considered the most prone to block ads and are often perceived as cynical consumers of all content, whether it’s advertising or editorial.

But the report notes that these users can be reached effectively with the right ads.

“High-energy/action advertising themes resonate more with younger respondents,” says the report.

Tags: ads, advertising, nielsen, research, trust in ads, trust in advertising