Advertising research organizations have been trying for years to measure the effectiveness of advertising.

Recent research by Erik du Plessis and his colleagues at Adtrack South Africa, and subsequently at Millward Brown, has helped to show that the strongest factor predicting success is not the scheduling rate, but how much an advertisement is liked.

Erik du Plessis draws on information about the working of the human brain from psychologists, neurologists and artificial intelligence specialists to suggest why 'ad-liking' is such an important factor in establishing a firm memory of an advertisement and predisposing consumers to buy. He explores what 'ad-liking' really means, and suggests how use of this paradigm could lead to a new phase in the ongoing effort to obtain maximum return from advertising spend.

Millward Brown were also behind the research for the BRANDchild initiative.