Score a big win for President Obama's attack ad featuring Mitt Romney singing "America the Beautiful" as the screen fills with headlines about his former company shipping jobs overseas. It was rated highly memorable by some 600 viewers who are part of a new joint Vanderbilt University/YouGov.com team that plans to rate the effectiveness of campaign ads.
But, they said, the Obama campaign needs a new one. The reason, ads come out so fast and furious that they have a short, three to four day, shelf life before viewers tune them out. "Ads matter," said Lynn Vavreck, a UCLA politics professor, but "the effects of advertising decay fast."
For his part, Romney's attack at on Obama claiming the "private sector is doing fine," also scored most memorable.
The Vanderbilt/YouGov team announced their creation today at an unveiling at the Brookings Institution. What they offer that is different than other ad evaluators is actual viewer-voters, not pundits or college professors as advertising judges.
What's more, they've enlisted the help of celebrated GOP ad man Fred Davis to help pick the "game changing ads."
