How ad testing can boost your brand ROI

You're juggling TV campaigns, performance channels, and social media all at once. Your board wants proof that the big brand investment will pay off. 

Meanwhile, you're asking yourself: "Should we bet millions on this campaign? Is our creative actually working, or are we just burning budget?"

Most fast-growing brands focus on channel mix—but overlook the real multiplier: the creative itself.

Here's what most smart CMOs are discovering: by testing their ads before launch, they maximize ROI and prevent wasted spend. In fact, research shows the best creatives can deliver up to 11× more sales impact than average.

So why keep crossing our fingers? With ad testing, you can predict winners before you spend your media budget and invest with confidence.

Why your creative is the real growth lever

You've got ambitious growth targets, a lean team, and budget scrutiny from every direction. You know your brand needs stronger mindshare to compete with the big players, but every campaign feels like a gamble.

The usual route is costly research that takes weeks and delivers confusing metrics with no clear answers. You’re left defending a strategy with data you don’t fully trust.

Here’s what really moves the needle: creative quality. It’s the second-largest factor in ad profitability, right after market size. In digital channels, creativity drives 56% of performance compared to just 37% from media placement.

In other words, it’s not just where you advertise — it’s what you advertise. The creative itself delivers more than half of your results, which is why testing it up front is so powerful.

When growth stalls, creative usually knows why

Picture a fast-growing consumer brand expanding across multiple markets. Despite its success, it runs into a familiar problem:

“We’re running a campaign we had high hopes for, but the growth just isn’t there. Is the issue the creative? Or is it a lack of market demand?”

Sound familiar? Every CMO knows that moment when performance stalls and you’re not sure if the problem is the creative, the market, or something else entirely.

The answer often lies in how well your creative delivers on three critical components:

• Brand: Can viewers instantly recognize this is your ad? Not just logo placement, but distinctive elements woven throughout like colors, sounds, and visual style that scream “this is us.”
  
• Need: Does your ad link to genuine buying occasions? The strongest campaigns connect brands to real moments when people naturally think about your category.
  
• Emotion: Do people feel something that helps them remember? Emotion amplifies everything else, making brand-need connections stick in ways that drive future purchases.

When brands measure and refine these three elements before launch, the payoff is clear.

Real brands, real testing, real results

Hedepy

Take Hedepy, an online therapy platform that doubled its turnover but hit a performance plateau. New user acquisition stagnated despite success across eleven European markets. 

Instead of throwing more budget at the same approach, they tested their campaign concept first. Initial results showed average scores; the creative lacked strong engagement and emotional impact. Armed with these insights, they refined the script before filming.

The final video tested much better: over half the viewers found it engaging, and most understood that it promoted online therapy services. 

Here were the results:

• ‍A 10-point increase in people considering online therapy
• 50% more new clients within two months
• An ROI achieved in just six months

Testing first helped them spend smarter and get better results instead of wasting ad spend on creatives that wouldn’t work.

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Big Shock

Or consider Big Shock's approach: The team tested three different creative routes and found that one performed twice as well as the second option and three times better than the third. 

With that insight, they focused their media spend on the winning concept, which delivered 20% higher mental availability compared to the alternatives.

By testing multiple options upfront, they avoided spending media budget on weaker creative and maximized ROI on the winner.

The real ROI of getting creative right

Let’s talk about the numbers that matter to your board. Spend $500k on media with weak creative and you might see only $250k worth of impact. Use strong creative with that same spend and you could generate $2.75M in impact.

Companies that excel at creativity consistently outperform competitors in revenue growth and shareholder returns. Sixteen years of data prove creative excellence translates directly to financial results.

For challenger brands, this multiplier effect is everything. You may not be able to outspend the category leaders, but you can out-create them.

Why ad testing is your competitive edge

The math is simple. Test a campaign for a few thousand, discover it won't work, and avoid wasting hundreds of thousands on media spend. Or identify the winning creative route and watch your media investment deliver better results.

Every campaign is a chance to build lasting brand-need connections that compound over time. But only if you're creating ads that truly connect with how people's minds work.

Whether you’re expanding into new markets, launching TV for the first time, or trying to restart growth in mature ones, the solution isn’t hidden in the budget — it’s in making sure your creative multiplies whatever resources you have.

The brands winning in today's chaos aren't choosing between creativity and measurement. They're using testing to avoid wasted spend, maximize ROI, and turn every campaign into a confident investment rather than an expensive gamble.

Ready to stop guessing which campaigns will drive growth and start maximizing every dollar of your media spend? Ad testing gives you the confidence to invest big in creative that works and avoid wasting budget on campaigns that won't deliver.

Test your campaign for a fraction of traditional research costs → book a demo with one of Behavio’s brand marketing experts.