Our AdRate Metrics: Understanding Groundswell and Backlash

AdRate is not conventional when it comes to analyzing your advertisements, and neither are its core metrics: Groundswell and Backlash.

We like these metrics because they help us more directly measure ad effectiveness in a complex, multicultural society where an ad that successfully appeals to one group may disengage another. It can be tough to wrap your head around this kind of thing, so let’s take a trip down memory lane to bring these metrics and concepts to life…

Let’s say you’re DJ-ing a middle school dance, and keeping track of how the kids are responding to your music. Your goal is to get as many kids dancing as possible, which means two things: first, you want to entice the kids who aren’t dancing to get on the floor (that’s Groundswell); and second, you want to make sure the kids who are already dancing don’t leave (that would be Backlash).

Exactly 100 students RSVP’d for tonight, and right now 80 are bopping to MIA’s “Paper Planes,” with 20 on the sidelines.

But then you take a look at the next song on your playlist… “Hero” by Enrique Iglesias – that’s a slow dance. As the music shifts, you see one couple sitting at a table get up to awkwardly sway at arm’s length, but they’re almost trampled by a rush of bodies in the opposite direction. As the couples figure out where to put their hands, you see that 60 kids left the floor.

So of the 80 dancers who could have left, 60 did – that’s 75% Backlash. And of the 20 bystanders who could have joined, only 2 did – that’s 10% Groundswell. With 100 total attendees, there is a Net loss of 58 students – a simple -58%. You’d call this a Low Groundswell, High Backlash response.

Let’s translate this in terms of advertising.

Imagine that before a new campaign, a company’s brand was perceived favorably by 80% of the market and unfavorably by 20% of the market. But unfortunately, the campaign features Tom Brady, winning you a few consumers in the Northeast but alienating the rest of the country. The result could be that you lose most of the original 80% you had, while only gaining a small portion of the 20% you didn’t.

Return now to the middle school dance. As the parent & teacher chaperones make their rounds to police hip distance, you check what’s next in the queue. Darude’s “Sandstorm” – that’s a banger. As the kids feel the pulse of the electronic beats, 42 of them crowd the dance floor, forming a mosh pit with break-dance circles appearing on the sides. But now that the adults in the room are focused on making sure no one gets hurt, two of the slow-dancing couples sneak off to continue flirting in the shadows. When the dust clears, you take another headcount.

Of the 22 slow-dancers who could have left, 4 did – that’s 18% Backlash. And of the 78 kids who could have joined, 42 did – that’s 54% Groundswell. That makes a Net gain of 38 dancers, or +38% of the 100 total from this High Groundswell, Low Backlash reaction.

Let’s translate this in terms of advertising.

This was a song that everyone could get behind, and posed little flight risk for those already on the dance floor. A now-classic marketing example of this is the 2018 Super Bowl’s Doritos Blaze vs Mountain Dew Ice commercials, featuring Peter Dinklage and Morgan Freeman. Although the ads were framed in terms of competition, in reality they were scoring points for one another by making clear the appeal of each brand. Whatever Backlash there was for these brands was easily dwarfed by the almighty Groundswell this strategy achieved.

Back on the dance floor, things are looking good, but then you remember – there was a sheet for song requests! You skim until you find one that you recognize – “Toxic” by Britney Spears. Well, you might like it, and so do most of the girls, but on hearing the opening most guys just tune out. Of course there are some exceptions, but you find that exactly half of the mosh pit dissolves, and exactly half of the bystanders join in.

So of the 60 dancers who could have left, 30 did – that’s 50% Backlash. And of the 40 kids who could have joined, 20 did – that’s 50% Groundswell. Which makes a Net loss of 10 dancers, or -10% of the 100 students. You pretty much expected this High Groundswell, High Backlash reception.

Let’s translate this in terms of advertising.

Here, activating one demographic (girls) came with the cost of alienating another segment (boys). But if we assume that the person who put the song on the list wanted to attract girls to the dance floor regardless of the boys’ reaction, then that student would consider it a success, even though the Net response was negative. This case is similar to recent ad campaigns from Nike and Gillette tackling the issues of institutional racism and toxic gender norms. What mattered for these brands was high Groundswell for segments at the heart of future growth, regardless of the inevitable conservative Backlash.

Your thoughts are interrupted when the head chaperone comes over to you – it’s almost 9pm and they’re looking to wrap things up. So you skip to the final song on your playlist – Europe’s “The Final Countdown.” A handful of dancers feel their phones buzz as their parents arrive early to pick them up, and wave bye to their friends. But a few kids who have been on the sidelines the whole time pop their heads, finally recognizing a song from their parents’ record collections. You take a final count as they lankily shuffle from their seats.

Of the 50 kids who could have left, 5 did – that’s 10% Backlash. And of the 50 bystanders who could have joined, 5 also did – that’s 10% Groundswell. Which makes a Net change of 0 dancers, which is obviously 0% from this Low Groundswell, Low Backlash reaction.

When analyzing the effect of advertisements on favor towards your brand, the same logic applies. You achieve Groundswell when viewers who could get a favorable view of your brand do. You get Backlash when viewers who could lose their already-favorable view of your brand do. And based on those numbers, you can calculate the Net change in how many viewers hold a positive view of your brand.

While the basic intuitions of these metrics are easy enough – for your target demographics you want high Groundswell and low Backlash – comparing them across ads requires a little bit more context. You need to know where your brand started out to understand what your ad did!

Let’s consider an extreme case – imagine two scenarios in which 98 of 100 kids are dancing. In once scenario, you know that the two kids not dancing are a couple who are super into Muse, so you put on “Falling Away With You” as the slow dance to get them on the floor. It works, but the other kids have no idea what’s going on and half of them leave. That would be 100% Groundswell, but only with two people, and 50% backlash, but with 98 kids. This would result in a Net change of -47%; without knowing the distribution of dancers and non-dancers beforehand, you might have been confused by how the numbers in this case add up.

In the second scenario, imagine you can see that the couple not dancing is having a fight, and in an effort to bring them together you play Vampire Weekend’s “Harmony Hall.” Unfortunately, one of the quarrelers jumps up to dance with friends, leaving the other sulking on the sidelines. Out of the corner of your eye, you also see the dancer who earlier was double-fisting fruit punch now rushing for the restrooms. In this example, one of the last two kids rose to dance, equaling 50% Groundswell. In addition, one of 98 dancing left the floor, equal to about 1% backlash. But since one kid joined and one kid left, the Net change is 0%.

So it’s important to look at Groundswell, Backlash, & Net separately. If your goal is to maximize the final number of people who view your brand favorably, then Net is your friend. But if your goal is to resonate with your base without worrying about expanding market share, then look to minimize Backlash. And if your goal is to expand your brand’s appeal even if it may annoy your current consumers, then focus on Groundswell. For example, you could be focused on achieving Groundswell with Asian consumers, avoiding Backlash among Millennials, and also scoring the highest Net possible with the Total Market.

That’s also why when we present our metrics for your ads, the dashboard includes more information: Brand Favorability before and after the ads, and key Brand Impressions in response to the ads. With this context, you can get a more holistic idea of ad performance. And in our analytics, we analyze how these metrics interrelate, what ad features and emotional responses cause them, and how they are indicative of changes in Purchase Intent.

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4550 Montgomery Avenue
Bethesda, Maryland, 20814

(240) 482-8260

Stay Informed

Sign up for Cultural Insights for Growth, our complementary bi-weekly newsletter for insights and marketing professionals seeking to unleash the power of culture for brand growth.

Email *:

Collage Group is a certified Minority Business Enterprise (MBE) by the National Minority Supplier Development Council (NMSDC).

Terms and Conditions