Behaviorally targeted online advertising solutions provider Tacoda has released the results of an eye-tracking study that pits behavioral targeting against contextual targeting in terms of user engagement with advertised brands. The primary finding: Behavioral targeting generated an average of 17 percent more "looks" at the ads than contextual targeting, and after the first exposure, that advantage increased to 54 percent. However, the total time ("seconds") spent on the ads was virtually identical: 1.35/1.36 seconds.

Each brand was shown four times to each test subject, both in a behavioral targeting context and in a contextual targeting context, therefore making it possible to "analyze frequency effects," according to the study, titled "The Advantage of Behavior Targeting Increases Dramatically with Frequency" and authored by Bill Harvey, CEO of Next Century Media.

Whereas for contextual advertising there tended to be "a pattern of declining looks from first to subsequent exposures," for behavioral targeting the pattern tended to be one of "ascending looks."

"The immediate implication for Internet advertising is that Contextual Targeting ought to be used at the beginning of a campaign, but that for subsequent frequency Behavioral Targeting should be used," according to the study.

Another implication of the findings is that "Internet publishers ought to give more thought to how to design pages and price solo sponsorships so as to reduce clamor/clutter effects."

The eye-tracking study was conducted in November-December 2005 in cooperation with Panasonic; its plasma TV screen ads were tested along with ads for a car company and a computer company.