Advertisers may soon be able to gain a better understanding of the emotional impact of content-led marketing to determine how effectively it engages with consumers, a new study by BBC StoryWorks has found.

The study, title ‘The Science of Engagement’, measured consumers reactions to campaigns on BBC.com, and combined traditional research metrics with facial coding to determine how effectively the supplied content engaged with consumers.

The study found that well executed and clearly labelled content-led marketing is both trusted and persuasive in quality environments, and significantly has a powerful emotional impact for the brands involved.

In addition, it was found that exposure to content-led marketing has the ability to significantly improve consumers perceptions towards brands – a  +77% increase in explicit positivity between pre and post exposure was recorded.

People’s second-by-second facial movements were also measured as they watched the content, which was designed to determine the true engagement of each respondent’s implicit reaction. The results found that exposure can also lead to a 14% increase in subconscious positivity.

BBC Advertising senior vice president Richard Pattinson said it was vital for advertisers to know the real impact of their content, especially in a time where an increase in spending on content-led marketing is occurring.

“In a time when advertisers’ are increasing their spending on content-led marketing, it is important that they also feel confident in its effectiveness, and understand the significant positive impact this kind of content has on their brand. We believe that this study will enhance advertisers’ understanding and confidence in these campaigns, and in the value of high quality content-marketing delivered in premium environments,” said Pattinson.

The month long study, conducted in October 2015,