Value-Driven Marketing (VDM) can generate significant improvements in brand preference and likability, perceived relevance, and ad performance. It is a valid approach for all categories of products and services, and it not only drives the effectiveness of advertising, but also of the media.

These are the conclusions drawn from research carried out by Warc together with the Aletheia Marketing and Media agency, which has focused on analyzing the impact of values ​​on advertising performance. Thus, it has studied how the public perceives and reacts to value-based marketing, through the development of a series of controlled tests.

The analysis

In order to carry out the research, six values ​​have been considered that, according to the consultants, most directly influence affinity with the brand, purchase decisions and loyalty and, therefore, are of greater relevance for marketing professionals. These are:

• Achievement, related to success, recognition or luxury
• Pleasure, related to fun, variety, or indulgence
• Freedom (freedom), related to creativity, exploration or independence
• Purpose, motivated by compassion, impact, social good
• Tradition, motivated by family, stability or legacy
• Security, motivated by order, predictability

To evaluate the audience’s response to these values, a total of 27 different, unbranded advertisements generated by artificial intelligence and with strong signals of these values ​​have been created as part of the study. They correspond to three categories linked to consumer needs and desires: consumer goods; represented by toothpaste; QSR, represented by a pizzeria) and financial services, represented by investment advice.

In July 2025, 5,016 American adults across all demographic groups were assigned to one of three value types—achievement, purpose, and tradition—and were surveyed about their advertising preferences and effectiveness.
The objective has been to analyze, among other things, whether people respond similarly to value-based marketing regardless of the category or whether this approach drives demand in both the short and long term.

The results

Warc and Aletheia highlight a series of outstanding results and conclusions:

• Preference

Ads that align with a person’s dominant values ​​gain preference. For example, achievement value-oriented consumers were 17 percentage points more likely to prefer an achievement-aligned ad than other executions they were exposed to.

• Effectiveness

According to research, value-based marketing is effective in all categories. The report points out that purpose ads in the QSR and consumer goods categories exceeded the average effectiveness by 27 percentage points; while financial services ads focused on achievement were 28 points above the average. of effectiveness.

• Coincidence

As Warc explains, the strength of a person’s values ​​predicts their level of response to advertising. Thus, consumers with strong achievement and purpose values ​​leaned toward ads with those types of values. On the other hand, respondents with traditional values ​​were the most likely to avoid ads that conflict with those values.

• Relevance

The report indicates that messages that are aligned with audience values ​​increase ad acceptance and perceived relevance. So, for example, consumers with strong achievement values ​​rated achievement-focused ads between 12 and 18 percentage points higher than average.

• Segmentation

The study points out that including values ​​in segmentation increases the effectiveness of the media. Thus, purpose-related ads increased their predictability – the ability to predict results – by 193% when combining values ​​with segmentation.

The learnings

From all this, it follows that brands strongly aligned with the values ​​that matter most to their audience generate trust and foster deeper, lasting connections, especially when supported by memorable and attractive brand assets that are displayed consistently across all touchpoints.
Thus, the report reveals that communicating the right messages to the right audience considering their values ​​drives performance improvements between 1.8x and 2x on average.

In this sense, Warc maintains that value-based marketing helps brands respond to changes in the landscape of consumers, buyers and media. “Increased competition, increasing ROI pressure and the constant need to do more with less mean marketers must make more accurate and better-informed media decisions about their messages,” they note.

Thus, brands can respond better to changes in:

• The criteria of consumer decision making: value-based marketing generates emotional resonance and, therefore, brand trust and competitive advantage. According to Ipsos data, the percentage of people buying brands that reflect their personal values ​​increased from 53% in 2023 to 69% in 2024.
• Buyer behavior: Values-based marketing works on both impulsive and thoughtful purchases, being able to generate emotional responses, stimulate interest and minimize risk in purchasing decisions.
• The Evolving Media Landscape: Values-based marketing reinforces the combined performance and brand-building approach needed to drive relevance and results.

The tips

From Warc they emphasize that value-based marketing improves advertising effectiveness and helps brands in terms of attention, relevance, emotional connection and precision in segmentation. The consultant offers a series of tips to embrace the approach and put it into action.

He points out that there are four areas in which professionals can focus to implement the strategy:

• Audience intelligence, that is, identifying priority segments and opportunities based on common values ​​with consumers
• Media Intelligence: Use value-based segmentation to analyze positioning opportunities and optimize message reach and frequency
• Message intelligence, that is, aligning value-based messages with audience motivations and brand KPIs
• Impact Intelligence: Value-based marketing can help analyze short- and long-term performance, as well as evaluate actual versus planned performance.