Imagine this…

It’s 10pm on Friday, it is raining outside and you’re getting ready to watch “Us” (trailer here) in your living room. You get the popcorn and a can of spicy rum coke ready and place it on your side table…..you turn on your large screen tv, search for Us on Apple TV, select the movie and press play. You pick up your popcorn, ask google to turn down your lights. You grab a mouth full and suddenly a flash of light goes through your room reminding you that the rain is getting heavier. Your attention is diverted back to the screen as an eerie music eases you back into the movie as a person jumps out towards you from the screen and….I leave the rest to your imagination.

That was an experience, albeit, an elaborate one!

Watching a horror movie on a TV screen at home in my living room is very different from watching same horror movie on my phone and will feel even very different if watching in a cinema with 100 ft. wide experiences. My gut is I am likely to have a stronger subconscious imprint with a larger screen experience than a smaller screen. There’s something about us as humans having stronger responses to things closer to our body size than those smaller – be it fear or admiration.

If true for a horror movie then maybe it is true for advertising too. If so, then make sure not to keep the TV screen experience top of mind when assessing effectiveness of a creative. Mobile adoption is growing every year, however, TV screen size have also been growing every year allowing closer to Cinema like experiences from the comfort of your home.