creative fatigue

Intermediate 📣 Marketing / Advertising

Definition

The phenomenon where your audience becomes so numbingly bored with seeing the same ad that performance metrics plummet faster than enthusiasm at a timeshare presentation. The marketing equivalent of playing 'Wonderwall' at every party.

Example Usage

Our click-through rates dropped 60% in two weeks—classic creative fatigue—so we're rotating in new assets before people start reporting our ads as spam.

Origin

Advertising psychology research from the 1970s studying repetition effects

Fun Fact

Studies show creative fatigue can set in after just 3-5 exposures in digital channels, compared to 20+ in traditional media, because internet users have the attention span of caffeinated squirrels.

Source: Advertising psychology and media planning literature

Related Terms

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