New survey reveals TV advertising drives measurable, full-funnel outcomes across devices, demanding a new standard of measurement
LOS ANGELES, CA — DISQO, a leading provider of advertising intelligence, today released its Outcomes Report: TV Advertising 2026, a comprehensive study examining how television advertising drives consumer attention, outcomes, and brand impact across a fragmented, multi-screen landscape.
Today, consumers watch more video across more surfaces than ever before. The challenge for advertisers is no longer whether video and TV work, but understanding exactly where, for whom, and at what frequency, and having the measurement infrastructure in place to prove its full funnel value.
DISQO's Outcomes Report: TV Advertising 2026, based on a survey of 2,662 US adults, is designed to help close that gap. It examines how consumers engage with content, what captures attention, what erodes it, and how quickly TV advertising translates into real consumer outcomes. The findings are consistent and clear: television is not a passive awareness vehicle. It is an active trigger for downstream search, site visitation, and purchase decisions, with the majority of those actions occurring on a different device and at a different time horizon.
"What we have long known but continue to see is that television drives more consumer behavior than most marketers realize. Consumers are searching, visiting, and purchasing as a direct result of TV exposure, often within minutes and almost always on a different device. That multi-touch journey is happening at scale, every single day, across every screen. Understanding it in full, not just the moments that are easiest to measure, is what gives brands the clarity they need to invest and optimize with real confidence.” - Stephen Jepson, President of Media Effectiveness, DISQO
Key Findings from the Outcomes Report: TV Advertising 2026
TV drives full-funnel outcomes
Television advertising works across the entire consumer journey simultaneously. 44% of consumers use TV ads to discover new brands, and 34% use them to help decide what to buy. The medium is not a pure awareness vehicle — it drives consideration and conversion in addition to discovery — and the contribution is easy to undercount in measurement frameworks that credit only the last touch.
The path to purchase is fast and mobile
Eighty percent of consumers have taken some form of action after seeing a TV ad. Search is the dominant first response at 46%, and 57% of all post-TV actions happen on a mobile phone. The TV-to-action window is shorter than most attribution models are built to capture: 39% of consumers who act do so immediately or within minutes, and 63% act within the same day of exposure.
Brand building and performance are one strategy
Forty-four percent of consumers are more likely to consider buying from a brand they recognize from frequent TV advertising. Familiarity built through repeated, contextually relevant exposure is what puts a brand into the consideration set before performance advertising has a chance to close the deal. Brand building and performance are not separate line items. They are two outputs of the same investment.
About the Report
DISQO's Outcomes Report: TV Advertising 2026 examines consumer attitudes, behaviors, and expectations around television advertising across five core areas: TV Viewing Behavior, Attention and Ad Experience, Advertising Effectiveness, Path to Purchase, and Brand Building Impact. The study was conducted in early 2026 among 2,662 US adults ages 18 to 79, balanced across four generational cohorts and weighted to reflect the US population across age, gender, income, and ethnicity.
Millions of people have opted in to share their brand experiences with DISQO, empowering clients to cultivate deep insights about their target audiences and to perform objective, person-level measurement of ad effectiveness on attitudes and digital behaviors.
About DISQO
DISQO is a leading provider of advertising intelligence, measuring brand and performance outcomes across every media channel to power data-driven marketing decisions. Trusted by 500+ of the world’s largest brands and 150+ agency and media partners, and recognized by Inc., Deloitte, Ad Age, Digiday, Forbes, and Cynopsis, DISQO is redefining the power of measurement in advertising. For more information on DISQO’s Brand Lift, Outcomes Lift, and other measurement solutions, visit disqo.com or follow @DISQO on LinkedIn.
For more information on DISQO’s Brand Lift and Outcomes Lift solutions, visit disqo.com or follow @DISQO on LinkedIn.
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