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WARC research shows campaigns that embed Values-Driven Marketing unlock ad preference, likeability, relevance and performance

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1 year ago

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WARC
  • VDM can uplift ad preference up to 123 points vs. a 100-point average
  • Ads aligned with an individual’s dominant Values consistently win preference
  • Stronger Values drive stronger responses
  • Values-aligned messaging boosts ad likability and relevance
  • Including Values in the targeting mix increases media effectiveness

5,000 US adults surveyed on Values-aligned adsNew WARC x Aletheia research by LIONS Advisory: Unlocking the value of Values-Driven Marketing introduces a new model and playbook for marketers on how VDM can improve advertising effectiveness

October 16, 2025 – The ‘Values’ in Values-Driven Marketing (VDM), as defined by Behavorial Science, refer to desirable – although often unarticulated – motivations that shape how people think and act. They are deep-rooted drivers of consumer behavior and are predictive of how individuals will respond to marketing stimuli.

‘Unlocking the value of Values-Driven Marketing’ is landmark research published today by WARC x Aletheia Marketing and Media brought to you by LIONS Advisory, highlighting the potential of VDM. It validates that VDM leads to meaningful lifts in ad preference, likability, perceived relevance and performance. It shows how VDM enables brands to drive higher ad performance through optimized targeting, media and messaging decisions.

Imaad Ahmed, Principal Strategist, LIONS Advisory and Head of Advisory WARC, says: “Understanding the motivation behind audience behavior and finding ways to inspire action is critical. Alongside our partners at Aletheia, we have the evidence to show what a Values-driven approach can offer and how to apply it in the real world across audiences, media, messaging and measurement. The opportunity is compelling.”

Alisa Miller, Chief AI Officer, Aletheia, Co-Founder, Pluralytics and Lead Inventor, AI VDM Patent, says: “The most effective marketing is built on deep human understanding. This research proves that when audiences are defined by their values and messaging is precisely aligned, ads perform significantly better. Values-Driven Marketing is emerging as a scalable, repeatable and performance-proven discipline for modern marketers in an era of Agentic AI.”

Chris Schembri, Founder and CEO, Aletheia, says: “We’ve spent years exploring how values shape marketing performance, and this research confirms what we’ve seen with our clients time and again: when brands connect with people around what truly matters to them, engagement deepens and conversions follow. Consistently delivering the right message to the right audience—grounded in authenticity and shared values—is what transforms marketing into a force for meaningful connection and growth.”

New research: The dynamics of Values-Driven Marketing

Using controlled testing, the research takes a deep-dive into how audiences perceive and react to VDM.

Research objectives
(1) do people respond to VDM in similar ways regardless of category, (2) is the degree to which someone holds a particular Value predictive of response levels, (3) can the different creative factors contributing to the effectiveness of VDM be isolated, (4) does VDM drive both short- and long-term brand demand.

Methodology
The six Values that most directly influence brand affinity, purchasing decisions and loyalty, and therefore are of greatest relevance to marketers, are: achievement, freedom, pleasure, purpose, security and tradition.A total of 27 unique unbranded AI-generated ads with strong Values Signals were created for three categories covering consumers’ needs and wants: CPG (represented by toothpaste); QSR (a pizza restaurant); and Financial Services (investment brokerage / advisory).

In July 2025, 5,016 US adults across demographics were assigned to one of three ValuesTypes – achievement, purpose and tradition – and surveyed on ad preference and effectiveness.

Headline findings

#1 Ads that align with an individual’s dominant Values are consistently preferred:

Achievement ValuesTypes were 17pp more likely to prefer an Achievement-aligned ad than other executions they were exposed to.

#2 Values-Driven Marketing is effective across categories:

Purpose within QSR and CPG categories were both +27pp above average; in financial services, achievement ads were +28pp and tradition ads +8pp above average.

#3 The strength of Values held by someone predicts the level of response:

Strong Achievement and Purpose consumers gravitated towards ads with matching values. While Tradition-oriented respondents were the most likely to avoid ads that conflict with those Values.

#4 Values-aligned messaging increases ad likability and perceived relevance:

Using ad resonance rating, AchievementTypes rated achievement ads +12pp to +18pp above average, PurposeTypes rated purpose ads +8pp to +11pp; and TraditionTypes rated tradition ads +2pp to +4pp.

#5 Including Values in the targeting mix increases media effectiveness:

Analysis of the research shows that demographics have some predictive power: AchievementTypes had a 75% uplift in predictability once Values were combined with demographic targeting; TraditionTypes had an 83% uplift, and PurposeTypes a 193% uplift in predictability.

A new model of how Values-Driven Marketing improves advertising effectiveness

Following the research, a new model combining behavioral science and artificial intelligence, shows how VDM can improve advertising effectiveness to help brands overcome attention scarcity, establish relevance, spark emotional resonance and target with precision to drive higher results.Operationalizing Values-Driven Marketing: A new playbook for brands

There are four areas of focus for marketers wanting to put VDM into practice:

Audience intelligence
Use Values-based research to identify priority segments and incremental opportunities, underlying consumer needs and wants, and competitor mapping.

Media intelligence
Use Values-driven targeting to maximize reach and optimize frequency, analyse placement and partnership opportunities, and include performance modeling capabilities.

Messaging intelligence
For a significant competitive edge, align Values-driven messaging with key audience motivations and brand business KPIs, and implement real-time testing capabilities for content optimization.

Impact intelligence
Values-driven marketing can help create and refine short- and longer-term benchmarks, evaluate actual versus predicted performance, and establishes continuous feedback loops to maximize campaign effectiveness.About Values-Driven Marketing

VDM drives performance uplifts of 1.8X to 2X on average

Brands strongly aligned with the Values that matter most to their audience build trust and foster deeper, lasting connections – especially when supported by ownable, memorable brand assets that consistently show up coherently across all touchpoints.

The research found that by transmitting the right signals to the right ValuesType drives performance uplifts of 1.8X to 2X on average.

Jennifer Posnikoff, SVP, Global Brand Growth and Experience, Virgin, says: “If you get Values right, you build long-term brand equity while still delivering short-term performance.”

Values-Driven Marketing responds to changes in the consumer, shopper and media landscapes

Heightened competition, growing ROI pressures and the constant requirement to do more with less mean marketers need to make more accurate media choices and better-informed messaging decisions.

Brands that apply VDM can better respond to shifts in:

Consumer’s decision-making criteria
Brand trust is now a critical competitive advantage. VDM creates the emotional resonance that builds this trust. Ipsos research shows people that buy brands that reflect their personal values has risen from 53% in 2023 to 69% in 2024.

Shopper behaviors
Brands on social platforms and retail media networks are intent on reducing the path-to-purchase time. VDM works across impulse and considered purchases by delivering clear, compelling signals tailored to consumer motivations by triggering emotional responses, stimulating interest and de-risking purchase decisions.

Media environments
In recent years there has been a shift towards ‘performance’ channels. WARC research outlined in ‘The Multiplier Effect’ shows switching from a performance-only to combined brand-building strategies boosts total revenue by a median of 90%. VDM provides additional unifying force by focusing on audience motivations.

Values-Driven Marketing delivers strategic and executional benefits

VDM in marketing, and the insights from Behavioral Science that underpin it, is an emerging practice with clear advantages: it provides unified answers to the fundamental questions of “who are we targeting?”, “what do we want to stand for?” and “how will we achieve our goals?”These strategic benefits can be translated into day-to-day execution. AI-powered advances in audience profiling, media targeting, messaging analysis and impact measurement, enable brands to operationalize VDM at scale.

The full report is available to read here. A relatively new discipline, the study outlines why VDM is a valuable addition to the marketing toolbox, features case studies of brands that are successfully applying VDM, and how to apply VDM to maximise effectiveness. A WARC podcast with Aletheia will follow with a deep-dive into the research findings.

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Africa gains governance momentum in the 2026 Chandler Good Government Index, but sustaining progress is the real test

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6 hours ago

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October 29, 2026

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Africa

Across Africa, average scores improved in six of the seven CGGI pillars over the past year, with the strongest gains in Helping People Rise and Financial Stewardship

This signals that stronger government capabilities are beginning to translate into tangible improvements in people’s lives

KIGALI, Rwanda, October 29, 2026/APO Group/ –Africa was the second best-performing region for governance progress in the 2026 Chandler Good Government Index (CGGI), with 71% of the African countries assessed in both 2025 and 2026 achieving higher overall scores. However, the continent remains the lowest-scoring region overall, highlighting the challenge of translating improvement in government capabilities into better outcomes for citizens.

 




 
 

These findings were highlighted by the Chandler Governance Group (CGG) at a joint session with the Rwanda Governance Board (RGB) to launch the 13th edition of the Rwanda Governance Scorecard at the Kigali Serena Hotel on Thursday, 22 October 2026.

“This year, Africa’s strongest gains came in Financial Stewardship, followed by Helping People Rise, the CGGI’s outcomes pillar. This signals that stronger government capabilities are beginning to translate into tangible improvements in people’s lives, from access to quality education and healthcare to the public finances that fund them. The task now is to sustain that progress over the coming years,” says Dinesh Naidu, Director (Knowledge) at CGG.

Now in its sixth edition, the CGGI assesses government capabilities and effectiveness across 133 countries representing 94% of the world’s population, up from 120 countries in 2025. It measures 35 equally weighted indicators across seven pillars, providing governments with a framework to benchmark performance, identify gaps and learn from the experience of other countries.

Globally, the findings point to improving governance performance. Of the 120 countries assessed in both 2025 and 2026, 61% recorded higher scores, representing the highest annual share of countries improving since the Index launched in 2021. However, longer-term progress has been less consistent, with only 43% of the 104 countries tracked since 2021 recording an overall improvement.

Africa’s leading governments

Mauritius remains Africa’s highest-ranked country, placing 55th globally, followed by Rwanda (62nd), Botswana (70th), Morocco (79th) and Tanzania (80th). South Africa ranks sixth on the continent, in 85th place globally.

Rwanda features prominently in the discussion, ranking 11th globally for Leadership & Foresight and emerging as the highest-ranked low-income country in the Index. It ranks 61 places above where its income alone would predict. Across the Index, government capabilities track citizen outcomes more closely than national wealth does, suggesting that strengthening government capabilities matter in delivering better outcomes for citizens.

The joint session brings together the CGGI’s international benchmarks and the Rwanda Governance Scorecard’s assessment of governance in the Rwandan context, creating an opportunity to consider both global perspectives and country-specific priorities.

Progress across key governance pillars

Across Africa, average scores improved in six of the seven CGGI pillars over the past year, with the strongest gains in Helping People Rise and Financial Stewardship. These improvements point to progress in areas associated with public services, including healthcare and education, as well as the management of public finances.

Longer-term trends also highlight areas of progress. Between 2021 and 2026, nearly every African country assessed across the period improved its Data Capability score, with Morocco recording the largest gains. Ghana’s overall score improved in 2026, supported by stronger Financial Stewardship, while South Africa continues to show relative strength in Robust Laws & Policies, ranking 44th globally, and Attractive Marketplace, ranking 48th.

Despite these gains, the scale of the challenge remains clear. Africa’s regional average is still below its 2021 level, 23 of the 35 African countries in the 2026 Index rank outside the global top 100, and none is in the top 50. Seven African countries joined the Index this year: Chad, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Gambia, Guinea, Lesotho, Liberia and Togo.

“Rankings provide a useful starting point, but the broader value of the CGGI lies in helping governments understand where they are making progress and where further work is needed. Sustained improvements depend on the ability to strengthen institutions, manage resources responsibly and turn policy into meaningful outcomes for citizens,” says Naidu.

A tool for learning and improvement

The CGGI is designed as a practical diagnostic tool, helping governments identify gaps, track progress over time, and learn from peers facing similar constraints. The collaboration with the RGB brings international benchmarking together with locally grounded assessment.

“Every country faces its own governance challenges and is driven by varying priorities. Governments that are willing to take stock of the evidence and learn from peers to strengthen their institutions are well placed to achieve real improvements,” concludes Naidu.

Distributed by APO Group on behalf of Chandler Governance Group.

 

 




 

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Spiro brings electric motorcycles and battery-swapping technology to Ghana, expanding its pan-African footprint

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6 hours ago

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October 29, 2026

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Spiro

The integrated offering aims to reduce daily operating costs and minimise downtime, with battery swaps completed in just two minutes and potential savings of up to USD 2 per day compared with petrol-powered motorcycles

ACCRA, Ghana, October 29, 2026/APO Group/ —

  • Spiro’s entry into Ghana introduces the Ekon 450 M1 V3 electric motorcycle and its battery-swapping solution, bringing a new mobility option to commercial riders and delivery fleets.
  • The integrated offering aims to reduce daily operating costs and minimise downtime, with battery swaps completed in just two minutes and potential savings of up to USD 2 per day compared with petrol-powered motorcycles.
  • Test rides and product demonstrations across Greater Accra will support the rollout and help riders experience the benefits of electric mobility.

 




 
 

Spiro (www.Spironet.com), Africa’s largest electric mobility company, is expanding its footprint in Ghana with the introduction of the Ekon 450 M1 V3 electric motorcycle and its battery-swapping solution. Combining electric two-wheelers with access to charged batteries, Spiro aims to make everyday transport more affordable and practical for riders while supporting Ghana’s transition towards sustainable mobility.

For commercial riders and delivery fleets, fuel expenses and time spent off the road directly affect daily earnings. Spiro’s integrated offering addresses both challenges: riders can exchange a depleted battery for a charged one at a Spiro battery-swapping station in just two minutes, while potentially saving up to USD 2 per day in operating costs compared with conventional petrol-powered motorcycles.

Ghana represents a major opportunity for electric mobility, with a rapidly growing two-wheeler market and increasing demand from commercial riders and delivery fleets

Designed to meet the everyday mobility needs of African riders, the Ekon 450 M1 V3 offers an alternative to petrol-powered motorcycles. Supported by Spiro’s battery-swapping technology, it allows riders to get back on the road without waiting for their motorcycle to recharge.

Auroasish Choudhuri Managing Director Central and West Africa, commented: “Our entry into Ghana is an important step in strengthening Spiro’s presence in West Africa. Our focus is on building a local ecosystem that riders can rely on, combining electric motorcycles with convenient access to battery swapping. By working closely with local partners and listening to riders’ needs, we aim to support the long-term adoption of electric mobility in Ghana.”

Kaushik Burman, CEO Mobility of Spiro said: “Ghana represents a major opportunity for electric mobility, with a rapidly growing two-wheeler market and increasing demand from commercial riders and delivery fleets. By bringing the Ekon 450 M1 V3 together with our battery-swapping solution, we are addressing two key barriers to adoption: operating costs and access to charging infrastructure. Our ambition is to build a strong foundation for electric mobility to scale across Ghana.”

To support its rollout, Spiro is engaging with prospective customers through test rides, product demonstrations and live demonstrations of its battery-swapping technology across Greater Accra. These activities give riders the opportunity to experience the Ekon 450 M1 V3 and understand how battery swapping can fit into their daily routines.

Mr Maxwell Dodd, Managing Director of Spiro Ghana, said: “For riders in Ghana, the value of electric mobility lies in what it can deliver every day: lower operating costs, less downtime and more time on the road. Through the Ekon 450 M1 V3 and our battery-swapping solution, we want to make those benefits accessible and support riders as they make the transition to electric motorcycles.”

Ghana forms part of Spiro’s wider expansion across Africa. Building on its recent USD 270 million equity funding round and an additional USD 18 million in debt financing from the Africa Go Green Fund, the company is scaling its electric mobility ecosystem with the ambition of establishing a presence in 20 African markets. Spiro is also preparing to enter new countries, including Ethiopia, Malawi, Mali and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Distributed by APO Group on behalf of Spiro.

 

 




 

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Huawei Wireless Unveils Innovation Breakthroughs to Pioneer New Communications Networks

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6 hours ago

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October 29, 2026

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Huawei

The innovation breakthroughs for pioneering new communications networks include RetinaMIMO, new materials, and OSCAR solution among other root technologies. By tackling coverage, energy consumption, and capacity challenges, the breakthroughs drive ubiquitous experience, simplified and green networks, and superior spectral efficiency. The breakthroughs have unlocked a wealth of new capabilities, including the world’s first commercial U6 GHz device VitaAAU, GigaGreen Plus series, and UBBPi series.
Huawei promotes A2A-T standards and drives commercial open-source OpenAN through extensive partnerships to build an open telecom agent ecosystem.

 




 
 

SHANGHAI, CHINA – Media OutReach Newswire – 29 October 2026 – At Huawei Decoding China 2026, Fang Xiang, Corporate Vice President and President of Wireless Network Solution of Huawei, unveiled a series of innovation breakthroughs to pioneer new communications networks. The innovation breakthroughs mark major leaps in root technologies focused on ubiquitous experience, simplified and green networks, and superior spectral efficiency. With the breakthroughs, Huawei has launched the world’s first commercial U6 GHz device VitaAAU, GigaGreen Plus series, and UBBPi series. Additionally featuring the new progress in open ecosystem for telecom agents, the breakthroughs will lay a solid foundation for new communications networks.

With booming intelligent devices and services, new devices, traffic, and applications are taking shape in the mobile industry. The new devices are expanding network connectivity from people to things and agents, increasing the number of connections by 100 times. Device-cloud synergy for intelligent services calls for stronger uplink capabilities to support training and inference, shifting network focus from downlink dominance to both uplink and downlink. With new applications, come a diversity of new interaction modes, calling for higher standards in experience and driving networks to support ubiquitous steady ultra-low latency with a high reliability.

As the world steps into an intelligent era, the value of connectivity is not only about quantity—it’s more about quality. This has been inspiring Huawei to convert cutting-edge breakthroughs into the commercial practices of new communications networks by focusing on root technologies for ubiquitous experience, simplified and green networks, and superior spectral efficiency.

Pioneering ubiquitous experience

RetinaMIMO is a new pioneering technology designed to solve the challenge of concurrent ultra-high bandwidth and ubiquitous coverage. It features the industry’s first Retina scanning system that allows RF link topologies to be reconstructed to eliminate coverage collapse in the vertical direction. It also adopts a reconstructed antenna array architecture to address the diminishing marginal gains as array elements (AEs) increase.

Based on RetinaMIMO, Huawei has launched the world’s first commercial U6 GHz device VitaAAU. Compared with similar products with 1024 AEs, VitaAAU widens coverage by about 30%, enabling U6 GHz to match C-band in both horizontal and vertical directions. This enables operators to deliver U6 GHz coverage for new communications networks on their C-band sites, minimizing overall TCO. To date, VitaAAU has seen commercial adoption in the UAE and other markets, with peak downlink speeds exceeding 10 Gbps, making ubiquitous premium experience a reality.

Pioneering simplified, green networks

Huawei’s pioneering EP power amplifier (PA) architecture capitalizes on new materials and technologies to solve the problem of energy efficiency decline on higher frequency bands, maximizing energy conversion efficiency. The industry’s first-ever multimode dielectric filters allow antennas to have small dimensions and low power consumption on multi-channel networks with high frequency bands. Powered by new materials, technologies, and architectures, VitaAAU antenna is reduced to 1.5 m in diameter while supporting “0 Bit 0 Watt 0 Loss”, delivering superior energy saving efficiency. These innovations enable Huawei’s GigaGreen Plus series products to achieve significant reductions in dimensions, weight, and power consumption, better positioned to power simplified and green networks.

Pioneering superior spectral efficiency

Multi-band, multi-cell, and multi-user interference is a major restrictive factor of capacity. The time scaling of the Tau (τ) law is introduced to base stations for the first time to realize optimal dynamic resource scheduling across all domains based on the OSCAR solution. With low-latency bus and high-speed interconnect technology, a high-speed architecture is built to enable the real-time exchange of massive data. Thanks to software and hardware synergy, new UBBPi series products improve average user experience by 1.3 times while reducing power consumption by approximately 40%, further improving spectral and energy efficiency.

Pioneering open-source autonomous networks

Autonomous networks have emerged as an inevitable choice to deal with the growing AI services and increasing network complexity. RANSpirit is another industry first from Huawei, implementing single-domain network autonomy based on the telecom foundation model and digital twins. To date, RANSpirit is serving more than 1.2 million cells across 25 networks around the world, providing assistance to more than 2,000 engineers.

Extensive agent collaboration relies on an open, win-win ecosystem. This galvanizes Huawei to join industry partners to develop ecosystem standards, communities, and industry alliances. In terms of standards, Huawei adapts to the TM Forum, building a cross-agent foundation on the A2A-T standard and framework agreed upon by the industry. In terms of communities, Huawei jointly promotes neutral open-source communities and donates open-source agent components to the Linux Foundation, driving global collaboration and innovation. With regard to industry alliances, Huawei has taken the initiative to pool ecosystem strengths to accelerate business implementation based on the GSMA industry platform.

Fang concluded with the reiteration of Huawei’s unswerving pursuit of dual-drive innovation to promote new breakthroughs in mobile networks and work with partners from around the world to deepen the OpenAN ecosystem, advancing new communications networks through technological innovation and open collaboration.

FAQs

Q1: Why is it challenging to balance ultra-high bandwidth and ubiquitous coverage?

Ultra-high bandwidth depends on higher frequency bands. As we know, a higher frequency leads to a greater propagation loss of electromagnetic waves and a weaker ability for them to penetrate obstacles, because high-frequency signals attenuate fast and have short coverage distances, while ubiquitous coverage requires signals to travel a long distance in complex environments. Inherently, the two priorities pull in sharply opposite directions.

  




 

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