There’s a moment—somewhere between unlocking your phone and watching the Uber driver icon inch toward your location—when time stands still.
You’re not reading emails, not scrolling TikTok, not replying to WhatsApp messages.
You’re just… waiting.
And in the silence of that wait, something fascinating happens.
You pay attention.
That sliver of time, fleeting and unremarkable to the untrained eye, is where Paul Wright, Uber’s Head of International Advertising, sees gold.
Not metaphorical gold—but the kind you can quantify, track, optimise, and yes, monetise.
Because in today’s over-saturated media landscape, attention is no longer just a metric.
It’s currency.
It’s scarcity.
And more importantly, it’s predictive of profit.
Welcome to the age of the attention economy—where brands aren’t competing for shelf space or airtime anymore.
They’re vying for milliseconds of undivided focus.
The Paradox of Plenty
We are exposed to more advertising than at any point in human history.
On screens, in feeds, in the silence between songs on Spotify.
According to Wright, that ubiquity has created a paradox: more access, less impact.
Advertising, once a novelty, has become ambient noise.
“It’s no longer about being seen,” he explained at Advertising Week Europe 2025.
“It’s about being noticed—and remembered.”
Uber’s answer lies in seamless, native ad experiences stitched into the very fabric of the app’s user journey.
Ads that don’t interrupt but accompany.
Ads that feel less like billboards and more like signposts.
The Science of the Glance
To understand attention, Uber turned to Lumen Research, whose eye-tracking tech maps where, how long, and in what order our eyes wander through digital spaces.
What they found was astonishing.
Typical mobile display ads hold attention for 1.3 seconds per 1,000 impressions.
Uber’s in-app ads? 5.5 seconds.
In advertising, that’s not just a win—it’s a landslide.
Even more compelling: each 1,000 impressions delivered an average of £29.37 in incremental profit, and a 27% uplift in brand consideration compared to non-exposed users.
But Wright doesn’t see this as a fluke.
He sees it as the result of meticulous design: non-clickable ads while users wait for their drivers, reducing frustration.
Clickable ads only when the user is safely in the car.
Contextual relevance based on time of day, location, even food cravings.
It’s not about ads. It’s about alignment.
From Eyeballs to Emotions
This insight is straight from the Malcolm Gladwell playbook: small details, big consequences.
In The Tipping Point, Gladwell argued that subtle environmental cues can lead to outsized behavioural shifts.
Wright’s application of this principle is advertising’s version of that: when you honour the user’s moment—respect their attention—you earn their trust.
And trust opens wallets.
By reducing friction, Uber’s ad model invites curiosity instead of resistance.
And in doing so, it taps into something primal: our tendency to engage when something feels made just for us.
“We designed the experience to feel like it belongs,” Wright said. “Not like it barged in.”
The Takeaway for Marketers
The implications for brands are profound.
We’ve been measuring impressions and clicks.
But perhaps the most powerful predictor of ROI is neither—it’s attention.
Not the brute-force kind, but the thoughtful, intentional, respectfully earned kind.
Lumen CEO Mike Follett put it best: “Attention almost exactly predicts profit.”
It’s not enough to shout the loudest.
In fact, it may be smarter to whisper—if you know when and how to do it.
In the End, Attention Is Human
In a way, Uber’s ad strategy isn’t about technology.
It’s about psychology.
It recognises that people don’t like being interrupted—but they love being understood.
It’s a reminder that the most effective advertising doesn’t break into your life.
It walks beside you.
So the next time you’re watching that little car icon glide across the map, consider this: Uber isn’t just getting you from A to B.
It’s learning, testing, and refining the art of what holds your gaze.
And that, dear marketer, may be the most valuable destination of all.
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he APPIES is an annual event that presents a rare opportunity for creative, media, digital and marketing agencies or brands to present their best campaigns to the industry.
This is the only event where Live Presentations meets Live Judging.
Similar to TED Talks, The APPIES is the chance for great presenters with outstanding work to show it off to some of the industry’s most important industry leaders.
This year’s winners will receive Gold, Silver or Bronze trophies for 21 categories, and 6 special Best of Best categories (red trophies) that require no submissions!
Campaign entries must have run between June 2024 to May 2025
