Unruly Media put out a new report looking at the impact of social video recommendations on traditional brand metrics such as brand recall, brand favorability, purchase intent and brand association.

Keep in mind that this is the firm behind such viral hits as Evian Roller Babies and Old Spice: The Man Your Man Could Smell Like (not to mention the campaign that got Chrome’s PageRank penalized):

“Notably, it was found that viewers are far more likely to recall a brand name and engage with an ad’s message if a branded video has been recommended to them by a peer,” an Unruly spokesperson tells WebProNews.

The firm points out the following highlights from the research:

• Brand recall and brand association rose 7 percent among viewers who had been recommended the videos versus viewers who found it by browsing;
• 73 percent of respondents who viewed a peer-recommended video recalled the brand when prompted versus 68 percent of viewers who had browsed to the video directly;
• There was a 14 percent increase in the number of people who enjoyed the video following a recommendation versus those who had discovered it by browsing;
• People who enjoyed a video were 97 percent more likely to purchase the product featured in the video

Here’s a closer look at the enjoyment comparison between recommended vs. non-recommended videos:

As Unruly notes in its report, the enjoyment level is important because it has a direct impact on key brand metrics:

The entire report is available in white paper format.

Need some pointers on what makes a video go viral? Here are some good points made by Robert Knorpp at the BlogWorld and New Media Expo in November.