- Steve McClellan

NEW YORK A TV ad from Delta Faucet promoting a spigot that turns on with the touch of a wrist communicated its message most effectively to consumers in the third quarter of 2009, according to syndicated commercial tester Ace Metrix.

Delta's so-called "Dirty Hands" spot features a montage of hands washed beneath an artful, gleaming faucet. The ad debuted in July.
 
Ace, which counts Deutsch, Microsoft, Nissan, Coldwell Banker and CBS among its clients, is unveiling its list of 10 most effective ads for the just-ended third quarter later this week.
 
The spot-tracking firm gave Adweek an early sneak peak at the results.
 
An ad from Southwest Airlines promoting its "Bags Fly Free" initiative was rated the second-most-effective spot for the period. The commercial debuted in September.

Rounding out the top three was a spot from Samsung touting a new line of digital cameras; that ad, which features a photogenic gorilla, also debuted last month.

In June, after three years of development, Ace launched its new syndicated TV commercial testing platform that tracks the effectiveness of TV ads, assigning number grades for an array of distinguishing factors such as likeability and persuasion. The grades are based on responses from an online panel of consumers. The responses are crunched by proprietary algorithms that are used to generate an overall "Ace" score for each spot, as well as separate scores for individual variables.

Ace Metrix's Q3 top-10 list, with ranking, brand and ad title:
 
1. Delta Faucet - "Messy Hands"
2. Southwest - "Bags Fly Free"
3. Samsung - "People Take Photos"
4. AT&T Wireless - "Two Phones Work Together"
5. Evian - "Roller Babies"
6. Nintendo Wii Sports Resort - "Motion to Reality"
7. LG - "Is It a Refrigerator or Something Better?"
8. AT&T Wireless - "Man Finds Girl's Lost Dog"
9. Febreze - "Authentic Scents Without fire"
10. Sears - "Trust In Your Hands"