I can’t remember any change in digital media sales that has been as dramatic as the concept of viewability. It paves the way for efficiency and opens the door to exciting metrics – for example, the idea of selling based on attention – which are good for advertisers, agencies and premium publishers alike.
However, viewability also makes everything a lot more complicated. There are over a dozen MRC-accredited viewability vendors as well as many more that aren’t accredited – both lists are quickly growing. Some vendors are accredited for banners, others for video, some for standard display, and yet others for rich media. It’s not realistic or beneficial for any party to optimize towards viewability if each stakeholder trusts a different vendor that’s showing different data.
That’s why I think it’s important for premium publishers to have a consistent policy on how to deal with viewability. Below are the guidelines we have recently developed at FOX News. While these may not be the guidelines that are ultimately accepted industry-wide, we think they are a good start. The last thing we want to do is add complexity to the process and make life more difficult for our partners. Ultimately, our hope is in the coming days and months that other publishers will either adopt similar stances or come up with better guidelines that we could copy.
For all orders that include a viewable guarantee:
Buyer/agency and seller agree to a percentage of traffic that will be guaranteed viewable based on the industry accepted definition of 50% of the pixels within view for one continuous second for banners, or 50% of the ad within view for two continuous seconds for video.
If buyer/agency chooses to use a viewability vendor other than Moat:
- Viewability rates must be within 10% of Moat’s rates. If the viewability rates exceed a 10% discrepancy, buyer/agency agrees to use Moat’s viewability numbers.
- Buyer/agency commits to providing, or giving publisher access to, measurability rates broken out by placement on a weekly basis.
- FOX News agrees to provide buyer/agency weekly Moat reporting at no extra cost.
FOX News does not guarantee a viewability percentage for any custom definitions of viewability set forth by buyer/agency.
Viewability guarantees do not apply to the following products:
- Sponsorships, Ownerships or Roadblocks of any kind
- Native placements
- Logos
- Added Value placements
- Video Companion Ads
- Mobile, Apps
For all orders that include viewability tracking but no guarantee:
If buyer/agency chooses to use a viewability vendor other than Moat, buyer/agency agrees to review Moat viewability as well. Buyer/agency also commits to providing, or giving publisher access to measurability rates broken out by placement on a weekly basis. FOX News also agrees to provide buyer/agency weekly Moat reporting at no extra cost. These products cannot be optimized for viewability:
- Sponsorships, Ownerships or Roadblocks of any kind
- Native placements
- Logos
- Added Value placements
- Video Companion Ads
- Mobile, Apps
In the short time that viewability has been an active metric, we have seen requests for clients to optimize toward placements that have a higher viewability rate according to the agency’s vendor, even though those placements show a lower viewability rate according to our (publisher) vendor. That’s why we think it makes practical sense to ensure all decisions are made within 10% of a single trusted vendor. For us, that trusted vendor is Moat. For other publishers that trusted vendor may be someone else.
We chose Moat for a few reasons, but chief among them is their history of showing the highest measurement rates. Measurement rate is the number of impressions the vendor was able to identify as either in-view or not in-view divided by total impressions delivered. The higher the measurement rate, the more accurate the viewability rate will be. At this moment, there is no minimum measurement rate required to be certified – however the MRC is quickly working to fix that issue.
The MRC has stated that their official definition of viewability is a minimum standard. Many advertisers and publishers have worked on creating premium definitions, such as 100% of pixels in view instead of 50%, or five continuous seconds instead of one.
Our view is that those definitions can be great KPIs for campaigns. We will optimize for those metrics in the same way we monitor and optimize campaigns that are graded against a CPA. However, at this time we’re not prepared to agree on using custom definitions of viewability as a form of currency because there are too many variables, including but not limited to a lack of historical data and concerns about larger units.
In our view, there are some products where a viewability guarantee doesn’t make sense. Those include sponsorships and ownerships where the buyer is getting all impressions, usually on a flat fee and regardless of viewability.
Currently there is no definition or certified vendor for mobile or apps. Some vendors can, and do, measure mobile web using the same technology and definition as desktop. However, the same technology is not readily available for apps. The MRC is working to fix these issues.
You may have noticed that there is no specific percentage of viewable impressions in these guidelines. We believe that can and should be a point of negotiation throughout the RFP process. In some cases, a higher viewability rate will require bonusing additional impressions, which may or may not increase the cost. In other cases no premium or additional impressions will be needed.
These standards are only days old, so we don’t yet know how effective they can be. One of the things we’ve already learned is to avoid defining these guidelines as T&Cs. Including additional T&Cs may require agency legal teams to be involved, which can delay or block the sales process. We hope to learn a lot more going forward. Our goal is make efficient and effective digital ad sales easy for all of partners in a way that makes sense for all parties involved.
Want to add your voice to the viewability debate? Fill out the survey for the Fall 2014 Viewability Litmus Test.