APPLYING VIEWABILITYINTELLIGENTLYfor Measurably Improved Performance
2016
© 2016 Goodway Group. All rights reserved. Applying Viewability Intelligently for Measurably Improved Performance 2
WRITERS
Jay Friedman, COO
Olivia Bias, VP Sales Operations
CONTACT
Penthouse Suite at The Pavilion
261 Old York Road, Suite 930
Jenkintown, PA 19046
(877) 274-9881
www.goodwaygroup.com
© 2016 Goodway Group. All rights reserved. Applying Viewability Intelligently for Measurably Improved Performance 3
Google features more than 200,000 search results for advertising viewability. Viewability has been one of the most focused on and hotly debated topics in advertising technology during the past two years.While Goodway Group has shared its opinions, it’s important to contribute
to the continued growth of the digital media industry with real facts.
Despite the volume of discussion around the topic, there have been little
data presented to support the value of viewability. Goodway Group’s
data-science team decided to take on this task, analyzing more than one
billion delivered impressions to understand viewability’s true impact on
campaign performance, and also the importance of viewability within the
many factors affecting digital media campaign results.
This paper has four key findings:
1. Users who are served ads that are measured as viewable
convert at an 8-9% greater rate than do users who are served
ads that are not measured as viewable.
2. A large gray area exists in viewability: impressions that are
measured as being in-view for some amount of time but not
enough to meet the IAB standard.
3. Contrary to intuition, sites that have nearly 100% viewable
inventory are the worst-performing sites in the programmatic
ecosystem.
4. Viewability’s lift on performance cannot be compared with
other dimensions’ lift, such as behavioral data or site/context.
Viewability is instead foundational to enabling all other
performance to catalyze a campaign.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
© 2016 Goodway Group. All rights reserved. Applying Viewability Intelligently for Measurably Improved Performance 4
ADVICE FOR MARKETERS APPLYING VIEWABILITY AND MEASURING DIGITAL SUCCESS
In line with the Executive Summary Key Findings, advertisers are now
finding out that even if they followed the advice to only buy viewable
impressions — perhaps especially if this advice was followed — results
were anything but guaranteed. Given that the sites with the best
viewability contribute the least to conversions, viewability must be applied
as one dimension of many.
Here are five ways to embrace viewability that will benefit campaign results:1. Multi-dimensionality: If digital is anything, it’s “hyper-dimensional.”
With so many facets and dimensions to digital media, it’s really hard to
grasp even just the few that have the most influence. This is to say, no
single dimension should be weighted too heavily without determining
its covariance when paired with other variables. Marketers who
state, “This year we’re going to put a big focus on ‘X’,” should be more
skeptical.
2. Be Skeptical of Sensationalist Headlines: Similar to what grabs
attention in traditional news, sensationalism is used in our own trade
magazines to create fear and shock to drive greater readership. Jokes
about statistics abound. They exist because we should all dig in further
to understand for ourselves.
3. Timelessness: Marketers are better off using advertising strategies
that worked in the 1960s than over-focusing on bleeding-edge
technology. Great creative placed in relevant media vehicles with
productive reach and frequency levels will consistently achieve better
results compared to over-focusing on a single dimension.
4. Embrace Directional Guidance: We know that all ads reported as
unviewed aren’t truly unviewed. We know that approximately 30%
of impressions aren’t measured. And we know that frequency is the
catalyzer within the (frequency * in-view) equation. Finally, different
viewability technologies are discrepant by as much as 40%. This is to
say that the difference between 70% in-view and 80% in-view might
not be much of a difference at all.
5. Explore The Private Marketplace: Great-performing sites lift the
performance of a campaign when the ads are seen. While some of the
deciles shown above have lower viewability, the private marketplace is
beginning to mature and can offer large marketers and programmatic
media partners the ability to cherry-pick viewable inventory as a
stopgap until publishers re-code their websites such that all ads (or
nearly all ads) are viewable.
© 2016 Goodway Group. All rights reserved. Applying Viewability Intelligently for Measurably Improved Performance 5
Before presenting the data, it’s important to zoom out and first understand
the problems plaguing decisions being made around viewability today.
They are
The Big Guess: The IAB created a strict binary standard with no research
to back up whether or not 50% of an ad being in view for at least 1.000
seconds was actually the right standard. This means that an ad which is
100% in-view to a user but is only in-view for .98 seconds does not count.
In this hypothetical scenario, is .98 seconds versus 1.00 seconds (where the
ad would be measured viewable) meaningfully different for a marketer?
This hypothetical scatter plot of ads shows how many pixels were in-view versus how long the ad was in-view. Are those highlighted in green really more valuable than those in red?
Our analysis showed that 8% of campaign impressions fall in the upper
left quadrant, where 50% or more pixels were in-view to the user, and the
time in-view was greater than 0 seconds but less than one full second. A
similar percentage of impressions fell between 1.000 seconds and 2.000
seconds. These impressions are in a gray area for marketers. The ad was
seen — the technology even said so. Depending on the complexity of the
creative, times less than 1.000 seconds may or may not be enough to make
an impact.
An extreme example of this flaw is found with full-page takeovers. These
ads are clearly seen 100% of the time — the ‘X’ to remove it doesn’t come
up until the ad does. Yet a top provider of these full-page takeover ads
reports that this ad unit consistently only achieves 70% viewability.
Challenges around measuring viewability’s real impact:1. The IAB’s measurement
standard is too absolute
and not data-supported
2. The various accredited
viewability measurement
tools do not produce
consistent results
3. Viewability measurement
results are dependent on
conditions in which the ad
was served
4. Oft-cited viewability stats
can be deceptive and geared
toward headline-grabbing
WHAT DROVE THIS RESEARCH?
Per
cen
t o
f Pix
els
In-V
iew
Time In-View
0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1 1.2 1.4 1.6 1.8 2
100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
© 2016 Goodway Group. All rights reserved. Applying Viewability Intelligently for Measurably Improved Performance 6
The Non-standardized Standard: As of the beginning of 2016, there
are 14 MRC-accredited viewability vendors for display and 11 for video,
all supposedly to a standard. (Note: Some overlap occurs between the
14 and 11.) However, these vendors have significant discrepancies with
each other and with standard ad servers due to varying technology and
methodologies.
See the results from a BrightRoll study published in conjunction with
Kellogg’s below:
In test 5, discrepancies reach a minimum of 60% but possibly reach 99%!Additionally, viewability vendors can’t and don’t report on various
scenarios in which an ad was served, such as browser and OS, page
scrolling, an ad being served in cross-domain iframes, and others. This
often equates to approximately 30% of impressions going unmeasured.
You can see the specific pitfalls across technologies and vendors in this
document, which is from the United Kingdom’s IAB equivalent, the ABC.
Deception: Many in the digital industry took advantage of the media’s
focus on viewability to confound it with fraud and get their point of view
published. “56% of all ads are never seen by a human!” This implies 56%
of ads are viewed by bots, but that’s not the case. The truth is, “when
combining ads not measured as viewable and occurrences of fraud, 56%
of ads are measured not viewable by human eyes.” Blending two topics
to confuse marketers is irresponsible and damaging to those trying to
improve our industry.
One oft-repeated quote about viewable ads is “An ad that’s not seen isn’t
worth less. It’s worth zero.” While empirically correct, the variations across
viewability vendors mean one vendor may say the ad was in-view and
another may say it wasn’t. Or it was 48% in-view for 12 seconds. Or 100%
in-view for .980 seconds. There is some value in each of these scenarios.
The only way to quantify the value of a viewable ad over one that is not
viewed is to run tests with true control groups.
BrightRoll Viewability Study Vendor A Vendor B Vendor C Vendor D
Test 1: 100% in-view 100% 100% 60-80% 40-60%
Test 2: <50% in-view 100% 60-80% 40-60% 40-60%
Test 3: Start 100% in-view, scroll to <50% 80-99% 80-99% 40-60% 40-60%
Test 4: Start 100% in-view, scroll to <50%, then back to > 50% 60-80% 40-60% 60-80% 20-40%
Test 5: Tab away from active tab at 25% 80-99% 40-60% 20-40% 0-20%
© 2016 Goodway Group. All rights reserved. Applying Viewability Intelligently for Measurably Improved Performance 7
Now that we’ve reviewed the problems at the surface level of the
viewability argument, let’s dig into some substance on viewability and
understand why it is really important.
Goodway Group’s data-science team ran the data using two of the largest
and most well-known viewability technology companies. The data showed
that using technology partner #1, impressions measured as viewable led
to an 8% greater likelihood for the user to convert compared to those
who were served impressions not measured as viewable. With technology
partner #2, it was 9%.
A marketer’s first thought upon hearing results of 8-9% may be that too
much effort and expense has been spent on viewability for such little
lift. Why not just apply behavioral data or contextual targeting to the
campaign or any other type of low-effort, tried-and-true tactic that would
probably achieve an even greater lift? The research suggests pivoting this
viewpoint and interpreting viewability’s lift differently. It’s not the value of
viewability compared to other tactics to create lift, it’s that viewability is
foundational to creating lift provided by other variables. It’s a multiplier.
Another tried-and-true way of measuring ad effectiveness supports this
data.
Consider a common brand survey/study advertisers run to measure the lift
in brand perceptions among those exposed to a brand message and those
who were not exposed. Goodway Group’s experience has been that the lift
achieved in these studies ranges from 6-10%. This is very much in line with
the 8-9% viewability lift that was found, a likely non-coincidental finding.
Here, the lift in brand metrics is directly in line with the conversion-based
results tested in our data. The users in the control group that bought were
going to buy anyway and didn’t require advertising to encourage them to
make the purchase.
Also supporting the point that viewability is foundational to campaigns
and not an isolated variable is a study conducted by Integral Ad Science
(IAS) as presented at the AdExchanger Omni.Digital conference. IAS
found that viewable ads do indeed improve conversion rate, and with great
nuance depending on how long the ads were viewed (and creative, and
targeting, and others). However, the platform’s same research showed
that frequency and viewability combined have a much greater impact than
viewability or time in-view alone.
REAL SCIENTIFIC RIGOR APPLIED TO VIEWABILITY AND ITS IMPACT ON CAMPAIGN PERFORMANCE
It’s not the value of viewability compared to other tactics to create lift, it’s that viewability is foundational to creating lift provided by other variables. It’s a multiplier.
Viewability Lift Partner #1 Partner #2
Impressions measured as viewable 8% 9%
greater likelihood for the user to convert compared to those who were served
impressions not measured as viewable
© 2016 Goodway Group. All rights reserved. Applying Viewability Intelligently for Measurably Improved Performance 8
FACTS ABOUT VIEWABLE PROGRAMMATIC INVENTORY
Now that we’ve determined the value of viewable inventory with real
scientific scrutiny, shouldn’t advertisers require 100% of inventory be
viewable? This is an admirable goal, but the reality of the programmatic
marketplace and the viewability technology suggest this is a dangerous
path. Beyond what we’ve already explored, we also found that sites with 90-100% viewable ads were the poorest converting inventory available
(private or open exchange, see data below). Before looking at the data,
here is some important information to keep in mind:
• There are no y-axis labels. The bars are proportionate to each other
based on the lowest data bar.
• We looked at one billion impressions for this study with Moat
validating viewability. These were taken from campaigns’ “learning
period,” which is prior to optimizing to viewability. This provided the
rawest data.
• The data is derived from aggregating site-level data (that is, a site came
in at 34% viewability on average across all ad units. An impression
itself clearly cannot be 34% viewable).
• This is 100% programmatic inventory, both PMP and open exchange.
These are scary results for marketers over-focused on viewability. Some
simple analysis shows
• Conversion rates for the “best” (90-100%) sites are worse than sites
with 0-10% viewability.
• Clearing prices for sites with 80%+ viewability don’t deliver value in
that their eCPMs aren’t justified by strong conversion rates.
• Sites that perform the best fall into disparate deciles, with 30-40%
owning the top spot, followed by 70-80% and 10-20%.
• For the price, sites with 30-40% viewability offer the greatest value,
but your likelihood of actually delivering a viewable ad is less than half.
This is fixable and addressed in the closing discussion (page 9).
Conversion rates for the “best” (90-100%) sites are worse than sites with 0-10% viewability.
Clearing Prices of sites by Viewability Decile
Conversion Rates on CPA Campaigns by Viewability Decile
90-100%
80-90%
70-80%
60-70%
50-60%
40-50%
30-40%
20-30%
10-20%
0-10%
90-100%
80-90%
70-80%
60-70%
50-60%
40-50%
30-40%
20-30%
10-20%
0-10%
In viewing the “Clearing Prices and Conversion Rates” data (page 8), many
marketers have come to the following conclusion: “Sites in the 30-40% and even
10-20% and 20-30% buckets have significantly better conversion rates, so those
sites should be bought regardless of their viewability.” This entirely misses the
point of viewability being foundational to measuring conversion lift and value.
The following represents the six possible user paths as it relates to measuring
the value of an ad against the value of a subsequent conversion:
It’s important to recognize that the
site on which an ad is purchased
(and its predilection for causing a
conversion) only matters if the ad
is seen in the first place. Looking at
the scenario on the far right where
an ad is truly never seen, we know
that even if that ad ran on a relevant
site to a relevant user and it typically
performed well, that impression
delivered no value. Even if the user
does end up subsequently converting,
the ad that was never seen cannot
be credited with driving any part of
that conversion. Vendors who do this
intentionally — paying low prices for
sites in high-converting but low-
viewability deciles — are known to
be “cookie bombing,” attaching their
cookies to as many users as possible
in the hope that the sheer volume of
users they touch will make it appear
as though their media influenced
conversions and performance.
The middle scenario describes an
ad that is viewable by the user but
doesn’t meet IAB measurement
criteria or is incorrectly measured
due to technological limitations. If
the user doesn’t end up converting,
it’s unlikely that ad had any value. If
the user does end up subsequently
converting, it is difficult to measure
the value because we don’t always
know what caused the ad to be
declared unviewable.
Where an ad is truly in-view and
measured in-view, it’s clear there is
value if the user converts. If the user
doesn’t convert, we can safely say the
impression didn’t have value for that
specific campaign, although there
may be residual brand value that is
beyond the scope of this paper.
In summary, the key to understanding
relatively high conversion rates in
lower viewability buckets lies in
understanding how conversions
occur at all in relation to ad exposure.
In real life, conversions occur with
or without advertising exposure,
and conversions also occur beyond
the scope of the industry’s technical
measurement capabilities. These
layers of complexity in interpreting
viewability lead us to the conclusion
that making campaign decisions
about viewability should not be siloed
or extreme. A marketer declaring
he or she will only pay for 100%
viewable is not only overly binary but
also misinformed and detrimental
to generating optimal campaign
performance. Conversely, a trading
desk deciding to only buy sites in the
30-40% decile because they drive
high conversions is falsely claiming
success for conversions that would
have occurred anyway.
How to Understand Conversion Rates for Non-viewable Ads
© 2
01
6 G
oo
dw
ay G
rou
p. A
ll ri
ghts
res
erve
d.
Ad is Viewable by User, but Not Measured Viewable
Ad is Measured Viewable to User
A User is Served an Ad
Ad is Truly Never Viewable by the User
YES – user later converts
NO – user does not ever convert
YES – user later converts
NO – user does not ever convert
YES – user later converts
NO – user does not ever convert
© 2016 Goodway Group. All rights reserved. Applying Viewability Intelligently for Measurably Improved Performance 10
CONCLUSION AND FOUR STEPS TO ENSURE VALUE
With all of the tools and technology now available to measure an ad
campaign, the advertising industry is getting to a point where advertisers
can now know with significant precision whether or not their campaigns
worked and to what degree. By using viewability, control versus exposed
methodology, and offline-to-online sales matching and attribution, digital
media has leapfrogged its traditional counterparts by being able to deliver
provable, measurable value.
At Goodway specifically, in order to deliver the highest viewability possible, here is what we are doing to ensure value for every campaign that we run.
1 LEVERAGE PRIVATE
MARKETPLACE DEALS 2 PARTNER WITH
THE BEST
We have the buying power
to negotiate with publishers
directly for viewable inventory
at discounted rates. This
ensures that regional agencies
and marketers don’t get shut out
from the best inventory typically
reserved for holding companies
and other big advertisers.
We partner with MOAT,
an industry-leading,
MRC-accredited viewability
provider. MOAT is seamlessly
integrated into every campaign
that we run, allowing us to
monitor viewability daily and
report on viewability at no extra
cost to our clients. However,
we work with all accredited
viewability partners should you
prefer a different one.
3 IMPLEMENT SITE LIST
CONTROLS 4 OPTIMIZE WITH
HUMAN EYES
After serving billions of
impressions each month, we know
which sites deliver value and which
don’t. We blacklist sites with low
viewability and focus delivery on
proven performers.
With the largest independent
trading team on the planet of 60+,
our trading experts optimize every
campaign towards viewability
through optimal targeting, fold
adjustment and bid management.
Goodway Group is a leading managed-services
programmatic partner to local, regional, and Fortune 500
clients. Bootstrapped and 100% privately owned since
1929, Goodway moved into the programmatic digital
media space in 2006 to continue its rich history of tackling
complex local and regional campaign executions with data
science-driven targeting and support services to make
achieving success easy for clients. Its proprietary algorithms
pair with a technology-agnostic approach to enable clients
to achieve their ultimate goal – drive more traffic and sales.
(877) 274-9881 | [email protected]
Contact us to improve viewability and get more value from your media.
Top Related